"Just different personalities," she explains. "One minute you're one way, the next minute you're losing it."

Marrett admits she's no expert on mood disorders and she never saw her co- worker's medical records. But in an age of pop-culture diagnosis, words like "bipolar," "OCD" and "split-personality" are thrown around freely.

So who actually has bipolar disorder and, maybe more importantly, how do we know it's not us? Bipolar isn't so black and white.

Part of the problem with the mood disorder formerly known as manic depression is that it is often misdiagnosed initially.

"There is a fluctuation in the symptoms," says Dr. David Brady, an adult psychiatrist with the Carolina Center for Behavioral Health. "So how do we typically find out about this? Well, typically the person shows up in the emergency room in a manic state with handcuffs on because they've been arrested or family members have now been concerned."

We all swing from good moods to bad moods and from happy to sad, but the severity of the behavior is the difference, says Brady.

"With bipolar disorder you will get these very drastic swings," he says. "And depending on how rapidly they cycle, that can occur where you're depressed for months or weeks or days at a time."

Raj Gavurla can relate. When he was 28, the electrical engineer and motivational speaker was diagnosed with depression and given three weeks of anti-depressants.

"I was under the assumption, that like a cold or a flu, take medication, drink orange juice, get some rest and then you're off of it," he says. "I had never in my life taken medication for three weeks straight."

Gavurla thought it would be like coming down with any other sickness - take medicine for a couple of weeks and then your body takes over. But his body never took over.

Three years later, after battling what he says was "one of the worst feelings" he ever had, he checked himself into a hospital and was subsequently diagnosed with bipolar disorder.

Gavurla takes medicine everyday now.

Bipolar disorder often shows its face during stressful situations, and has been documented most often in those between the ages of 17 and 24, when many experience life changes.

"In their mid to late teens and early 20s is usually the first time that someone experiences a major stressful event," says Dorit Reichental, executive director of the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill in Greenville. "That's why so often you see kids in high school diagnosed with a mental illness."

But new statistics showing an average 70 percent of bipolar patients are misdiagnosed have sounded alarms on the mental health front.

"You hardly are ever going to have someone walk into your office or go to the emergency room when they are manic or hypo-manic," Brady says.

"Because, 'I'm not going to go see a doctor when I feel fantastic.' "

Much of the current research focuses on kids. NAMI Greenville plans on working in schools to educate teachers, administrators and parents about what to look for.

The earlier it's caught, the more effective the treatment.

Reichental says with medication, counseling and education about their illness, most people could lead a normal, healthy, productive life.

"If addressed appropriately, this by no means is going to affect dreams and goals," Gavurla says.

Staff writer Lillia Callum-Penso can be reached at 298-3768.