My Bipolar 2 Diagnosis Doesn’t Define Me…My Faith Does!

Hi everyone: My name is Beatriz, have been diagnosed with Bipolar 2 disorder since 2005. I’m also a writer, started when I was 40, now I’m 61. Have been hospitalized 3 times, been stable for 3 years. Started having anxiety and depression when I was 8, but at that time there wasn’t too much help for my conditions. My anxiety and depression were on and off for many years until after I gave birth to my second child everything exploded because of a family dispute with my 5 brothers. They stop speaking to me and my husband for many years, that was excruciating and very painful for me.

The first panic attack

One day I was driving with my 2 children (the oldest was 6 and the youngest 2), back from my parents home and I started to sweat and began having very strong palpitations. I thought I was going to die… Called my husband immediately from my cell phone to his office crying, he told me to calm down and to keep on speaking to him until I got to our house. When I got home I felt as if I was completely beaten down, I couldn’t even get out of the car. Thank God Paulette, the lady that worked at our home was there at the garage waiting for us (definitely this was the hand of God). She saw me crying and immediately took the children inside, my husband arrived 20 minutes after. He opened the car door, hugged me, consoled me and took me to our room so I could lay down in bed.

Living in fear and losing independence

From that day on I stopped driving, my husband had to drive me every morning to my parents home with my youngest child (my father had Parkinson’s and my mother Alzheimer’s), then at 2:00pm a man that worked for them drove me to pick up my oldest son from school and back to my parents home. My husband would pick the 3 of us around 10:00pm to go home, when he closed his business. That went on for 5 years, until one day I couldn’t get out of bed, couldn’t eat, didn’t even want to bathe.

Family support

Five days went by, until one Monday the wife of my husband’s twin brother went to my house in the morning to see me. She went inside my room, hugged me (I was crying in my bed) and told me: “Beatriz, let me help you shower, I will wash your hair and dry it, you will feel better.” After that we sat on the bed next to the telephone and I told her that I couldn’t bear the situation that was happening with my brothers. She took the phone, dialed the number of the family company and gave it to me. I asked for my fourth brother to the secretary, he answered immediately and asked me: “Bea what’s happening,” I began crying profoundly and handed the phone to my sister in law. She only told him: “your sister has been feeling really bad, she isn’t well.”

Reconnecting with my brothers

I fell asleep…when I woke up on my bed and on my bedroom sofa where 4 of my brothers and my husband. There where many tears and hugs, as I’m writing this I get very emotional and I’m crying. That night my fourth brother called one of his neighbors, who was a very good psychiatrist and made an appointment for the next morning at 9:00am. I went to the appointment with my husband and when I got there, my five brothers were there too. That day I started with 2 medications for my panic attacks and my depression, that day I was reborn. It took about 3 weeks for me to feel like myself again but still couldn’t drive alone.

Pregnancy and bipolar

Years went by with ups and downs, changes of doses of my medications. Got pregnant when I was 39 with our third child and stopped taking the two medications, thinking they would harm the baby. My Oby Gyn and the Psychiatrist convinced me that in lower doses they would not harm my baby and thank God I gave birth to a very healthy baby boy. One day after, I wrote my first book that same year, I called my second brother to tell him that I was going to do my first radio interview. He told me that I was speaking way too fast, so he mentioned it to my husband by phone. That night my husband asked me if we should make an appointment with my psychiatrist because he had noticed changes in my behavior. I was so pumped up with the interview that I told him to call the doctor himself.

My bipolar diagnosis

The appointment was the same day of the interview, we had to be at the doctor’s office at 3:00pm. The interview wasn’t until 6:00pm. When we got to the consult my second brother was already there. I remember that I went to pee like 7 times and kept interrupting the doctor all the time. He told me that I was having symptoms of being Bipolar and to please cancel the interview. Being very stubborn as I am, I told him: “Let me do the interview and I promise you that tomorrow I will come back so you can give me the proper medications for that condition.” I can tell you sincerely that I didn’t know what was coming ahead, years of constant battle with myself and the medications. Sometimes I refuse to take them, the side effects were awful, it was like living in a constant roller coaster of emotions.

Medication, bipolar, and trauma

Years passed and at last my Psychiatrist prescribed me the correct medications for my Bipolar 2 condition and PTSD. We decided to move from Puerto Rico to Miami when our youngest son was 6 years old, my parents had already passed away and my husband’s mom and sister lived in Miami. Everything was fine, until one day I decided that I was fed up with taking so much medications, so I told my Psychiatrist. He told me that by doing that I could go into a psychotic episode, but I was so “high” I didn’t pay attention to his advice.

Hospitalizations and bipolar disorder

First hospitalization, horrible experience which lasted a week. A month after that, husband and myself went to St. Augustine for 4 days to relax, there I had my second psychotic episode, when we went back home, second hospitalization as horrible as the first one. After 2 weeks, out of the blue, I told my husband to get out of the house and that I was leaving to Spain for a vacation with our daughter. For the first time in his life my loving husband slept out of our house … in his mother apartment.

Those 2 days where blurry to me, I remember I was very anxious. My daughter, the wife of one of my nephews and I flew to Palma de Mallorca in Spain. When we arrived one of my Spanish cousins with her husband, who was a psychiatrist and owned a clinic, where waiting for us. We went to have lunch, afterwards her husband asked me if I wanted to see his clinic, I said yes. When we got there he took me to his office and told me to my surprise: “Well now let’s fill out your papers of admission.” I said absolutely NOT and told him to drive me to the Hotel to meet with my daughter. The moment I went into our room, someone knocked on the door, there were 2 security hotel guards with my cousin, telling me to go to the lobby. I asked why, but no one answered, my daughter began crying. When we got to the lobby, 2 very tall men dress in white grabbed me and took me inside an ambulance. All the time I was calling out loud for my daughter while I was crying too. Inside the ambulance one of the men injected me with something and I fell asleep.

Waking up in a psychiatric hospital

When I woke up my legs and hand’s were strapped to a bed, next to me were a female and a male nurse. I had all of my clothes on except my boots. It was daytime, I had slept for 14 hours…Asked them where I was, they told me that I was in a psychiatric hospital called Son Espases. Told them I had to pee, so they un strapped me and the female nurse accompanied me to the bathroom. In that hospital, which had patients who had intended to commit suicide cutting their veins, burning their arms with cigarettes, schizophrenics, the only bipolar and the most “normal” patient was me.

Finding meaning in a difficult experience

This hospitalization though it was the most intense and horrible, made me more humble, empathetic and made me comprehend my condition completely. I knew that I was going to be there a long time (one of the nurses with whom I became friends told me), so I said to myself that I was going to make the best of it. It was tough, like living in a prison, no mirrors, food in plastic plates, plastic cutlery, plastic cups, 10 minutes shower, lines to get your necessities and to give them back in 20 minutes, dress code blue pj’s, lines to take my medications, I could only use my room to sleep, the rest of the day it was locked and schedules for the meals, which honestly weren’t good.

Finding ways to contribute

I was there for 2 months and a half, I made friends with patients and nurses, I gave yoga classes, make up classes for the women patients and English classes to a female nurse. My daughter went everyday in the afternoon to visit me, and one day at the end of my stay she arrived with my husband. I ran towards him hugged and kissed him. He told me: “Bea I’m coming to get you out of here,” explaining to me that my cousin’s husband was the one who called this hospital for them to go and get me because he said I was psychotic and that the only way that I could get out from there was if I got admitted to his clinic. Three days after we had a meeting with him and the psychiatrist of the hospital, I told them that the only way I was going to accept to be admitted to his clinic was if my husband stayed with me during my stay. He said yes… My stay in his clinic lasted a month, too long for me. During our return flight to Miami I was drained but happy to see my 2 sons again and sleep again in my bed.

Reflections on my faith journey with bipolar disorder

When I went to my Psychiatrist appointment he asked me what did I learned from my 2 hospitalizations in Spain. I told him: “Definitely my Bipolar 2 diagnosis doesn’t define me at all Doctor. There’s so much more that I can accomplish in my life!!!” Now on 2025 I’m 61, writer of 7 books, being the 7th title “The Stigma Towards Mental Illnesses”, Spanish Support Group Facilitator for the Alzheimer’s Association and Motivational Speaker. The only explanation for my accomplishments is simple…MY FAITH!!!