Hi,
This was a repeat on NBC a few nights ago.
I thought that the writers did a good job with a bipolar plot:

A college aged daughter of one of the cops gets accused of stealing. She is also exhibiting bipolar symptoms. Because this is TV Land, she gets diagnosed before she is arrested.

But she is 19 and her family (her father is a cop) cannot force her to admit she has bipolar and go into treatment.

Ellen Burstyn plays the cop's mother and his daughter's grandmother. The grandmother has life long untreated bipolar. The cop tries to confront his mother about admitting she has bipolar so she can help out the grand daughter.

The cop and his mother have a bad history because of her untreated BP while he was growing up.

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There was lots of talk in the episode about making the right choices -- something that sounded a bit off to me.
The show seemed to be saying that bipolar people can make a choice to get treated OR to stay untreated and be different / difficult / in jail.

Do you think of having bipolar as being about choice?


Anyway, Ellen Burstyn did a good enough job and was lovely to watch.
If it was any more realistic, it would not have been appropriate for television.

Here is a link to a synopsis:
http://www.aceshowbiz.com/tv/episode..._unit_s10_e03/

also here:
http://www.nbc.com/Law_and_Order_Spe...0004&ima=53366

M.


NBC
Attn: D!ck Wolf and/or Law & Order producers and writers
30 Rockefeller Plaza
New York, N.Y. 10112

choice. hmmm. yeah like choosing whether a med works or not?


This choice thing sounds very black and white, all or nothing to me. That in itself tends to be a TV-land characteristic too (like the good guy and bad guy concept) i suppose, but in this case it is certainly not a positive aspect of the portrayal. Well, at least it sounds like the rest of it was fairly on the ball.

We do get Law and Order here, so unless they shuffle the scheduling around unpredictably and without notice (very typical ) so i miss it, or move it to the pay channels by the time that season arrives, i might get to see the episode myself... eventually.

Thanks Mari.

~ waves ~