A message of hope.

     I bring, today, words of encouragement and hope.  For the overwhelming majority of people with a mental health condition there is hope of recovery.  With proper medication, functioning in society is within the grasp of most.  This can be a long and frustrating process.  I remember not having any kind of insurance and my initial medication being cost prohibitive so they put me on another drug.  This particular medication technically worked.  I certainly wasn’t symptomatic; however I also wasn’t much of anything else.

    I found another medication which worked for me.  It was, again, out of my price range.  I was lucky enough to find out about a medical group that helped people get particular medications for free.  Unfortunately, when I moved to Canada this program was no longer available and I was forced to pay out of pocket.  The medication was significantly less expensive, but still $300 per month.  Then, I was given the opportunity to get supplemental insurance.  Though things seemed bleak for a long time, and I thought I was going to be stuck taking the medication that left me a mere shell of who I truly was, I kept my spirits up and tried to do my best to work towards taking the steps needed for my continued mental health.

     Having hope is very important to everyone, and it can be especially hard for those with a mental health condition.  Remember that the dark clouds in our life will not stay forever.  It may certainly seem that way, as though the sun will never again shine.  Just remember that no matter how low you get it will only go to make the good parts of our life, when we are able to fully experience them again, seem that much brighter.  I know that it seems as though no one understands; know that you are not alone in your suffering.  A large portion of society experiences, at one time or another, clinical depression.

     It may be clichéd, but flowers cannot bloom without the rain.  Getting the proper treatment, the right therapist or team, and/or medications can help significantly.  Knowing that your first, or even thirty-first, therapist may not be right for you and it is always your option to find a new one, one more suited to your needs, may be necessary.  But have hope, there is one out there for you, there is the right medication for you, maybe no medication at all, but the right treatment for you exists.

     Know that it is work, and it isn’t easy, but you cannot take a passive role in your treatment process.  I know from experience what it can be like to be so anxious in a given situation with a doctor who does not seem to have the time to spend with you that you deserve.  It took months upon months of improper treatment for me to work up the courage to state exactly what I needed.

     Don’t give up hope.  You deserve to be happy and healthy, both mentally and physically.  You deserve to be loved by yourself and those close to you.  Although I do not know you, know that I hope you, or those who need help, get all the help they need.

--JJM

Labels and allowing yourself to become an illness.

     Is it really useful to have a label to apply to yourself, especially in the context with a disorder or illness?  While many people who have a mental health diagnosis eventually move past this label, it can be hard for some to accept that they are more than their diagnosis.  I know one individual that relates every experience they have to their diagnosis.  They have self-imposed this sort of rigid set of definitions upon themselves such that everything that occurs does so because of their illness.  Partly, in their case, it is done because that is all they have known.  However, many people who have lived a “normal” life before being forced to live with a diagnosis adhere to this same behavior.

     Though I have spoken on the issue of being more than just a list of symptoms, it needs repeating that when professionals reduce us to a series of symptoms and responses; we begin to adhere to this view.  I agree it is nice to be able to identify what is wrong and be able to give it a name, but there is a subtle difference between the sayings “I am bipolar” and “I have bipolar.”  Replace any other health condition with bipolar and see how the statements stand up.  “I am a cold.”  “I have a cold.”  “I am diabetes.”  “I have diabetes.”

     Why is it that so many people are taught to think the former?  They begin to see everything they do as a symptom.  I have often seen people who think they should have no affect.  If they begin to get agitated they immediately say that they need a medication adjustment.  I, personally, am on the opposite end of this spectrum and have refused to see that my medication did need to be changed.  Often medications are given that can reduce a person to next to no discernible personality.  I was on a particular medication for over a year.  This medication sedated me, robbed me of my ability to speak clearly, and made me a different person.  I was on this medication since before my psychiatrist, therapist, or psychosocial rehabilitation facilitators knew me and therefore assumed that this was the way I was supposed to be.

     Sure my symptoms were gone, and I thought that was all that mattered, so I put up with the side effects.  I assumed that putting up with not having a personality was my curse for having a mental illness.  As such I boxed myself into a checklist of symptoms and noticed I had none of them and assumed I was doing well.  To my psychiatrist my symptoms were gone, and that was good enough.  If I was feeling sedated, I should split my dose.  If I was feeling lethargic, it was due to a lack of exercise, not the medication.  The medication was working.  I became my illness such that all I could think of was reducing my symptoms through medication.

     Medication is a very important aspect of mental health recovery.  Ever since switching my medication I have become a “new” person.  That is, I became the person I was before being diagnosed.  They found the right medications for me, and did so fairly quickly.  For some people, this process takes years.  I got lucky.  However, medications are not the be-all end-all.  To medicate your symptoms away and not allow yourself the freedom to experience life is allowing your diagnosis to rule your life.  Realize that there is a lot of work and “personal medicine” to be used in conjunction with psychiatric medication.

     Please do not wish away every emotion.  Be anxious, be sad, and be a little excitable from time to time.  However if you truly feel off, perhaps a medication discussion is in order.   It just should not be the first place to jump to.  If a situation makes you anxious, popping a pill to relieve the anxiety will just reinforce the notion that when anxious a pill makes it better.  Sure, for some people this may be the only course of action.  I would fashion that many people can learn to overcome their anxiety much like any other phobia.  

--JJM