“When I grow up, I want to be mentally ill"
Chapter 1
I have everything that I could have ever wished for and more. But, my pre-cog vision distorts my reasons. Over the years, since my last writing, I have continued to get myself educated. I have done my best to better understand my illness, so I can better understand myself, so I can better explain to my doctor what ails me- so then my doctor can prescribe the proper treatments.
This merry-go-round process has been going on for decades. For me, this process is still too much of a guessing game. But, medical research (with DNA mapping) is now bringing mentally ill patients even closer to better treatments than ever before.
It is always a brilliant idea to better yourself. But what would you do if you were trying to prove your not broken? Even though those around you insist that you are. Would you navigate your inner issues or follow your outward dreams?
For me, it was a question of perception. How could those around me be so cruel, when I’m still the same person they grew up with? Some people, in my life, even nurtured the aspect of my mental illness as a child, instead of helping me to set things straight. Growing up in the 70’s and 80’s, was a very difficult time within the education system on preparing for the possibility of becoming mentally ill as you reach adulthood. There wasn’t enough education about how to survive it.
No one as a child ever says, “ When I grow up, I want to be mentally ill. “ Not a one. Not even me, but I found the courage to try to deal with it. Somehow, the more I educate myself on my inner reasoning and society’s perception, the better I am able to navigate as a productive citizen.
I have found that humanities quells my questions on proper thought processes. In philosophy, we studied Plato’s allegory of the cave. Without my continuing education, I would still be as that being in the cave before it was pulled out and shown a different view. What a very logical novel idea that Plato had.
It was further into my study of philosophy, that I began to realize something very crucial within my own perception. While I was exploring my reason, I came across the novelty of your perception. I found that what you see and what I see may be totally different. Maybe the hue you see is a little more vibrant, maybe orange for me is red for you. But, as children, we grew up with the same standard. A tree is a tree and an umbrella is an umbrella and so forth. But we grew up with the assumption that people’s perceptions are exactly the same as it is for us. Thus Plato.
Exploring my reasoning, along with comparisons brought up within my studies, allowed me an inner insight into my own thought processes. The classes I took were very pivotal in helping me corral my wayward thoughts. But, my classes in humanities were even better than that. They helped to teach me the way I think, why I might think that way, and if others might think in the same fashion. I feel like I have grown by leaps and bounds.
My other humanities course was sociology. There, that class taught me the ways of society, How society shares it’s views and how society forms its own class standards regardless of what you might think of yourself. One such aspect is status. The other is role. I learned how I get relegated as inferior and how stress happens.
My last class was health. In that class I learned the updated short-version of new health behaviors, treatment, options, and diagnoses. It tied into both my philosophy course and my sociology course.
With the help of these studies, I have found greater inner understanding. I have then been able to take this understanding to my personal “treatment” table.
Surviving mental illness from the inside out is not what I ever wanted to do. Treatment should have been as easy as a blood test for locating the proper medicine. But, mental health doesn’t work that way. I had to find a proper inner path.
Chapter 2
You are the number 1 factor in receiving better treatment. With your knowledge of yourself, you are your best advocate in navigating your mental health treatment.
This is not to be confused with your mental health path. Because recovery from mental illness is a long road, there are many paths available to navigate. This means you need a team of experts to help you mark your way as you go, and sometimes mark it before you get there.
I have had the benefit of being third-generation mental health patient. This means that I had learned from the paths navigated before me as I was growing up. Some might wonder if it made it any easier because of this fact. But sadly no it didn’t. It actually made it harder. I had predetermined paths before me and many in my life tried to set me upon those paths already worn from use.
I wanted to scream, “ I’m not broken!”. It was very frustrating for me and my loved ones. There was also the frustration from mis-interpretation of diagnoses. They thought they knew, so proceeded in a certain fashion- if it had been trod before, that is the path to go-sort of thing.
But, no. I find myself walking the edge of reasoned reality. It was that way as a child, so I find myself referencing my tangible reality to what my experiences were as a child. If I can touch it I know it is real. If I can plug my ears and hear the inner peace of my heartbeat, then I am not hearing voices I am hearing peer pressure. But, I find that these are things that I should have been taught as a child, through family. Why was I forced to learn this on my own?
I will continue onward in my education, for now I am surely convinced of certain truths that I was unsure of before. I have found my personal path toward reality checking and it feels great.
Chapter 3
Exploring my reason is a healthy step toward mental health recovery ( if done properly ). What distinguishes one person from the next, also kind of works the same way with mental illness. Everyone is different and everyone suffers from their episodes in a different way. Just like everyone has a different personality. Unique unto themselves.
At the moment, there is no known cure for mental illness. But, you can recover (if you are courageous enough to handle it). Coping skills are necessary, if you want to survive mental illness. But, what skills do I need? Well, there is wisdom and knowledge. Then, we have common sense and reason. All of these are very good, well--- starts --- Somehow, with these capabilities, there is one thing that is missing and that is- truth.
So many times, I have needed to dig for the truth. I had to learn how, learn where, and sometimes learn why. Learn why the truth is missing. So, in searching for the truth, I found how to explore my reason. I increased my knowledge. This in turn gave me better wisdom, with the common sense that goes with it.
With all of this going for me, I cannot ask for much more. I mean this in the truest sense. You would not question my resolve, if you knew how difficult it was to navigate to get to this point in the first place.
Just think, I am growing up while I am already grown. I use to explain having to deal with a disability as such where one is forced to navigate two paths at the same time. Learning a little bit in each as you go along. Like, being enrolled in two classes at once. There are advantages and disadvantages of such a situation.
For the normal person, they only need one class at a time to stay on their proper path. The disabled person is slowed down by this extra burden where consequently they work harder just to keep up on the one path that is considered normal while navigating forward at the same time on the other path. With such a struggle, one sort of fails to realize the amount of energy needed just to keep consistent.
Chapter 4
Consistency is a goal. Something to search for and attain. Will I ever get there? I might come close, but no I don’t think it is completely attainable. I have found that it is not where you choose to go, but how you choose to get to where you need to go.
How many of us though, know where we need to go? We sometimes think we know where we should go, know where we would like to go…but, where we need to go? Sounds easy and difficult at the same time. But, it is necessary to have the tenacity to figure out where you need to go. Where are your resources? What are your resources? How resourceful are you? How would you go about knowing what is available to you? Well, that is why it is good to have a team of mental health experts to guide you. What someone might not know of, another will.
In this day and age, I have noticed one thing that is definitely consistent- psychological stigma. With the stigma associated with mental illness, society sort of wages psychological warfare on those in most need of compassion and understanding. Its sad to watch it happen to someone and even sadder when you know that that someone is you,
It’s no wonder that so many of the mentally ill commit suicide. There are statistics in sociology about suicide. There are statistics about the mentally ill and suicide. Many newly diagnosed citizens get despondent about their situation. That is because no one wants to grow up to be mentally ill. It is usually a contingency unplanned for and they find themselves unprepared for the struggles life brings with any mental illness diagnoses.
How to go about integrating the school systems with classes that can better prepare our youth, I don’t know. I wish someone would look into it. I just don’t know how to get the message out. Sorry.
Chapter 5
What can one person do really? Well, you can be a friend, a sister, a brother, a mother, a father and so on. Mentor. You’d be surprised what a difference a friend makes. Through samhsa.gov word is getting out about mental health awareness. It is time to move into the 21st century. It is time to open your awareness and actually take a look. Maybe there is someone you can help right now. Someone, who can use a little kindness, a little compassion. If there are enough good deeds done, who knows? Maybe, little by little, with the compassion to try to be understanding- we can make a difference.
“The ignorance of my reason, contrasts with
my wisdom of knowledge.”
S.A. Suworow
May we someday be able to erase the ignorance of
the unknown, replacing it with the wisdom of compassion.