Mood Disorder By Janice Butterfield

While we have come to be numb to its existence in our society, the prevalence of Mood Disorders is devastating. These disorders affect people from all walks of life and cause great destruction in their wake. Janice Butterfield is one such individual who lives with a Mood Disorder. She is a 47-year-old Caucasian woman who is married and has three daughters. She is a self-employed real-estate agent and gains great satisfaction from her job. This has been a point of stress for her, however, because the poor economy forced her to take losses within her business. She lives with her husband of 27 years and her youngest daughter. Janice often feels overwhelmed and like a disappointment because of her worries she won’t be able to send her daughter to college or financially provide for her family.
Janice has sought therapy following an attempted suicide, where she took a large amount of medication previously prescribed for a back problem. Janice says that she has depressive episodes that last anywhere from one to two months before subsiding and seem to randomly follow periods where she feels almost ecstatic. During the high points of her mood, Janice acts in erratic ways, whether it be spending money frivolously (uncharacteristic of her modest tendencies) or needing very little sleep. This has caused great damage to the relationships in Janice’s life, she spent most of her savings and she and her husband often fight about financial issues. On the other hand, during the low points of her mood, Janice spends majorities of her days in bed and toys with thoughts of suicide. These mood swings have bothered her since she was 19, and despite thinking of therapy in the past, this is the first time she has actively sought it. Janice’s illness n...

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... in time. However, if she stops treatment prematurely, she will have little success. Individuals with Bipolar I Disorder are difficult to treat because they are used to fluctuating moods. Some go through periods of normalcy where they experience their base mood, so they don’t always see treatment as necessary. Janice’s path to recovery is difficult because it is revealed that she stops taking medication when she begins to feel better. This could directly undermine the treatment. She also worries about looking “weak” to her family and directly attributes therapy to this weakness. Unless she overcomes this preoccupation with the stigma of therapy, she will never experience true success. In the future, I see Janice, and individuals like Janice, continue to experience the roller coaster of emotions associated with Bipolar- especially if they are reluctant to get help.