But it's mostly a rather "hyped up" feeling, so it feels like the opposite extreme of the depressive phase.

When I was younger I'd regularly miss out on a night of sleep for exactly that reason, but as I get older I notice side-effect of this "treatment" of the physical kind. My teeth, which are already damaged by years of nightly gnashing, will start to hurt easily, with a higher chance of gum infections after I missed out on a night of sleep.

That's sadly something not mentioned at all in the BBC article, while my mind feels like it could be awake for days on end, my body doesn't really like that strain, especially as I get older.

My dentist made me a slimfit mouthguard for teeth grinding. It cost $500 but it's the best dental investment I ever made as it prevents further expensive damage to my teeth.

The first few nights I kept dreaming I had a piece of steak in my mouth though.

It was also the dentist who unriddled particular nasty tension headaches I suffer from sometimes. All the nightly gnawing makes my neck muscles sometimes tense up, which leads to pains in the back of the neck radiating up to the back of the head.

Sadly that's not something the mouthguard helps with, so I will probably have to look for a solution to actually end the gnawing itself.

edit: This commenter [0] suggests Magnesium might help with the nightly teeth gnawing. A quick Google search, sure enough, seems to confirm the relation [1], awesome!

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16219942

[1] https://sleeptrack.io/2016/03/10/magnesium-rhodiola-bruxism/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temporomandibular_joint_dysfun...

See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bipolar_II_disorder#Hypomanic_...

As a kid, I was pretty much constantly very social, lively and chatty, without any of these apathetic down phases. I kinda trained myself into these due to negative social feedback to my "liveliness". By now I feel somewhat guilty/out of character when I'm "too happy", as I fear I might annoy my social surroundings.

I like doing new things, up to a point where I dread any routine, but at the same time, I notice how not having routine makes me anxious. It feels like a trade-off between "stable but uncreative routine" and "creative/volatile let's try everything".

As you might notice: I'm a bit all over the place, which doesn't make a diagnosis very easy, especially once it starts factoring in my, rather unconventional, upbringing in two different languages across three different countries.

I don't know how it would stop the grinding, but it, sure enough, sounds like it would help with the tension headaches I get when my neck muscles tense up/cramp up from all the grinding.

Thank you very much for suggesting this, if this actually stops the grinding too then you've just given me some serious increase in quality of life!

ASMR videos often help me calm down and fall asleep. Many different kinds out there, from soft whispers with positive reinforcement to simple stuff like rain. Just make sure to listen to the audio only, the blue light of most tablet/smartphone screens are really bad for trying to sleep (just like most monitors) because it's a light frequency that keeps the brain awake.

A good workout, like running, can lift the spirits and if you power your body out it often helps to calm down and fall asleep easier. Once you get into regular running it's also a great way to "declutter" your brain from whatever thoughts you might have collected during the day.

You could also try Indica Cannabis, which is usually a good sedative. Tho it can make depressions worse due to the sedative effect, so try with some caution.

Also i usually recommend sativa and to stay away from indica. Sativa turns my depression into productivity, indica into a careless couch potato (which may is what you want tho)

That's why I'm not sure they are that good of a choice for dealing with insomnia, a hybrid might be a good middle ground between light couchlock and lifting mood.

I’m glad that you pulled through.

https://www.uni-bonn.de/Press-releases/sleep-deprivation-lea...

http://www.jneurosci.org/content/34/27/9134.short

Lighter reading:

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/can-a-lack-of-sle...

https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2013/12/how-sleep...

I should admit that there is still some debate around this issue, with key points being:

1. Do people who experience a psychotic break or symptoms during sleep deprivation represent a vulnerable group?

2. Sleep deprivation is often seen in the context of stimulants, from caffeine to methamphetamine, and they are known to potentially lead to psychosis when abused.

Personally I’m in the camp who believes that sleep deprivation is more than capable of leading to transient psychosis without preexisting risk factors. The problem is that long term sleep deprivstion studies can’t be done for ethical reasons, so it’s hard to know for sure. Ultimately it comes down to a combination of studying more limited sleep deprivation, and evidence gathered in the field over time. It is all highly suggestive though.

And, as you note, periods of hypomania aren't long-term sustainable. Ultimately you need to learn how to cope with all of your moods and states.

Cuts all over, dozens of stitches, yet amazingly no permanent injuries. She had to spend a couple of months in inpatient care to stabilize.

However, it's still incredibly important to understand whether or not you have these behavioral changes because they can often have a negative impact on your life if you don't understand them and develop coping skills for them. Your behavioral controls might be calibrated to who you are day to day rather than who you are when you're hypomanic. And that can lead to a lot of problems, spending too much money, taking irrational risks, etc. Being able to step back and realize that your feelings and impressions are being filtered by basically a mood altering state (just as you'd realize that you act differently when drunk and need to compensate for that) will help you navigate those behaviors better and be able to retain your ability to act rationally and in your own future best interests.

I've also personally experienced how a friend of mine was depressed for years, unemployed but still functional 'enough' to carry on, and what helped him 'snap out of it' was dragging him along on a trip/adventure. Whether it was the change in scenery, the change in behavior as a result, or perhaps just suddenly being too busy to dwell on things in the 'comfort' of home, or something else, I'm convinced this trip was the primary cause of his eventual (but still of course gradual) improvement.

While I think depression is so broad that any advice should not be taken as applicable to every depressed person, I do wish it was an option for more people with depression to try solutions like this. I completely understand that a therapist might not always have the luxury of suggesting this, but I wish we'd experiment a bit more with such approaches.

It also reminds me a bit of the whole rehab/relapse cycle that many people get stuck in. Sometimes I wonder if perhaps we should spend more energy thinking of ways to make the 'rehab' experience more permanent or at least long-term, and more integrated with or at least much less disconnected from 'real life'.

Of course maybe all these things are happening and I'm just not aware of it :). I really hope so.

Yes, of course–in a certain way. It's not even much of a secret. While mania is itself a serious condition and should be avoided, it is fundamentally the same dimension as depression, only opposite. That's why you cannot be manic and depressed at the same time (Manic Depression, or Bipolar Disorder, is alternating between these states).

So it is really that simple: Depression + "semi-mania" = something approaching normalcy, for a limited time, with some cognitive impairment and just a bit too much nervousness.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixed_affective_state

Which I realize only works because I am self employed.