A worked example showing how each of the 12 PIP activities can be described for someone with bipolar disorder. It concentrates on the part that is hardest to get onto a form: you cycle, so the same activity can be affected in two completely different ways across a year. Written in the first person, in the plain wording assessors look for.
Bipolar disorder is one of the hardest conditions to put on a PIP form, because the form asks what you can do and bipolar does not have one answer. You cycle. In a depressive phase you may not get out of bed, wash or open a letter for weeks. In a manic or hypomanic phase you may be awake for three nights running, spend money you do not have and come off your medication because you feel better than you have in years. Neither phase on its own is the whole picture, and a form that describes only one of them leaves an assessor with half a claim.
The parts of bipolar disorder that usually matter most on the form are:
An activity only counts as something you can do if you can do it safely, to an acceptable standard, repeatedly and in a reasonable time. Bipolar disorder is judged over time rather than on the day you happen to fill the form in, and a difficulty counts if it is there on more than half the days, so phases at both ends of the cycle add together. The trap is averaging yourself out into someone who is fine. Describe the depressive weeks, describe the high weeks, and say roughly how much of the year is one or the other. The DWP always makes the final decision, but describing the whole cycle accurately gives your form the strongest chance of being understood.
What to cover for each one. Your paid form writes the full answers for you.
Describe both ends of the cycle, because they cause different problems. In a low, explain that a cooked meal only happens if someone pushes you into it, and say what you live on during the days when nobody does. In a high, describe starting something ambitious in the middle of the night and walking away from it with the hob still going, and say who has to keep an eye on you. Make clear you cannot do a simple meal safely and repeatedly across a normal week.
Explain that the difficulty is remembering to eat at all rather than the physical act. Describe going a day or more without food when you are high because you are too wound up to stop, and losing your appetite completely when you are low, and say who has to remind you and put something in front of you. Weight you have lost or gained across a cycle is worth mentioning.
Keep this about needing to be prompted rather than any physical difficulty. Say how many days in a row washing goes completely by the wayside in a depressive phase, and mention that it also gets neglected in a high because you are too busy and restless to stop and do it. Explain who has to keep at you before you will get in the shower, and what happens in the weeks when nobody is there to do that.
This question is about getting on and off the toilet and cleaning yourself, so bipolar disorder often does not reach it and it can be left alone. What would count is a medication side effect you have to manage, such as constipation or urgency, or a depressive phase deep enough that you need prompting to go at all or have not made it in time because you could not get up. Only claim it if it is genuinely true for you, because being straight here makes the rest of your form more believable.
Describe staying in the same clothes, or in nightwear, for days at a time when you are low, and the encouragement you need before you will change at all. Also mention the times in a high when you have gone out in clothing that was wrong for the weather or the occasion, because choosing suitable clothes is part of this question. Make clear this is not about managing buttons and zips.
Fast, pressured speech in a high is worth putting here only if it genuinely stops you being understood or stops you taking in what is said to you. What would count is people having to repeat things or write them down because racing thoughts run away with you, or a low so flat and slowed that the words simply do not go in. If you can still make yourself understood and follow what is said, leave this one alone and put how you come across with people under mixing with other people instead.
Explain that this is about taking information in, not about your eyesight. Describe how racing thoughts in a high stop you staying on a page long enough to follow it, and how in a low you read the same paragraph over and over and still take nothing in. Mention important letters that have gone unread or unanswered, and who has to sit and go through post with you before the meaning registers.
Describe both directions honestly. In a high, explain how disinhibited you become, the arguments and fallings out that follow, and any relationships that have been damaged. In a low, describe how far you withdraw, cancelling whatever gets arranged and going weeks without seeing anyone. Mention the support you need from someone you trust before you can face company, and any risk to you or to others when you are unwell.
Focus on what stops a journey happening, not on how far you can physically walk. In a low, say how many days you do not leave the house at all and whether someone has to come and collect you. In a high, describe setting off on impulse with no plan and no thought about getting home, and any journey that ended badly. Say whether you need someone with you to travel safely on a route you do not know.
Bipolar disorder does not usually limit you physically, so if you can walk normally between episodes, tick the distance honestly and leave this one alone. Not going outside in a depressive phase belongs under planning and following a journey, because this question is only about how far you can physically walk and stand. It would count here if medication side effects, another condition or an injury genuinely limits the distance you can manage before you have to stop, so say so plainly if that is your situation.
The tips above are general pointers. Your paid form gives you a full, ready-to-copy answer for all 12 activities, written from your exact conditions, medication, aids and bad days, not a general example. This is a worked example for bipolar disorder; yours is written for you. £99.99 one-off.
This is a worked example, not a script. It shows one honest way a person with bipolar disorder might describe both ends of their cycle, so you can see the level of detail and the plain wording that assessors are trained to look for. Please do not copy it word for word. Your own answers should reflect your bipolar disorder, how often your phases come and how long they last, the medication and monitoring you are actually on, and the help you actually get or go without, because that is what the assessment is about and that is what makes an answer ring true.
Being straight about what bipolar disorder does not change makes the difficulties you do describe far more believable, so there is no need to stretch every question. If you have other conditions alongside the bipolar, they may change some of those answers, and they belong on the form too.
The thread running through all of it is reliability: you are only counted as able to do an activity if you can do it safely, to an acceptable standard, repeatedly and in a reasonable time. With bipolar disorder the mistake to avoid is writing yourself down as the person you are between episodes. Cover the depressive weeks and the high weeks, say how much of the year each one takes up, and let both of them show. If you would rather start from your own words, tell us about your health and we will write your answers from your own conditions, in the same first-person style, ready for you to read, edit and copy onto your PIP2 claim form or AR1 review form.
Tell us about your bipolar disorder in your own words and we will write one full activity for you, free, before you pay anything.
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