Society vs mental illness

It is hard for people who have never experienced madness to understand what is going on, what it is all about and indeed how best to help that person.

First of all it is something that requires a lot of intervention, and specialist intervention too. We have been cast out in the past, but you cannot wish us away; not accept any responsibility for being part of the society that caused the problems in the first place. It could even amount to individual responsibility for causing emotional and personal trauma in another. If someone suffers emotionally in tribal societies for example, the whole tribe gets together to discuss the problems, they sit down and the first question they ask is what have we done to have caused distress for this person. Rather than cast us out, vilify us, reject us, why not take a good look at yourselves and also look at what we have endured through living in this unbalanced and degrading world we live in?

The sort of intervention necessary when someone is emotionally distraught and they have no knowledge themselves that they suffer from bouts of madness, is to get them to a safe place, somewhere away from the environment where they are suffering unbearably in. Then yes, there may well be a role for some theraputic medication, but in no way should this be the be all and end all of treatment. As it has been discovered already, talking is of paramount importance and time and effort should be put into this activity. Education is pivitol too, teaching people about what the symptoms of madness are, help that person accept it. Then there is art and craft; providing an outlet for the upset and trauma and a medium for communication ( something that I will be going into more depth with in a future post).

There is much talk about 'recovery' and I want to be absolutely clear about this because it was not a term invented by profesionals although they were quick to jump on the bandwagon with all that it mean't to them. For profesionals, mainly senior management it mean't effectively ceasing all treatment and resources for the mentaly ill, a denial even that they had anything that was different about them, apparently we are no different to anyone else now. Funny that, how come we feel, act and behave differently then? Service users invented the term 'recovery', it was a way they had come to understand their difficulties, and the transition they had made from sanity to madness, a way they could hook onto their past and recover an identity that would not render them as useless, second class citizens, written off of and out of society completely.

We wanted to be part of mainstream life ( who doesn't) but of course we are different, just as deaf people are deaf, blind people are blind, learning disabled have a learning disability, we are mentally ill. Once you have crossed that line into insanity, most of us will experience it again and for those who only have it once ( it is very rare) they never ever forget it although in order to fit into to mainstream society they expertly cover it up, however that memory and the pain will never leave.

Madness, or mental illness is not about loss of or lack of intelligence, it has nothing to do with intelligence, there are many people with learning difficulties who also suffer with insanity due to the frustrations they have. There are also highly intelligent people who suffer it. Insanity is not about intelligence, it is an emotional disorder, emotional deficit or emotional over load. Being broken emotionally is life changing and very serious, in fact none of us ever recovers as such, none of us ever can become 'normal' again, that is a person who has no knowledge of what insanity is like. Once broken, or insane, you are a changed person, permanently changed and more vulnerable. A vulnerability that stays with you for life.

I know it is very hard for the mentally ill to accept that they are vulnerable as sometimes they feel they have extra strength and are opposite to the perception of vulnerable, they feel themselves to be strong. Now of course we are strong, but we are also vulnerable. Every breakdown is unique and every persons experience of madness is unique to them and on each occasion. Therefore I thought the best way to attempt to explain how we are vulnerable is to describe it in myself.

It is not easy, but here goes ... I am highly suspicious of others, we could go into what caused this or even just accept that it might be something I was born with; a personality trait if you like. Anyhow I am also inquisitive, sensitive and intelligent and they might be good traits to have, but couple that with a highly suspicious nature and you get explosions, outbursts and misunderstandings. Medication plays its part in subdugation, but the state never fully leaves me. It renders me vulnerable in many ways, but one is that this combination of emotions in extreme tips over to paranoia and I am and become a danger to others. I have never physically attacked anyone ever, but others can sense my unease and it requires intervention from others in order for the pain I am in to be alleviated. I also get very depressed because of this and because I am very sensitive and at times when the depression is accute I am a danger to myself.

There are many people with similar problems, and the way we are, the emotional problems we endure are undoutely exacerbated by the society we live in. The high levels of competiton for example for jobs, housing, qualifications and so on all raise our emotional deficit or overload and make it harder for us to cope, but as I have said before and written about many times over, although we need others perhaps more than people without emotional problems need others, we do also have much to offer life, and if others and society can see and accept what we have to offer, rather than just see us as a problem, it would be for the good of all. Accepting us as we are into mainstream life with all our needs and vulnerabilites would have a very positive effect for us all, for society and for human kind.