Mental Health Awareness Month

While I agree there needs to be more conversation bringing mental illness into the light, I am not in a position to discuss it in so many areas of my life at this moment.  Hence, I write about it here.  I absolutely have to keep it hidden in the workplace.  I've been through it all before when I've had to take medical leaves from work.  Upon my return I had bosses assessing my work aptitude and abilities.  They had to learn if I would be able to perform the job well enough or if I needed to be demoted.  I not only spent returns to the workplace adjusting to new medications and refocusing my concentration and pretty much 'holding it all together' for public display and assessment, but I lived in fear each time that I would fail.  I would even venture to say certain people wanted me to fail so they could push a sickly, incompetent 'crazy person' out the door.  In some environments, there is no understanding of it whatsoever.

It was suggested to me at one point that I should just go on disability and work on my art full-time.  I can't do that.  One important part of battling mental illness is feeling one's worth and ability to thrive just like everyone else.  Ok, ok, I get it that I'm abnormal, but I'm not a waste of a human being.

On a similar spectrum, there are still others out there that think all this mental illness mumbo jumbo is not real.  Please tell that to the voices I have heard from time to time, and please tell that to the people I have seen who weren't really there, and please tell that to my crippling fear that has grabbed hold of me when I felt I was being harmed. 

On the emotional spectrum, I worked very hard in therapy coming to terms with a pregnancy loss and am currently coming to terms with the fact that I cannot go off the medication to try for a pregnancy again.  It's not going to happen, and while that may not seem like such a big deal to some, it was everything for me.  My psychiatrist really believed it could be possible for me and encouraged me to try, but the last few months of medication changes have shattered my hopes of being able to do it...

So you see, there is big life stuff involved in all this invisible mental health stuff.  It's obviously not black and white.  I cannot stress how different every human being being treated for mental illness truly is.  I cannot stress the importance of getting to know each patient and assessing what kind of treatment will work for each individual.  Each pill works differently for each individual.  It's a long road...