Discrimination against the mentally ill makes my blood boil. I’ve been told many times to never, ever say those particular words to people because ‘it would freak them out. Wait until they get to know you and then tell them in a way that won’t make them feel uncomfortable.’ Needless to say, this does not help a person feel comfortable being themselves or helping them own their own uniqueness. It makes a person feel ashamed which can start patterns of self-destruction.
When we hear that someone has a physical illness, it’s easy to feel compassion and empathy for them. For the most part, our physical bodies appear to work the same way as those we see around us. You have two feet. One gets amputated. It isn’t hard to imagine what that might feel like and extended our compassion to that person. You won’t ever really know unless it happens to you, but you can imagine. The same for cancer or diabetes. We can imagine what that might feel like or at least what it might feel like to have the simplicity of our life taken away, so we can immediately extend them sympathy.
All that changes when we start talking about mental illness. There hasn’t been the same amount of study and diagnosing done for the inside of our brain as has been done for our physical parts. People aren’t comfortable talking about depression or medication or therapy. Whens someone tells you that they just can’t get out of bed in the morning or that they feel so sad they think about killing themselves or that they haven’t been able to save any money because they’ve spent every cent on alternative therapies, it gets harder and harder to sympathize with them. It’s uncomfortable. You’d like them to just stop and ‘act normal.’
If you are the mentally ill, you don’t want anyone at work to know you go to therapy once a week and take medication because it might impact how your job performance is perceived. Your occasional bad day takes on a whole new dimension and when it comes time for promotion, you might not be seen as ‘steady’ or ‘reliable’ even if your job performance is very similar to those around you with no stigma of Mental Illness.
I often receive emails from people struggling with these issues and I feel so helpless to help any of them. All I can tell them is that I know how they feel. Being diagnosed as Not Otherwise Specified doesn’t really do a lot to comfort. We need much more research and open dialog and better work in creating diagnoses.
A few weeks ago I was invited to participate in a phone call with Dr. Ken Duckworth, the medical director for the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI). I was excited to speak with someone who spends their time helping the mentally ill by furthering research and most of all just spreading awareness by talking about it. I’m sad to say I ended up not being able to make the call due to a misunderstanding about the time. However, here is an audio link for that call if you’re interested in listening.
I think Dr. Duckworth hits the nail on the head when he states that people will feel much more comfortable with mental illness and the treatment of, when we can pinpoint better how things in the brain work. He also talks about the relationship of alcohol and drugs with a chemically imbalanced brain, which I know about intimately. And I really like that they talk about how accountability and learning from natural consequences is different for the mentally ill than for, say, an alcoholic without a mental illness hitting bottom. The learning curve is different and needs to be discussed with the family of the mentally ill to help them understand how things might be more helpful for their loved one. 12-step programs are great and a good starting point but there are specific differences. Also touched on – endocrine disorders and thyroid issues have shown some connections with depression and unbalanced brain chemistry. I hope they do more research there. As I stated in an earlier post, I was amazed at how similar the symptoms were. I have no doubt that we will only find more and more supportive facts that show how our brains and our physical bodies share illnesses. Had I been able to make the call I would have asked him about dissociative disorders. (duh!. : ) )
In an email yesterday, I was told that Revolution Health is partnering with O, the Oprah Magazine as a sponsor of the O You! Conference on September 29 in Miami. You can win one of five trips to the conference by entering here once per day. Speakers at the conference include Suze Orman and Martha Beck, who I think is phenomenal.
The stigma of mental illness never really seems to go away, sometimes even amongst family members. It’s so frustrating when it manifests in a cycle of good days and black cloud days, and the people around you seem to expect that somehow you will snap out of it or be cured. It’s even worse when you put that same pressure on yourself.
There are still some days that I just “get through”, but my life is infinitely better since I decided to treat my illness. I know that it’s a lifelong battle and I try to surround myself with people who really understand what living with a mental illness is all about.
Like you honeybunny. Thank you for speaking out and being you.
Big Confession: I struggled with accessing my own empathy in reading this post until you got to the point of mentioning family members and their need to better understand. And a giant lightbulb went off in my head highlighting where/why I struggle with the empathy: I was raised in a household with a mentally ill (single) parent and nothing was explained to me throughout my childhood. I had no support and was left in the dark. My battle with empathy comes from my own wounds, and I thank you for pointing this out to me. I think reaching out to family members is critical to bridge the understanding.
It seems like mental health research is 50 years behind the rest of medicine. Considering how many suffer from mental health issues, that is a real shame. I think medical schools need to do a better job of training physicians, so that they can better identify potential issues and help people get the care they need. Also, I recently heard that there are only 14 hospital-based geriatric-psychiatric units in the whole country! I would love it if Michael Moore did SiCKO 2 on mental health.
Leah – I posted a similar, but much less informative rant on my own blog about the cost of transparency when it comes to mental illness. It stinks! You keep shouting – they are finally starting to listen to us.
I think that much of the resistance people have toward accepting mental illness is that they’re not ready to live in a world where it’s possible that they can’t control what their brains do. It’s so much easier to think of it as a problem of someone not having enough willpower; they’re confident in their own willpower and can then reassure themselves that they’re immune to such problems.
It isn’t until people lose a little control themselves that they finally face the fact that we’re not as in charge of our brains as we’d like to be. That’s a frightening thought for anybody. Learning how our brains work will give us back a little of that “control” and will, I think, make people a little less afraid to talk about it. (It’s so much easier to confront monsters when you know how to banish them)
I’ve always been impressed with your candor and forthrightness about your own demons. You do it with such charm and grace that it almost looks easy, except many of us know that’s not the case. For that, I thank you.
@deezee – thanks for sharing that. i wonder sometimes how my children are effected by my mental illness history. it gets tricky being their mom and talking about it because almost immediately, their guilt sets in and they don’t feel allowed to really tell me how they feel. my daughter once told me that if she’s angry or sad about what happened, she feels like she’s betraying me since i couldn’t help it and did the best i could at the time. no matter how much i tell them it’s ok to really own those feelings and talk about how they felt abandoned and parentalised, it hasn’t happened yet. i don’t know if any of that fits in with your experience but i thought i’d mention it. xo
A recent copy of Reader’s Digest has a couple of articles on Alcoholics Anonymous. The crux of the articles is that the famous 12 Steps, don’t work at all. Apparently, there’s no data to support the claim that Alcoholics Anonymous is successful at getting people to stop drinking.. From my own experience, the 12 Steps, shut down the critical thinking section of ones brain. What do you think? Comments are welcome!!
PEACE BE WITH YOU
MICKY
This topic kills me. When I finally got help I was mortified. And I couldn’t figure out WHY I was mortified.
Now I like to scream it, but still…in the back of my head…mortified.
I know its not right. I KNOW there should be no stigma. But yet, there it is…in the back of my head.
IT sucks.
Funny thing is, with other people, I carry no stigma. Like, I get proud you got help, and cheer you on. With myself…stigma.
Why is that?
Many insurance policies have much stricter limits on treatment for mental health than…uh…regular health. It shows how differently mental health issues are perceived.
I agree with you about the mental illness stigma, but want to add that it’s not just simple and easy for those with physical illness either (not that you said it was). Perhaps those who have something easily recognized and feared, such as cancer, may find people more understanding and sympathetic, but having an “invisible” physical illness leads to experiences much like what you describe above.
But even a well known and potentially fatal disease like cancer can cause the same reaction in people that you mention above. Illness in general often makes people uncomfortable, and many people also don’t know how to respond when people own up to their struggles and don’t just say that everything is fine. Talking about your sickness, whatever form it may take, makes many want to go running for the hills.
When you have an “invisible illness,” which I think often can include mental illness, many people also dismiss, minimize, or even completely deny that your illness is even real. You look fine they say so how can you be ill. And taking off work to go to constant appointments or simply b/c you don’t feel well, having to take meds and have special needs at work, etc.–none of that is fondly looked upon by bosses and coworkers usually, regardless of whether your illness is mental or physical, visible or not.
I think speaking out for better awareness and understanding, as well as for the rights of the ill, is a wonderful thing. The more people understand and can become comfortable, the more I think rights will be upheld as well.