How can you tell if you have bipolar disorder or just depression?

Consult: This can be one of the hardest things to figure out for a psychiatrist, so you should go see a psychiatrist as part of figuring this out. You may well want to do some mood charting first (tracking mood over time) and you might want to check out the book "why am i still depressed?".

Bipolar: Bipolar experience extremes of mood changes from mania to depression. If you have episode of depression & prior similar episodes with no mania/hypomania, it is depression. If current episode is depressed & there is history of manic/hypomanic episodes, the diagnosis is more likely bipolar do, depressed type.

Not always easy: If the patient hasn't experienced a clear manic episode it may be difficult--sometimes pts r thought to have a depression & become manic when put on an antidepressant---some pts don't respond to antidepressants but do well on mood stabilizers--it isn't always clear initally.