I have a friend who suffers from bipolar. During her down periods, she is very withdrawn and tends to isolate herself from others. But when she's on the up, she develops these very intense interests in certain topics, and talks about little else when I see her. Usually, it's different political systems - at the moment, she's "really into" the idea of living on a commune, and whenever I see her, she tells me about different ones she's been researching. I don't think she'll ever go through with it, because the usual pattern is that she'll lose interest in the latest thing after a few weeks and move on to something else.
Generally, I try to be kind and listen to her, and discuss her interests with her, but sometimes it gets into uncomfortable territory. One such obsession she had was with conspiracy theories about Big Pharma and she was having all these bizarre alternative therapies. I don't believe in homeopathy or any of that stuff, and I feel like she sometimes gets taken advantage of by others who prey on her when she's vulnerable. She often makes friends with other people who are involved in these obsessions, most of whom are nice enough (the ones from her pottery phase are lovely!) but she has picked up a few who give me the creeps, quite frankly. You can probably imagine what the conspiracy theorists are like, for example...
I really want to try to protect my friend but at the same time, she is an adult and I can't stop her from seeing people who I don't have good feelings about. I do sometimes get tired of hearing her talk about her latest "thing" when I know it'll be something different in a few weeks' time. She can be quite self-centred and doesn't always remember to ask me about my life when we see each other.
Any advice on handling this sensitively? My friend is married btw, but her husband doesn't seem to be very present a lot of the time.