I am 27 and have struggled my whole entire life with bipolar. Although I wasn't formally diagnosed until I was 26. I have always been in therapy and counselling but they could never tell me what was wrong. I am a single parent going to college and working part time. Some days I call off just to stay home and sleep and other days I feel like a robot just doing what I am programmed to do. I am never fully happy - there seems to be no happy medium. My kids hate that I sleep a lot here lately. I am on 2 different medications; paxil and depakote. Sometimes they work but most of the time I am confused. I hear voices talking to me, I have nightmares, I often find myself talking to myself. I can't handle it any more. I just want to be happy like my friends. My finances always get messed up and then I have to try to fix it. Everything falls apart at times. I don't like to be around people or even talk to them on the phone. I just know what to do? I am in therapy but they really don't know what it is like. No one does. What can I do? I am afraid that I eventually will never be able to hold down a job because of my constant calling off when I am sick. The job I have now is a work study program through my school. So if I call off it doesn't really matter. But how does other people deal it? How do you keep going? How do you hold down a job?