Sarah Palin Has Bipolar Disorder? Really? No!
What I did find surprising was a tweet I received this afternoon sharing about Why Sarah Palin is Not Bipolar, which was a repost of an article by Sarah Felsen of bipolar-lives.com posted on Ezine Articles. Did we ever think she was? Was this somewhere in her dossier or disclosed in an interview? I cannot imagine the depth with which the media and rival contenders probe political candidates would leave something that politically career-shattering undiscovered and unreported.
I’ve done a bit of internet searching trying to find more information. I found quite a few political commentaries and blogs about her career, her run for the White House with John McCain, her family and, of course, the various scandals and such that have surrounded her. I did turn up one blog on the Daily Kos in which jhastings detailed his supposition that Sarah Palin has bipolar disorder; however, this was pure conjecture. I also found a considerable number of comments to various blogs in which readers use the term bipolar to describe some action or another by Palin.
However, I found no actual information or evidence that Sarah Palin has been diagnosed with bipolar disorder. Sarah Felsen sums up the situation quite well, “Increasingly, lay people feel free to sling the term bipolar around as a pejorative, and seem to believe they have, through pop culture osmosis, become experts on this very complex illness.” As we’ve discussed, Called Manic Depression or Bipolar Disorder Stigma Persists. ~Kimberly
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Learn more or join the conversation!
NEWSLETTER |
FORUM |
BIO |
TWITTER
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Comments
You have a point, but for me as a Scientist and a Geneticist, there is no question or even doubt that Sarah Palin meets ALL the criteria of a Bipolar Manic patient on loose. This is a very commonly accepted belief in my community, the scientific community to be precise from very early on and her awkward resignation decision and her very strange speech delivery just left me ever more convinced. My best friend, a psychologist mentioned Palin was a subject of discussions as a bipolar patient who is roaming wild at her school among the PhD students. Just look up the symptoms on wiki and you’ll see her described in all the symptoms. I stopped blaming her for anything ever since I was convinced on her condition.
My husband who is a MD diagnosed her informally based on Palin’s extreme similarity in behavior to his ex wife who was unfortunately a bipolar patient but a genius scientist herself( many bipolar patients are quite genius). My husband’s son is also bipolar. To us, bipolar is not a condition we would like to throw out there and see where it sticks, as scientists, we have no desire or need to put labels on people who are just born a certain way. I would suggest you’ll urge some serious psychologists contacting Palin and get her evaluated just for her safety of her family and herself, bipolar is one of the most difficult conditions for diagnosis and can be very devastating if left undiagnosed and untreated.
Wow…a fer sure diagnosis based on what you’ve seen via the media! It must be right!
It is a pet peeve of mine when the word ‘bipolar’s is thrown out arbitrarily to describe someones actions. It’s just wrong on so many levels. Bipolar disorder is nothing to joke about!
I very much doubt that Sara S. is either a
Scientist or a Geneticist.
I believe Sarah Palin and her family have been maligned and slandered enough. I do not care to read hateful remarks at the bipolar website that are suppose to be helpful to people!
It never occured to me to wonder if Palin is bipolar. I’ve thought of her as very annoying in her ‘polital discussions’ where she talks around the truth.
I find it ludicrous to assert a “qualified medical opinion and diagnosis” based on Political pundits and unexpected decisions. Does not a quirky personality ever come into play these days? We have no idea what is going on behind the scenes of her and her familie’s lives to even venture such a conjecture.
Unless Sarah Palin herself comes out and proclaims she has been “diagnosed” by her own medical psych with a bi-polar disorder, will I ever entertain such thoughts
It is not helpful, either politically or medically, to speculate loosely about such matters.
The burden is on anyone who seeks to engage in such speculation to identify specific behaviors and link them to the diagnostic criteria.
I can’t say I’ve followed Ms. Palin particularly closely, but am a regular consumer of general national news online, mostly from the NYTimes, and am unaware of any facts suggesting a depression episode, including anything in her general biography — other than switching colleges a lot, which could reflect depression, but also many other factors.
As far as mania, perhaps her latest decision was the type of sudden change that can occur in a manic period, with consequences later regretted. Perhaps her resignation speech, which I did not hear, was less coherent than even her own poorly-phrased norm because of manic flight of ideas. Perhaps she has grandiose delusions that now, after quitting her job suddenly, people will consider her presidential material.
But that is ALL extremely speculative. While medical diagnosis is not always forthcoming with public figures, for legitimate privacy reasons and because they, like many with mental illness, do not think there is anything wrong, we should not speculate without MUCH more evidence.
Sara S., is diagnosing over the internet part of the new Obama-care? If so, we’re all in trouble. And I *think* you need a medical degree to make to make a bipolar diagnosis. Just sayin’…
I am a Licensed Clinical Counselor (no, CAM, one does not have to have a medical degree to diagnose Bipolar Disorder), and would never even THINK of diagnosing someone I have seen only casually, let alone someone I have “met” only through the very peculiar lens of the media. One of my pet peeves is people who claim to be “scientists,” when they clearly have no idea of what the word means (it’s a method, not an occupation). And Sara, if your husband is an MD, but is willing to diagnose based only on second- and third-hand information, and using his ex-wife as his criteria, he should lose his medical license. Just sayin’….
Latest blog post: Palin Keeps ‘em Guessin’ http://tinyurl.com/lhnbyo
It’s interesting though to remember that late in the presidential campaign Palin told Brian Williams of NBC News that she would definitely release her medical records to the public, as had all three other major party candidates (Obama, Biden, McCain). But, oops, she forgot to do that — well, not yet, anyway.
Actually I wrote this piece in late 2008 for the http://www.bipolar-lives.com website and it was also published in Ezine Articles. The blooger in question has republished it without attribution – flattering I guess, but illegal. As Kimberly and Marcie corrctly note – the real issue here is the media representation of bipolar disorder – As my articles says: For those of us who do have bipolar disorder (also known as manic-depressive illness), or who advocate on behalf of the bipolar community, this is a disturbing development that epitomizes the extent to which bipolar has become synonymous with bad behavior. Increasingly, lay people feel free to sling the term bipolar around as a pejorative, and seem to believe they have, through pop culture osmosis, become experts on this very complex illness. The term bipolar has become contemporary cultural shorthand for anything we interpret as extreme or obnoxious in light of our own personal belief system.
It is rather sad and shocking to see how most people who have been writing here are putting a NEGATIVE image on bipolar disorder and also on what I wrote earlier ( read above). For me as a Geneticist, and for my husband as a Medical Doctor who has a son with bipolar and knows ALL you can imagine about this condition, people with bipolar are just like the rest of us, the difference is that they are born a certain way, as we all are.Everyone one of us is unique in our genome and environment and that contributes to how we end up behaving and functioning. For me in particular, genes play a HUGE role in everything a human is all about. Labeling Palin as Bipolar has never been about making her into some evil creature, it was to raise a SERIOUS question from the ‘in-closet’ medical community who have been suspecting this about Palin for a long time ( they mostly talk about it in our gatherings and believe this is the case with her in particular) but are keeping it quiet apparently on the web. I have GENIUS colleagues who have bipolar. My husband’s ex ( a bipolar) discovered something in Microbiology and is quite known in that circle. Many of us know that people with Autism, ADD, Dyslexia,Bipolar, OCD, OCPD, etc have out of norm capabilities and mostly are categorized as extremely capable above all in certain subjects and activities. Some become great musicians, some become great scientists,some great thinkers, etc. Palin is definitely not stupid, she absolutely has the right brain wiring to learn and certainly the high motivation to achieve, problem is she is NOT in the right field as far as I see it and never has been. She lacks curiosity for matters of politics and frankly for anything academic or scientific. The woman may be a genius in acting, entertaining,sport, coaching, etc, but NOT in politics. She is incapable of political anything as we have seen and the pattern of how she has gotten this far, along with her odd/out of norm actions and behavior that I have observed from day one have convinced me that she most likely is suffering from one of the Bipolar disorders ( there are many, and they are very hard to diagnose). Plus, if she is indeed bipolar and unmedicated, she must not be near any life changing decision making jobs, that is my problem with having Palin on loose. Again, most bipolar people that I know have great careers and perform brilliantly, they are just not in charge of having the nuclear code and they won’t even accept it if you insist, they are well aware of their condition and they know that may not be a good idea, why not contributing to the world doing something else. This is not to associate bipolar to a negative term, I am rather shocked some of you people who claim you know anything about science are so trapped by public average joe stereotypes of putting negative terms on conditions. It is rather disgusting to see bipolar people themselves claiming they are upset by this comparison, yes I know public uses such terms as negative, but your job is to EDUCATE the public. Everyone is born a certain way, we all have differences in our genome and no one is born with PERFECT set of genome if there is such a term and frankly, being bipolar can be a blessing in comparison to having any other medical or mental condition especially if DIAGNOSED early and HANDLED in the right manner.
Just because it’s not been diagnosed does not mean it’s not diagnosable…
Someone is pretending here.
sara s. has given us a beautiful rebuttal. I was put off by her first statement, but she makes sense, and reminds us not to stigmatize ourselves, our loved ones, or anyone else out there. see if you can drop your prejudices and re-read. we must use posts like this to debate and educate, not just aloe our egos with snide comments.
Hi Sarah of bipolar-lives.com,
Correct attribution is important to us so I would love to update the blog with a link to your original posting. However, I wasn’t able to find the blog entry. Can you send me the direct link to that specific blog and I’ll update.
Thanks!
Kim
Sarah S.,
If you husband is a physician I am sure that he knows it is highly unethical and unprofessional to even hint that he could diagnose somebody without actually evaluating them in person or via their actual medical history files. You should stop making your husband look bad by telling everyone that he is behaving in an unethical manner.
The blog entry referred to in this article about Sarah Palin seems to be a rip from an article I saw at ezinearticles written in 2008. The author has an excellent and informative website at http://www.bipolar-lives.com
http://ezinearticles.com/?Why-Sarah-Palin-is-Not-Bipolar&id=1534856 – Oct 02, 2008
Good Morning Peggy,
Thank you for the head’s up. I have already been chatting with Sarah of bipolar-lives.com to get the correct link. Our blog is now updated to link to her original article.
Kim
I agree with Sarah-it takes one to know one.Sarah Palin is bipolar-why not? Abraham Lincoln was. Being bipolar and a politician musician-Jimi Hendrix, comedian Spike Milligan,John Cleese,Jonathan Winters
actor,Vivienne Leigh,Patty Duke-AND ALL THE REST!
1 in 6 is Bipolar -lets have a party! thats 1 billion people and say
BIPOLAR?
SO F***** WHAT!
Lets celebrate the imperfection-be SELF ETEEMED-informed forearemed and educate OURSELVES about our strengths then others by being the best WE can be-as humans w a slight flaw!
Lets eat well , sleep well, choose to BE well take our daily meds and BE HAPPY that we have a wonderful opportunity to be the best that we can. In a humanly possible way without ttoo much extremist bp behaviour-
Education is key-expression of facts far outweigh the disablity fiction,fantasy dynamic-(feel sorry for me I have BP)
Richard-
You kind of lost me with the second half of your comment #22
Here’s what I’ve gleaned so far:
* Be educated
* Take your meds
* Take care of yourselves (ourselves) i.e;
a good diet, exercise, and restful sleep
* think positively about what we can do and stop the harping, look on the bright side
* contribute productively to society
* Think well of yourself,
Is that all correct?
Though, I agree with all those statements, being choice and education as the fundamental points, and applaud your understanding, but I’m finding the rest of it, confusing. This is what I’m having trouble understanding:
You wrote: “educate OURSELVES about our strengths then others by being the best WE can be-as humans w a slight flaw!”
“humans with a slight flaw” statement is something I disagree with and unrealistic, in my humble opinion.
Everyone has slight flaws in some form of another, albeit character ( i.e penchant for lying);, physical (i.e warts); medical (i.e. snoring). I don’t think BP does not fall under those kind of categories. I’m just trying to be realistic
John in Pocatello
(I lived in Idaho Falls for 16 years)
You said one doesn’t have to be a med doc to make a diagnosis of BP. I was under the impression that therapists, clinical counselors (as you put it), et al, could only make a assumption or a speculation (screening potential BP patients) to be passed on to the med doc for the official diagnosis.
btw- amen to your and ER’s comments concerning 3 party internet diagnosis.
Manic episode
A person’s speech may be pressured, check – resignation speech. Sufferers may go on spending sprees, check – the stuff she bought in new york. People may feel they have been “chosen”, are “on a special mission”, check – VP. Sexual drive may increase, check – 5 kids. In order to be diagnosed with mania a person must experience this state of elevated or irritable mood for at least one week, check – pick a week.
Jane Pauley, Sinead O’Connor, Carrie Fisher, and Linda Hamilton are bipolar.
Sorry, Palin is bipolar.
It’s rediculous to diagnose someone just by the way they act. It’s like saying joe doe keeps studdering because he can’t talk right. How do we really know that. Did his doc tweet it. Just because Sara Palin acts scewed up doesn’t mean she has bipolar disorder.