[legion]

My father was and my sister is bi-polar.

Having a mental illness does not relieve a person of culpability for their actions. My father used to intentionally binge and purge with his medications (not taking any for a while, then taking large doses) to cause medical emergencies and get sympathy from people. He would "punish" those close to him by putting himself in the hospital and blaming others for the actions he took to put him there. The ways he compromised his body were a contributing factor in his death. No matter what those around him did, he always found fault and felt the need to punish them--it just took progressively more severe "emergencies" to get the same reactions from people.

My sister was very resistant to taking medication when she was first diagnosed as bi-polar (15 or so years ago). She has been taking her medication religously for the past ten years and she functions normally. In fact, very few of her close friends know that she is bi-polar, and that is not an issue because she is in control of the disease.