Bringing bipolar into the light

MINNEAPOLIS (MCT) — Chances are, we all know someone like Marya Hornbacher. We just don't realize that we do because, like Hornbacher, these someones are charming, smart, well-spoken and prosperous — not at all like people who are (cough) bipolar.

"It's shocking to me that we're still afraid to say 'bipolar' out loud, so I do often, clearly and without shame," Hornbacher said, sitting right there in the middle of a busy coffee shop. "You do know bipolar people — successful, stable bipolar people — and that's why you don't know."

To say that Hornbacher wasn't always successful and stable is a bit like saying that Angelina Jolie wasn't always a humanitarian. Her memoir, "Madness: A Life" (Mariner, $14.95), is a tough read, often nightmarish, as she tracks her ascent into manic episodes, with the descent always lurking in subsequent pages.

Hornbacher, 34, a Minneapolis writer, begins at the beginning, describing nights as a terrified 4-year-old screaming for her mother to shoo the goat man from her bedroom, shrieks that continue until her mother draws a bath, lowering her into the calming water.

Not until Hornbacher was 23 was her bipolar disorder diagnosed. Those 19 years are actually close to the usual time between onset of symptoms (typically around age 23) and correct diagnosis (about age 40). But Hornbacher was only a child, so no one thought that manic depression possibly could be the reason for her behavior.

That's why she's speaking Wednesday at the fourth annual National Ted and Roberta Mann Symposium About Children & Young Adults With Mental Health and Learning Disabilities, sponsored by the PACER Center and the Mann Foundation at the Sheraton Bloomington Hotel. She'll speak to parents and teachers at a free symposium about the challenges of correctly diagnosing mental illness in young children and teenagers.

Early diagnosis is important because of "the kindling effect," in which the more manic episodes you have, the more you will have. "Over time, you start to lose the chemical ability to fight off episodes, so the earlier in a person's life we can diagnose, the better their chances of avoiding future episodes," she said.

Bipolar children may have other conduct disorders diagnosed, such as attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). As they move into their teens, "the question becomes, 'What's hormones and what's brain chemistry?'" She once asked her mother how she coped, "and she said, 'We kept trying to expand the boundaries of normal.' Like, 'Maybe it will make sense if we do this,'" Hornbacher said.