The number one question that comes up is: "When do I tell them that I'm bipolar?"

It depends a lot on how public you are with your condition. If it's something you tell everyone you know, (which I don't recommend) then you might as well bring it up right off the bat.

Julie Fast, a columnist for Bipolar Magazine, says that you should disclose "immediately" when you meet the person. But her job is being bipolar, she writes a column about it every month. It is the central defining aspect of her identity. And Bipolar Magazine is always telling everybody to come rushing out of the closet to "fight stigma".

If you're managing your condition reasonably well, there should be a lot of things more important to learn about you than that you're bipolar.

For a lot of us, our hands shake from our meds. That is the case with me. In my case, guys pretty much never bring it up. But women on dates frequently ask about it. That has to be dealt with.

Sometimes women would ask about my hands shaking on an early date and I'd just tell them that I'm bipolar right away. That usually, but not always, wound up being the last date.

When I was in college, my best friend became mentally ill caused by a substance abuse problem, and he had a nervous breakdown and spent some time in detox, and I corresponded with him via snail mail the whole time.

After I got out of college and started working, and long before I had bipolar symptoms, I met a girl and we were planning our first date. We had a long phone conversation, and I discussed the experience of my friend who went to the mental hospital.

Then, on the first date, over dinner, she told me she was schizophrenic and had tried to commit suicide. She was obviously thinking I could handle it, having had the experience with my friend.

It was WAY too soon. I really wasn't ready to handle it, especially the suicidal aspect. And I wasn't that attracted to her, really. Everything would have been much simpler if she hadn't burdened me with that knowledge.

If you've ever tried to commit suicide, you have to be really careful who you tell that to. In fact, it's a bad idea to tell most people if you've even considered suicide. It makes them afraid to be straight with you.

Most dating relationships last only a few dates before someone loses interest without the relationship really going anywhere. If you're not "out" with your condition, you don't want everyone you've dated running around knowing about it. Particularly, if you tell them right off the bat, they won't feel much obligation to keep it secret, especially if you wind up being the one to reject them.

I feel that it's pretty preferable that you spend a reasonable amount of time with someone before disclosing your illness to them, so that they understand you to some extent, and realize that you do make sense most of the time. If they know you're mentally ill right off the bat, then every time they have trouble understanding you, they're apt to leap to the conclusion that the problem is that you aren't thinking rationally.

One thing that you have to bear in mind is that, until you've told somebody and seen them deal with it, you don't know how they're going to react. It may well be a complete deal-breaker, and you have to be ready for that.

After I'd had 2 breakdowns, I was on a third date with a woman who I hadn't disclosed to. All of a sudden she jumped into bed with me and I was wondering what I'd done right. Then, while we were lying around in bed after having sex, she told me that her eldest child was conceived when her boyfriend raped her.

I thought "Holy cow! That's one hell of disclosure! I need to reciprocate!" So I told her that I was bipolar.

All sex ceased immediately. She kept seeing me, but I'd get excuses like "It's my time of month, so stop unbuttoning my shirt." She was often inconsiderate, like showing up an hour late for a date, and if I complained, she said that I was "guilt tripping" her. The evidence that she wanted nothing to do with me was overwhelming, and she was treating me like crap, but she wouldn't dump me, obviously because she was afraid I'd jump off a bridge or something. I clung on for awhile, it was horrible. When it was all over with, I wished I'd never seen her face. I have a picture of her where her face is in the shade. I kept it, thinking "This picture's perfect! I can't see her face!"

In retrospect, the problem with her was not telling her too soon, telling her anytime would have been a deal breaker. The problem was not facing reality and giving up easier when her reaction was so negative.

One sign that you're in the "I want nothing to do with you but won't dump you" zone is that the person starts setting more and more boundaries on where you can see each other. You wind up not being allowed to see each other at your homes, or even have a meal in a restaurant. With this woman we actually had a date for lunch in a park.

The experience I had with this woman was so awful that afterward, if I was starting to get a vibe from a girlfriend who knew about my condition that she wanted to break up, I'd just let her, without any attempt to negotiate staying together, because I didn't trust them to just dump me and get it over with if that's what they really wanted.

One guy I knew had a fiance, then he became bipolar and this was long ago so the only medication available was lithium, and it was terrible for him, it impaired him so badly that he couldn't hold down any job. His fiance broke off the engagement but kept seeing him, eventually it go so that she would not have a meal with him, but only meet him in a parking lot. This went on for years, and he switched to depakote and was really basically completely better, and when I talked with him he had had a good job in a chemisty lab for 5 years, but he was still not only meeting with this woman in parking lots, but she had lost her job and he was covering her mortgage so she didn't lose her home. I told him it was time ditch this relationship. I get upset when I buy somebody dinner and she won't give me a goodnight kiss at the end. Paying someone's mortgage when they won't have a meal with you is absurd.

I made a rule that I had to disclose my illness to a woman within a month of our having slept together. That was my rule for many years.

A lot depends on your outlook, your confidence about how well you're going to be able to handle things in the future:

During most of the 1990's I wasn't sure whether I was going to wind up in the hospital again anytime soon. I had a really nice girlfriend in 1995 who I disclosed to about a month after we started sleeping together, but at the time my expectations for my future were so pessimistic that anybody in their right mind would have broken up with me, which she did.

Eventually, in the 21st century, after I'd switched from lithium to better meds and rebuilt my career, I'd been so stable for so long that I was confident that there weren't rocky times ahead.

There is definitely such a thing as being too hesitant to broach the subject.

One woman who I met through friends was a cancer survivor, which I didn't know before the first date. It turned out that she had already heard about my condition through the grapevine (which she didn't tell me), and she wanted full disclosure about everything from the word go, going over her cancer experience in extensive detail. I didn't reciprocate with my own experiences, so she didn't want to see me again. If I'd gone over my own experiences, I might've had a chance.

One incipient girlfriend had just told me that she was a reformed alcoholic who didn't drink and went to AA meetings. Then she noticed my hands shaking, asked me why, and I refused to explain. She got pretty pissed off and ended the relationship that night. It was a big mistake not disclosing to her in that context. Anyone in their right mind would have gotten really annoyed.

Generally, if you get a really big disclosure and you're interested in this person, you'd better disclose your own condition before long.

Eventually, the strategy I took was that if they asked about my hands shaking, I'd say "I have a serious health problem, but it's under control with medication, and I'll tell you about it after a few more dates." They're all willing to live with that. Then, after a few more dates, I'd send them an email "Do you want to hear about why my hands shake?" They'd say "Yes", and then I'd send them a long, carefully composed email that I worked hard on, making sure I put things into their proper perspective.

In addition to giving you time to carefully compose the email, disclosing through that medium gives the person time to read, re-read, reflect, and process the information, calmly before being expected to react.

Sometimes they run and sometimes they stick around. You only need one. That was the approach I took with my wife.