Hi, you're right, stay away from negative people! The problem is, when you are bi-polar and have active symptoms, you don't know it.

Therefore, sometimes when people are telling you you are weird or are negative, sometimes, they are right. Just keep this in the back of your mind, after a while, you can start to recognise symptoms in yourself that are a tip-off to a depressive or manic episode.

And no, it's not your job to educate people about your condition. But if you care about someone, you should share what is going on with you. They probably, actually, care.

Best of luck

mia

I agree with mia, especially about although it's not your job to educate people, it's not theirs either in many respects & if they know nothing about your problem they may not even know how to find out, besides everyone is different, so they (those close to you or who you have to work with) need to hear from you what you need & where to learn about your situation.

There's no point them finding out what someone else needs or what to expect about someone else when you may be different.

Communication works both ways, talk to them, invite their questions & give them answers or places to look for answers then they can be there for you, they can (hopefully) avoid doing/saying things to make things worse.