We present a patient with a bipolar disorder and his (healthy) pregnant wife. After a normal pregnancy the delivery started at the beginning of the evening and last till the early morning hours. After this delivery the bipolar husband developed a manic episode. The impact on the young family was huge and for everybody traumatic.
Sleepdisturbance in the period of delivery and the following days/weeks may have a negative effect on the bipolar psychopathology in the first weeks after becoming a father. We precent an overview of the existing literature about this topic.

Treatment of bipolar disorder in pregnant women and the postpartum period is a challenge. Screening (with the MDQ) of bipolar disorder on depressed pregnant women may be a possibility to diagnose bipolar disorder and take preventionmeasures in the postpartum period, thus reducing psychopathology in the postpartum period. This will be part of our study.

A possible important risk factor for psychopathology in the postpartum period is the disturbance of the diurnal rhytm. Sleep disturbances are reported to be the most prominent early symptom of mania and deregulation of the sleep-wake cycle and other circadian rhythms may underlie the pathophysiology of bipolar disorder. We are about to start a study of the effect of sleepdisturbance in the period of delivery on the postpartum psychopathology in bipolar women and men. We will present an overview of the existing literature.