One of the mental illnesses that has given medical practitioners lots of concern is bipolar disorder. This is a condition that makes the victims to have mood swings from mania to depression or vice versa.Bipolar disorder is unfortunately a mental disease that tends to begin in childhood and gradually gets worse as they grow older. The problem with this is that you may miss its diagnosis at that tender age because you cannot be too sure of exactly what it is. As such, it gets the chance to actually get much worse.There are more children diagnosed with this disorder these days than ever before. Perhaps it has something to do with changes in society, or it may be that the diagnostic processes are constantly getting better. Either way, it means that treatment methods for kids will have to be stepped up a lot.There are all kinds of mental illnesses, and there are actually some of them that are manifestations of other mental illnesses. One of the most difficult to diagnose is bipolar disorder, because it often takes so long to complete its cycles. When this disease is suspected, the specialist usually takes a lot more time.Diagnosing a disease like bipolar-disorder can be a rather lengthy process most times. When you are in mania, the phase may last weeks or even months, and it could repeat itself for depression too. This makes it hard for the psychiatrist treating you to determine if it is one or the other that you suffer from… or both.