Help with the rages

[falljw]

My boyfriend is officially undiagnosed bipolar but absolutely refuses to see a doctor or take any kind of medication. The few times he has spoken about it he said he's seen doctors in the past who said he had bipolar, but that was as much as I ever learnt. He went once in the time we've been together - the doctor told him he was just depressed and gave him some philosophy to read and that was the end of that.

This is how he is - if anyone can tell me if this is normal behaviour for bipolar or not normal at all, please let me know.
For more or less 3 or 4 days a week he is his normal self - very intelligent, very social, driven, interested in things. Then he'll start to get stuck on some thought or idea, really irritated with things (especially if someone doesn't agree with him), have strong negative emotions, and become very strong minded and demanding. This comes in varying degrees and sometimes I don't notice for a little while.

After anything from a few hours to a few days of this, something will make him snap. Today, he was saying his body hurt and he needed hand massages, head massages, etc (happens pretty much every day) but otherwise was quite nice, then I had a problem with an ad I saw on TV and this is what set him off. Last time I took a moment too long to consider an idea he had. Other times its been I've left things around the apartment.

Once something has made him snap he will go into a rage within a few minutes. There's no point saying anything, it only makes it worse. He screams and hits things and says everything he hates about me and how terrible his life has become. It terrifies me. My heart beats a millions miles an hour and I often can't stop myself from crying. I know I should switch off and not make it worse but its so hard sometimes. At the worst of times he will suddenly come crashing down in tears and says how much he wants to die. He has tried a few times, and this is why I don't leave him alone when he's like this. Sometimes he takes it out on me. Afterwards he doesn't remember the terrible things he says or does. When its a bad rage with a big crash he's often feeling better by the next day. If he doesn't get so bad then he tends to be depressed for a few days, then the cycle begins again.

Sometimes he's his good old self for a couple weeks with nothing bad happening, but the longest I've ever counted was 3 and a half weeks. It does seem like this is a pretty quick cycle and I still haven't gotten at all used to it.

We've been together nearly 3 years, living together for 2 and a half and just recently moved to a new city. We thought it would be really good for us to leave behind the restricting social confines and negative people of our old town and start fresh, but I'm now worried it was the worst thing we did as we don't have many friends or family here and are under a lot of financial pressure. The last few months I've become depressed and don't feel I can even help him anymore when he's not feeling good. I used to be able to switch off and just lie with him and deal with whatever crap he threw at me till he calmed down, but now I can't even be in the same room.

I'm not sure what to do anymore. It's strictly off limits to even mention bipolar or even anything being wrong as it will set off another rage. He has said a few times 'I'm sorry, I'll get help when we have more money' and then other times 'I want to be able to overcome this myself'. I think the latter is what he thinks most of the time, as he won't even take fish oil tablets just to see if it might help his moods a bit.

I apologise for the length of this. There's no one I could talk to that I would a) trust and b) doesn't know my boyfriend. I tried speaking to a psychiatrist once after his first suicide attempt but I felt I was just being spoken down to and got told (more or less) to call the suicide hotline and/or leave him. It left me feeling weaker than before and gave me an idea of why he has such an objection to seeing doctors if that's what he has to go through too.

How can I possibly help him and us when he still wont see a doctor or take medicine after so long? Is this bipolar or something else? He's in his late twenties, smokes (tried quitting many times but the stress brings on a rage which makes him smoke again), and doesn't have any problems with drinking. I've heard 'he has to decide to get help on his own' many times and I've never ever forced the issue on him, but if there is any other advice out there I would love to hear it.

[falljw]

Thanks, I'll keep trying.

[stormbear]

It sounds like a mood disorder to me ,( Bi polar ) maybe you could ask him to go see a psychiatrist and you go with him or your going to leave him , he needs to take responsibility for his own condition , especially if its effecting him and yourself this badly .