Bipolar- Denial

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To be honest,and please ignore this is if you disagree,but some of the things you are doing could be driving your wife away from you and further from being willing to consider medicine.

I mean that from an objective perspective and not to indicate blame.

You mentioned that you listened to her for hours at a time but instead of offering advice have you ever really understood,sincerely agreed with and validated her experiences or empathised how you would feel if that happened to you?

Your wife has genuinly had some very negative and potentially traumatising experiences with mental health practitioners .For example they didnt even believe that her stomach symtomns could be physical or due to medication side effects and dismissed it as psychosomatic.This was hugely disrespectful on their part and potentiallly medical negligence.Numerous studies have shown that doctors often erronously dismiss patients with mental illnesses co existing physical symtoms as psychosomatic or prematurely say they are psychological instead of thoroughly consideirng it could be physical.

These negative experiences have possibly eroded her trust and that needs to be understood and dealt with first (with patience and not frustration) before she will be ready to move on to the next step of even considering that maybe not all practitioners are the same or are jerks who dont listen to her opinion or work as a team with her etc.

Its important for your wifes mental health that she has a stress free enviroment and is able to trust again both you and certain practitioners.

It soulds like doesnt fully trust you now either as she doesnt want you involved in appointments etc?

Try to have patience and gentleness with your wife because she may be more irrational or "hysterical" then before due to hormonal changes from the hysterectomy.

Maybe thats what caused her to not weigh up the risks vs benefits of the medication or try something else as suggested by the psychatrist.

Some of the genetic mutations in schizophrenia also overlap with bipolar and autism and intellectual disabilities so as you likely know some of the medications are used for variety of a different DSM diagnosises but your wife would perhaps be more lkely to receive that info positively from someone objective and not from yourself.

Saying "will seeing a counsellor now help" while shes in an emotional or angry state may be seen as antagonising her instead of helping and might instead fuel the fire.

Consider changing tact.

Instead of seeing your role as trying to get her help,instead see it as a loving,harmonious,very supportive husband whos goal is her happiness.

She needs to see you back her 100% whether in appointments or issues at work/with people in general.Which also means picking your battles well and sometimes agreeing with her just for the sake of peace and not beliveing a doctors word over her etc because even though your wife may seem irrational doctors can also be wrong/make errors.

Right now,she appears to have a low tolerance of when suggestions of "help" come from your mouth so maybe suggestions would be better coming from others- maybe could you direct her to this forum or something similar?

Maybe you could suggest she rejoins the exercise group (if she stopped) or another one or other similar activities but suggest it in a non threatening way.

Its great you both had a relaxing time in the country.While you cant probably afford to always do that is there a way that maybe you could recreate that peaceful and relaxing at your home maybe?

@Ant1 i am not sure if you are going to like what i have to say but i am going to say it anyway... also please be assured it is nothing about you having done something wrong but it may just be uncomfortable to hear.

I have Schizoaffective disorder bipolar type so it is kind of like have bipolar and schizophrenia at the same time anyway you said your partner had had a few manic episodes (correct me if i am wrong) but in my experience mania is very powerful and can in some ways be addictive... you feel like you are on top of the world like you are really alive. you feel like nothing can stop you and you can achieve anything. it makes everything feel more intense but in a good way things smell, taste, sound, feel, look better and you are full of new and wonderful ideas you feel like you can think better and everything becomes clear and vivid in your mind. in my experience when you loose that feeling it feels like you have lost yourself like the mania feels like your full self your true self and when you come down you feel like a shell of your self like whole chunks of your are missing. it feels awful when it stops and very uncomfortable especially if you then become depressed.

in my experience the medication has always put me into a depressive phase and made me feel utterly horrible to the point where i felt worse on it than off and would rather be gone than stay on the meds. the meds can make you slow they can make you sick they can make you constantly exhausted. they can really make you feel like it is not worth being around anymore if you have to be on them. they can ruin peoples lives. i am not saying this is the case for everyone but for some people, people like me they can make you feel worse than you have ever felt before. your partner may not feel comfortable or happy on them and so she may be refusing because of a bad experience with them.

also i would like to point out that psychiatric abuse is a VERY real issue. i have been abused by psych professionals on multiple occasions and it is terrifiyng and distressing and absolutely horrible to experience so i absolutely believe your partner that she may have experienced this as i have seen it happen to so many people including my self on so many different occasions.

I think if she doesnt want to take meds that should be her choice but i do understand your need for boundries and perhaps just working on those for now could be a good step perhaps if you went to a couples counselling session and worked on your relationship and how to manage things in a way that is healthy for both of you then she might be willing to see someone that way or at least it my get her to be more considerate of your needs in the situation.