While she thinks she hears her son, only 3 years old, say to her “I feel sad”, Laetitia Druart panics. Always convinced that a “curse” hangs over her family (“She killed my grandfather, my grandmother and almost had my mother”), the journalist decides to find out further. What is this disease, what form does it take (for her, it’s a “black rider”) and, above all, how to escape it and protect your children from it?
Episode 1, in the basement of his mother’s house. Who explains: “But grandma, it’s not her fault. Her father tried to sleep with all of her sisters. She was the oldest, she was able to defend herself. She should have gotten treatment for this from the start. We didn’t know all that. Today, it wouldn’t happen like that. » Lots of “it” and a grandmother who will attempt suicide eight times, “that’s a lot of messed up Christmases and bags of tears. And, at 84, the ninth attempt was the right one,” recalls Laetitia Druart.
She then returns to her mother’s suicide attempt, in 2020, while she herself was expecting her first child: “I came out with a son, and she, with a diagnosis of bipolarity, this disorder of the mood which alternates phases of severe depression with periods where the patient is elated. »
Emotional “Great Eights”
There you have it, the word is finally out, and even though his grandfather had to be 40 years old to be diagnosed. From him, Laetitia Druart chose to keep a wooden compass. And it is undoubtedly in order not to lose her bearings or her hand that she chose to lead the investigation (a family investigation), and to feed it with testimonies from bipolar people and the words of psychiatrists. Thus the psychiatrist Marion Leboyer, who recalls that, in France, 2% of the population suffers from bipolarity, that this disease is largely hereditary (70%), but that the causes which trigger it are multifactorial. In short, “there is no curse, but risks”, summarizes Laetitia Druart, worried, while she is a mother for the second time: “I feel on the edge. »
On the edge, but determined to find a shield to protect her from this “black horseman”. In the next episode, she recounts how, for ten years, she has tried to tame her emotional “roller coasters” on the couch. How her mother is now treated with lithium (the best-known molecule against bipolar disorders) and at peace with this necessary crutch: “The medications help me to stay healthy,” she assures.
Marion Leboyer then adds that preventive strategies also have their role to play: sleep, physical activity, diet, etc. Psychiatrist Didier Papeta also reassures Laetitia Druart when he tells her: “For you, the risk is low, I think. You have a healthy lifestyle that protects you, you learn to better manage your emotions, so you reduce the risks of triggering the pathology. Being interested in it already offers you protection, you are in a cognitive approach to the disorder. »
A “story” that suits him, and which sheds light, in a sensitive manner and thanks to beautiful broadcasting, on what has long been called “manic-depressive disorders”.
