Young Writers Society

Hey guys! For any of you who have heard about/read my current story: Trying, you might know/suspect that my MC will be diagnosed with a mental illness. I am trying to do research on them, but I don't know where to start! I started in the Bipolar disorder.
The symptoms I've found match my character quite well:

[*]Inflated self-esteem or grandiosity

[*]More talkative than usual or pressure to keep talking
Flight of ideas or subjective experience that thoughts are racing I'm not 100% sure what this means. If anyone could clarify, that would be super nice!

This is one I may try to include in the story:
[*]Attention is easily drawn to unimportant or irrelevant items

So basically the MC has a Manic Episode: A manic episode is not a disorder in and of itself, but rather is a part of a type of bipolar disorder.
But I feel like I need something more extreme. Can anyone think of something more extreme, or should I just stick with a Manic Episode? (which isn't even a disorder, so I have no idea if I should use this)

I basically have done some research, but I need to know if this is the right research to use.
My story: Trying: Chapter One
Thanks!

I would caution you on your approach to mental illnesses, because I see a lot of red flags here.

They are not a quirk, or a personality trait, or a plot point, or something to make your character "more extreme". Mental illnesses are one part of a person, and each person reacts to them differently. It seems you went very, very broad here, and haven't factored in personal experience, or your original character, or really anything that disagrees with what you want them to be.

Maniac depression is not clean cut at all. You have people with mild depression but lots of mania, people with heavy depression but next to no mania, and people who have more mixed states than anything, and everything in between.

It is not a personality type, as you're treating it here. It is characterized by cycles of mood changes that go from maniac to depressed, with various stages of "maniac" and "depressed". It hits people with every personality type under the sun. There is type I, type II, and various varieties of those types. The way to regulate it is finding the right mood stabilizers to make the cycles less extreme.

Similarly, disorders like anxiety, depression and OCD are not any set traits. The disorders are simply sets of criteria in terms of symptoms, and while those symptoms can result in certain personality traits because of compensation or societal experiences, there is no guaranteed cause and effect between those personality traits and the disorder itself.

I would go through and make a character, then go through various diagnostic criteria via the DSM, either the DSM IV or V to colour in the mental illness throughout the character. Those are the official manuals for diagnostics, and I suggest two because some changes made in V are not exactly the best changes, however some are. You can usually find out which changes were bad or good by digging within communities.

Another thing to keep in mind is: mental illnesses are constant. There isn't just "a" maniac episode. If this character has bipolar, then they will have been cycling between maniac and depressive episodes for at least two years (some people have late onset, some people have it their whole lives), and they will continue to have maniac and depressive episodes. Some people find the right meds and things stabilize. Others find the right meds and things become bearable, but still there. Some stabilize but have side effects.

I could go on, but I think this is a good start for bipolar and some of how to write a character with mental illness.

In summary they are:

- not personality types
- not quirks
- constant
- often debilitating, or at the very least make life more difficult
- sets of traits that affect people regardless of personality

Hope this helps.

This really helps. I'm sorry if my approach felt offensive. I've had no experience with mental illnesses which is why I'm researching it. I didn't know where to start or how to research it. I wasn't going to approach it like its a trait or anything, as I was aware it is not prior to your response. Also I wasn't trying to make the character herself extreme but since I didn't know much about a manic episode I wanted a mental illness that was more than just apart of another disorder. But now that you've told me more about manic episodes, things have been clarified
this is very very very helpful and I appreciate the response you've given me @Rosey Unicorn

The thing about mental illnesses is, they're all pretty separate but they're also fairly interconnected. There's a term called "comorbidity" which is basically "multiple illnesses in the same person" and you can also end up with two or more illnesses that are almost always in the same person. For example, PTSD often comes with anxiety and depression, even though they're not part of PTSD itself.

What made me think you were approaching this like a set of personality traits is the qualities of maniac depression you listed, and how they "matched your character". The traits you ended up listing were very close to personality traits, such as egotistical and talkative.

The main places to start are the diagnostic criteria and people who have the disorders. Articles such as how to "deal with" people who have a certain disorder tend to get things very, very wrong.

Ah okay. What I had done was gone to a few websites and researched illnesses that my character could possibly have based on how she acted and such. What I had listed were actually symptoms of people who may have manic episodes. These were from an official psychiatric site.
Ill be very careful to avoid making the episodes traits, as you have mentioned. I'm stil new to this idea and I know I started broad because I really needed a general idea first before I got more detailed. You really helped. If I have any more questions, would it be alright if I PMed you?

I completely agree with everything Rosey said. But seeing as, well, she's already said it there is no need to repeat it. Just know that writing a character with a mental illness will be very challenging - it's hard to get in to their heads because, more often than not, there is no reason for what they do yet it makes perfect sense to them.

I personally have a lot of experience in dealing with mental illness, and when reading what you want to happen there is one that comes to mind in particular that you should look in to. It's Pediatric Autoimmune Neuropsychiatric Disorder Associated with Strep virus - or P.A.N.D.A.S for short. To be brief, it is an onset thing with no he.Eric link - it is completely random. It is strongly related to Tourette Syndrom. What happens is this: a child will get strep throat repeatedly with no end. Over and over, despite medication for it, commonly back to back. Then, one day, they wake up completely different. Major cases of OCD, extreme anxiety, quick to anger, and the list goes on. You said you wanted her to have a manic episode, so that's what drew me to this - it is very common for people with PANDAS to have, essentially, mental break downs. They will feel like everyone is against them, they will say/scream horrible things to people without meaning them, they will essentially shut down, cry, and boil over in anger and crazy things that snt make sense. It can only be acquired by children but it will last a lifetime, but it is also not commonly known by doctors so the chance that your character would be undiagnosed would be extremely likely -most doctors would misdiagnose them with ADHD, bipolar disorder, so on and so on. I suggest you look in to it. If you need any help with it or have questions about it feel completely free to just ask me- I'm a bit of an expert on PANDAS xD

This is a very much appreciated response!
You're right it will be challenging so if I do need help I will PM you.
As for what you mentioned about manic episodes that is exactly what my MC is going through.
I want this to be as realistic as possible which is why I created this thread. Thank you Liv!

Hi!
I haven't quite read your excerpt, but here are some views:
One thing I would caution against is picking a disease based on observed symptoms. Differential diagnosis and stuff. Do it the other way around. Try looking for a disease that you think your character has and then, develop the person's life around that.

You will need to read up on :
- Causes
- Genetics of it
- Whether it is progressive or not
- Are there meds for it? Does the medication put them to sleep? Does the medicine merely treat symptoms or the actual disease itself? Do meds induce side effects, depression, passivity etc?
- Support groups

The main thing is it not a person with some quirks. But it's a different lifestyle to convey thorugh words. Wiki would be a good place to read up about the diseases while try to scourge for personal blogs and/or relative's blogs that highlight daily events.
For example, when someone I know had these psychotic episodes, she would only sleep between certain times of the day, one the floor, making sure her head faces north. And as other people around her, we had to be careful of things that would upset her and put her in such states.

Ahhh, kay. I've never actually heard of sites that exist like that, and for me I tend to highly dislike those hard associations because these associations don't always hold true. For example, outside of mania, those traits might be lessened or not exist at all.

To take another illness I know better: a person's anxiety can either make a quiet person into a chatterbox because they become so anxious with silence, or they can become very very quiet when they're normally a chatterbox because they don't want to say the wrong thing. Alternatives are, they can already be a chatterbox/quiet and get more extreme when anxious. It all depends on the initial personality. They would all have anxiety, though, because they feel extremely uncomfortable and modify their behaviour based on it.

That's why I say to make a character first, and have a diagnosis second. Because people have different reactions to mental illnesses based on their character. By breaking the associations of "people who have [disorder] behave [way]", you get away from stereotypes and end up reflecting the massive population that is the mentally ill.

And sure, you can PM me. Do be warned, though, I am not manic depressive and can simply help with research or attitudes around mental illness instead of actual experiences with mania.

@Lava thank you very much for the response. Your tips are very helpful and ill be sure to use them. I'm very glad you responded.

@Rosey%20Unicorn- I only wanted to PM you for research so thank you for saying I can PM you. I'm glad I created this thread because I am 2 chapters into my story. I really need to conduct all of this research now.

Thank you guys!

Hi there, actual bipolar person here to offer some input! Rosey already mentioned a lot of really good things to know, but here's some things I've learned based on my own experience (I have very extreme manic/psychotic episodes and mild depressions)

-Episodes tend to progress. Your character won't be normal one day and delusional the next. More likely, they will start off with more mild hypomanic symptoms, like maybe being more talkative than normal or sleeping less (sleep is a big trigger/symptom for me). This part (for me) is so difficult to distinguish from my normal behavior that I still can't tell when my episodes begin (and that's three years post-diagnosis). Of course, hypomania isn't always "happy"--you might be more angry/irritable than normal as well.

-As hypomania progresses into mania, THAT's when you might see the symptoms listed above. I tend to think VERY highly of myself when manic--like I have in the past believed I was a prophet or enlightened. But even this last episode, which didn't get as extreme thanks to better management, I got a little ambitious about what I could do over next week, the summer, etc.

-About pressured speech/racing thoughts: This is like my most common symptom yet it's so difficult to explain. Like imagine you're really really excited about something and you just HAVE to tell everyone about it: your friends, your family, the person bagging your groceries, etc. Over time your obsession becomes so great that you can't even THINK about anything else. You forget to do things like sleep and even eat. Tasks like ordering a sandwich or even getting dressed become extraordinarily difficult. And the best/worst part is when you try to explain these thoughts to people, you're either talking way too fast to make sense or you just become incoherent.

OK I could go on forever but I'll just go ahead and say you can PM me. Or you can check out any of these things I've written on the joyful subject.

you will not win tonight
Dancing on the Edge
crazy little pills
On the Edge <--this one got a little stereotypical, but I was going for dramatics. I'm not a prose writer lol
Niteowl's Nest <-my NaPo thread, which contains several snippets about my crazy
blog.php?u=53&b=60193 This blog entry about dealing with meds crap
What is life like in a mental hospital? --> In case your character ends up in the loony bin, here's mine and some other experiences

Wow, thank you for sharing this with me. I appreciate this help very much. I hope you don't mind, but I will PM you. Say if I write a chapter and Idon't feel it's realistic enough or is missing something important I will contact you.
You don't know how appreciated your response is.
Would it be alright if you find the time to read my story so far? The character has not been diagnosed yet, so Iwas wondering if my descriptions so far are accurate. Thank you again!

ummmmmmm......yeah, I have mental health issues tooo......( don't make fun of me people okkkk)

Anyways, last year I had major depression. Major depression is, well, depression, BUT VERY BADDDD!! Not saying that 'chronic depression' is any lesss.

Pretty much for me I CRY AND CRY AND CRY AND FEEL HOIBAL ......and it's for NO REASON! and no, with mental health issues you can't just 'snap out of it' or 'magical get better on your own" it's like 'extreme of the extreme sadness just about all the time, and or sometimes your mood will somewhat improve, but pretty much your down in the dumps. It hurts.


Andddd, so I have been takeing meds for it and are not deppressed anymore.....however, sence christmas break, I have develuped a new mental illness.....I have anitxy, irrlogical though, hullcinations, etc....well tell more later

Oh gosh it's sooooooo muchhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. And no, I will not tell you everything, becuse it's sentive to me, ok.

and a quick note

All of this that I am exspericincing......

* is not a 'thinking things' as in, i' m NOT experiencing all of this because I want to.

* happens at random and everything happends all the time, as in, I am dealing with an aspict of my illness everyday.

* what I am expericning is MOSTLY real to me. No, you can't just 'talk me out of it'. Imagon being stuck in a dream and not knowing what is real and what is not/being confused. t
his happends with my hullcinitons ('voices' ---imagine a 'thought' that is not your own. For me, it's like talking to someone on the phone inside my head all the time. They don't ever fully dissiper. And yes, ' they have diffirent sounding voices. I have auitory hullcinations that I hear 'outside ' of my head. They can be of people trying to talk to me and the voice sounds garbbled up. Weird noises, could be anything, could be a noise of somthing that is real, that is not near you or anything. MOST OF THE TIME THIS IS REAL TO ME! I REACT TO IT AND AM 'CONFUSED BY IT' I CAN NOT TELL WHAT IS REAL/NOT REAL WHEN IT OCCURS. To me, 90% of the time when I exsperice it, it exsist to me eventhough afterwords I may get an inkiling that it was not real. Even so, it was real to me.....This is the same with my visual hullcinations as welll

I feel bugs crawing on me and I have seen animals and colorfull numbers, bugs on the wall and a bug or too skittering across the floor,, indescrable 'weird things' and birds, lots of birds...and more.

I also have parinoia and delousions and most of the time it's SEVER!! as in, I ''run away and hid' and or get away from my parinoa..........this is upseting me..... I have other 'syemtoms too' and I lose tough with reality badly, too.

Queen I'm sorry
I won't use any of this information in my story if its too sensitive for you.
The research is helpful however.
But I'll be very conciencous when using this information.