THE DIAGNOSIS THAT WASN’T MINE: A STORY OF MISLABELING AND LIBERATION

What if everything you believed about yourself was never true?

By Roskamala

March 12, 2025

The Power of a Label

The session ended. The room was still.

Everything sat where it belonged—except me.

I had just published The Chameleon Story She Never Told two months earlier, believing I had finally found my truth. Sixteen years of believing I was something I was not—gone in an instant. A diagnosis that had shaped my identity, my choices, and the rhythm of my life simply disappeared.

I couldn’t process it. Not yet. The weight of the realization was too vast. How had this happened? What had I lost? How had I—and everyone around me—accepted a label without question?

For weeks, I sat with it. I didn’t feel the need to explain it to anyone. I wrote. I let the questions come and go, resisting the urge to grasp for answers. Then, my intuition whispered:

Do nothing.

And so, I did. No second diagnosis. No desperate search for an alternative truth. I let it be.

In that silence, clarity arrived—not in the form of explanations, but in the subtle disentangling of a belief that was never mine to carry.

How a Label Becomes an Identity

I was twenty when the label was given to me. I had woken up crying—not from sadness, but from something I couldn’t name. A friend suggested I seek help, so I did. I visited one of the most respected hospitals, trusting I would be met with understanding.

The session lasted no more than thirty minutes. A handful of yes-or-no questions. A brief summary of my life. When I left, I carried a piece of paper with two words:

Bipolar disorder.

No further explanation. No indication of type or severity. Just a label.

I did what any responsible person would do. I studied it. I learned what it meant, how to manage it, what to expect. But slowly, the knowledge became something else. I saw myself in the symptoms—whether they truly existed or not. I absorbed the disorder into my identity.

I became it.

If I was already broken, what was the point of trying to be whole?

And so, I descended.

I made reckless choices. I surrounded myself with people who mirrored or enabled my self-destruction. I convinced myself there was no future—because my mind had already been scripted into a story.

At the time, I couldn’t see beyond it.

How the World Saw Me

I didn’t realize at first how a definition could alter the way people see you. But to be labeled is to be misunderstood.

The moment the word bipolar is spoken, the air shifts. People hesitate. They watch you differently. They measure your words and actions against stories they’ve heard—stories shaped by headlines, misrepresentations, and fear.

I learned survival skills quickly:

One

You do not tell people. The stigma is stronger than their understanding.

Two

You learn to be misunderstood. No matter how you explain, the label speaks louder.

Three

Your mind rewires itself. The more you believe the story, the more people reflect the plot, the more you play the part.

I heard whispers: that I was seeking attention. That my struggles were conveniently worse in relationships. That I was intentionally irritable.

Eventually, I stopped resisting.

I had one silent voice disagreeing against a sea of loud voices. If this was how the world saw me, maybe they were right.

And when you begin to believe the world’s version of you, that acceptance slowly erases the you that always knew better.

Discovering the Misdiagnosis

Clarity wasn’t sudden. It came over years of inner work, long before I ever knew the diagnosis had been wrong. It arrived slowly, piece by piece, as I dismantled the beliefs that had shaped me.

I worked with dozens of therapists and psychiatrists over the years—sometimes yearly, sometimes monthly, then weekly. There were times I went three times a week, depending on how loud the noise was inside me.

Through it all, I peeled back each layer: assumptions, survival patterns, and the heavy cloak of the label.

Then, I did what once felt impossible.

Under professional supervision, and after years of self-regulation and healing, I began the process of coming off medication.

It was brutal.

The body doesn’t release what it has relied on without resistance. My mind fought against the fading of what it had known for so long. There were sleepless nights and overstimulated days. But I did everything naturally. And very few people knew.

But beneath it all, something else began to surface:

Stillness.

For the first time in my life, my mind was quiet.

No extreme highs or lows. No chaotic cycles. No patterns that fit the narrative I had once believed.

My thinking, my words, my energy—they all shifted.

Was this freedom?

I could finally hear music again. Feel again. Think clearly. Create.

And that’s when I knew:

I had never been bipolar.

This realization didn’t come from a single professional—it came from many, over time. Each one reviewing my history, my healing, and my present state.

What I carried was not a chemical imbalance. It was a life shaped by survival.

A nervous system wired by trauma. A mind conditioned to find familiarity in chaos.

But not a disorder that needed to be tamed.

And in that realization, I was not just freed from a diagnosis.

I was freed from the belief that I was inherently flawed.

Shedding the Label

To let go of a label is to rewrite the self.

It was not easy. Sixteen years is long enough to mold a person. But with time, growth mindset, books, therapy, mindfulness, solitude, self-compassion—and most of all, truth—I found my way back.

Back to the girl who once believed every lost bird needed rescuing.

The girl who now trusts they will find their own wings.

The girl who once believed the world was beautiful—and finally, believes it again.

I rebuilt from the ground up.

Each thing I let go of felt like shedding armor that had become a second skin. And beneath it all, I found her:

The real me.

The one I had almost forgotten.

And for the first time, I truly felt whole.

The Power of Owning Your Story

If I could speak to my younger self, I would say:

“It’s dark now, and the tunnel feels endless. But trust me—one day, you’ll have your own back. You’ll be your own hero. You’ll be free. And the kind of peace you’ll find? You can’t even imagine it yet.

I can’t give you all the answers because every challenge ahead is shaping you into who you’re meant to be. These hardships shape you. Believe in yourself, and hug yourself more often. You are doing the best you can with what you know—and that is enough.

You will carry things no one else can see, and still find your way. Keep going. Keep believing. Keep moving forward. You got this.”

And to anyone who has been defined by a label, I want you to know:

You are enough, exactly as you are. And one day, you’ll believe it.

About the Author

Roskamala is a storyteller and artist who transforms life’s complexities into music, words, and art. Each piece offers a lantern for those who are ready.

Her work spans award-winning music and thought-provoking writing, grounded in depth, intention, and a quiet belief in the human spirit’s ability to rise.

She lives gently and gives without expectation.