This Stranger, My Son: A Mother’s Story (1968) by Louise Wilson
Yesterday, I read This Stranger My Son: A Mother’s Story (1968) by Louise Wilson. It is about a family’s experience with schizophrenia. Aside from the consistency with which clinicians blamed Louise Wilson and her husband for the illness of their son, a nonsense that has disappeared in its more blatant forms but still persists in more subtle narratives of some today, the book is still remarkably relevant for its descriptions of family turmoil and the paucity of healthcare or social supports for parents and their severely ill children. In fact, I think it is the best of several books I have read about the experiences of parents seeking help for their children with serious mental illnesses—it is honest and beautifully written.
Well, today I slept til about 9am which is super late for me. Then about 30 mins later fell back asleep til around 11. This is after staying in bed all day yesterday playing my ps5, which I'm also doing today.
Needless to say this is outside of my norm of waking up around 7am. My head feels fucked, and I just can't use any brain function aside from vegetation via game. I tried talking to my aunt about what's going on with my head. but couldn't verbally articulate my thoughts well enough to be of any help to her with regards to helping me (that was last night after a full day of being out of home base, very exhausted).
I've discussed this quite a bit with my therapist, with regards to getting med adjustment via a couple day inpatient visit to a local behavioral health facility here in town. This is supposed to be the next step if my prn med doesn't help, otherwise this could go on for weeks or months.
If course rest and isolation from stressors is right up there in importance with the prn med. I'm kinda OK just doing nothing in a zero stimulus environment, but leaving my cave as I've had to do a few times in past few days, has made things worse.
The problem is that I have been affected by the stress from my moving and living situation, and have been working outside my comfort zone with my aunt to get my finances and life in order. I'd legit be homeless in addition to broke if she wasn't helping me, but it's taking its toll.
My aunt is now on a joint checking and savings account with me, and is fully managing it for me. I will also be canceling my credit cards. I have to tell her about literally every dollar I spend, and for the first time since divorce I'm on a budget.
Anyways, the latter bit about my finances, that's a big part of my stress and current mental and emotional degradation, and it's not going to just go away.
Sometimes when I'm in Standby Mode™️ I want to post about why I'm not posting. But actually it's boring af. I'm not feeling "right" currently, but also can't put my finger on what it is I'm experiencing rn.
Gotta say, it's been a while since i felt straight up "mentally ill," but that's where I've been sitting this last week. Usually, it's more of a mental health condition to manage or there are life circumstances to address, but lately it's disordered my life and left me feeling downright mentally sick.
Heck, off and on for months, my major depression, with borderline and dissociation sprinkled in for good measure, have been flaring up and leaving me effectively disabled for days at a time. Might be time to adjust my meds again (seems like i gotta do that once a year and always wind up at the same med and dose anyway 🤷🏼♀️), or maybe it's something else (hormones have been stable as far as i can tell).
Anywho, not fishing for support or advice, but rather to be transparent and destigmatize talking about mental illness.
It's okay to not be okay, and it's okay to talk about it. 💖
Over on BSky, Rahaeli (who is amazing) made a post about how sometimes present them sticks a potato in the oven, because they might not want a potato right now, but future them often is really happy to have a baked potato.
The Future Me Potato is now a big part of my self care plan.
Does Future You need a potato? Maybe there's something else you can do to help Future You?
Until the 1960s, many mentally ill people in the U.S. were locked away in asylums. In the face of a growing mental health and homelessness crisis, some are now asking if we should return to forced treatment and institutionalization.
@NPR reports: "Today, many of those who would historically be institutionalized in asylums are now instead incarcerated in jail, cycling in and out of emergency rooms, and living on the streets."
I sat in a room with my ex and 3 kids and told them I have schizoaffective disorder and we talked about what that means for me and for them.
It went really well, and lots of good questions were asked. Nobody treated me like a serial killer monster took me over.
Psychotic disorders are so stigmatized, and hard to talk about. But I felt like I owe it to all of them to arm them with real knowledge. They know I'm still the same person I was when I had the undiagnosed disorder.
It was hard to do, but also cathartic. I told them that I'm sure they will have questions as they process this on their own, and to go ahead and ask me. I'm trying to be open, doing my part to destigmatize the illness with my kids and their mother.
Also my ex apologized for misgendering me, but said that it's just hard to get used to, and she isn't doing it maliciously, she is trying to get it right. It felt sincere.
I imagine my ex will get some catharsis as well, because there were certainly times throughout our marriage when this illness made things worse. I'm sure she is having plenty of "aha" moments as she processes.
She thanked me for talking to her, in the same room. Up until I took olanzipine for the past month, this was not possible--I couldn't shelf my delusions around her long enough to feel safe talking about anything more than basic child info.
Anyways, I'm sure at some point I'll fall back into psychosis and ruin any good progress that might come of this discussion, but hopefully not.
Just thinking about how my mom and other family all recognize my mental illness now, because they have mothers, brothers, and sisters with mental illness and same symptoms I have. So, suddenly, it's familiar to them.
But, because it's stigmatized, nobody talks about it (except me who talks about it all the time--I know, big surprise right?). But everybody is caught by surprise with me because I didn't appear to be unwell or something? I'm just that good at masking, right? Why are people surprised? Because mental illness is STIGMATIZED. I knew something was wrong with me, but was not safe in my marriage to talk about it and was afraid to seek a proper diagnosis. I started telling my therapist "I think I'm schizophrenic like my grandma" 8 years ago. And I've been chasing a diagnosis to fit me the whole time. Except that any time psychosis comes into the picture, I lied to myself and others because... Stigma. I didn't actually want to be perceived as "crazy" and/or dangerous. I'm not dangerous, I can say that much for certainty.
We need more destigmatization. I know for safety reasons some people just can't. I don't know of many people who talk about it as much as I do, but would be great if more did.
Specifically my dad, two grandmas, and a first cousin, all have/had significant symptoms and diagnoses related to/same as mine, and nobody liked to talk about it. Had they done so, I might have recognized myself, might have gotten help sooner. Keeping secrets did me no favors. My mom said her mom knew since she was in her 20's, and that cost her a marriage, because if my grandpa would have known that her disordered and erratic behavior was mental illness, he would have stayed with her. It was a decades old secret.
I'm going to yell about it until I'm purple in the face, but at least y'all know some of the reasons why by now. And if you have these diagnoses, your children stand a chance of inheriting it, if the environmental triggers come into play, that chance is increased. This is why I WILL eventually talk to my ex and kids about it. It's that important.
The Death Row Prisoners Suffering From Severe Mental Illness
VICE News looks at high rates of severe mental illness among America's death row prisoners. Are we executing the "worst of the worst," or some of the country’s most vulnerable?
I am awake, with coffee in my veins, nearly mentally and emotionally prepared to continue with the second half of my SSDI 10 page function report.
It's super stressful because it's a pretty important form. But also my therapist and psych have received similar paperwork. My therapist has been working with me for nearly... 8 or 9 years I think (time is a soup) and she knows me better than anybody here in my life bubble, and I trust her to give an accurate picture of my function/lack of.
I've been whinging about the hell I live in having to work, and how hard it is, since the earliest days (the actual work expected from me was minimal and easy, also should be enjoyable because it was related to what i studied in college). So this won't seem like I'm complaining about it out of nowhere--complaining is pretty light descriptor for somebody who has curled up crying and psychotic on the floor of a locked office.
(Side note, I am super distracted and irritated by the starlings nesting in the rain gutter--noisy, tappy, scratchy, clicky. But it won't be my problem in a week)
I love talking about anxiety, not because I like anxiety, but I know a lot about it and like to help others understand it.
Did you know there are people who experience no anxiety? There are people who have experienced so little anxiety that they don't know what it is when it happens to them, and they are convinced they are instead having a heart attack? There are people who experience anxiety 24/7?
All anxiety is valid, and it doesn't hurt anyone to validate the anxiety felt by others if they open up to you. It is no place to one up them. To the person having anxiety for the first time, it can feel life threatening, even if it seems to be "less than" your own anxiety. We live in an anxious world now.
Ableism is discrimination in favor of able-bodied people. It is a growing concern in mental healthcare which has expanded to serve a much larger segment of the population than when it focused more on serious psychiatric illnesses like major depression, schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and PTSD. Some examples:
An emphasis on the stigma (i.e., shame) of undesirable behavioral symptoms is ableist toward those with more severe symptoms who are sometimes shunned as embarrassments by those who have diagnoses with less serious symptoms. Let's talk about discrimination instead of stigma.
An dogmatic respect for civil liberties in mental healthcare policy, admittedly in the best interests of the vast majority who are highly capable of making independent choices, is ableist toward those who are less able to make sound decisions in their own self-interest due to the no-fault symptoms of brain illnesses. Homelessness, incarceration, and death are too often the result of dogmatic respect for civil liberties.
The civil and criminal punishment of behaviors that are symptoms of illness is ableist toward those with such illnesses. No illness should be handled through the justice system. The fact that more persons with serious psychiatric illnesses get police officers as first-responders and are treated in the US justice system rather than in hospitals is the fault of the legal system, the medical system, and civil rights activists who have contributed.
The Recovery Model in mental healthcare is favored by a majority of patients (i.e., those who can and will achieve a high level of recovery). It is ableist toward a minority of patients who through no choice of their own are unable to recover and will need long-term supportive care to avoid homelessness and worse tragedies.
The National Alliance of Mental Illness (NAMI) was founded by two mothers who had sons with schizophrenia. It has become an ableist organization by growing the mental health advocacy umbrella to focus more on healthier persons, devoting a smaller portion of their efforts to those most in need of urgent help. A new advocacy organization is needed to honor the original intent of NAMI's founders.
I don't suppose there are any freelance #DataAnalysts interested in mentoring an apprentice middle-aged queer guy with a spotty work history, #MentalIllness and an absolute loathing of and revulsion to traditional performative job interviews (blind dates on steroids), knowledge quizzes, and milquetoast linkedin-style "networking", are there? Yeah, didn't think so. But I've already written all of this so here you are.
I have a solid history working with spreadsheets, relational databases, rudimentary knowledge of PHP and Python. At a previous employer I designed and programmed custom scripting for multiple variable data printing projects. I was enrolled in Google's "Data Analyst" training on Coursera but unfortunately can't afford the monthly fees to continue.
The caveat is you would need to meet or exceed my current generous retail salary of $15/hr. Try me for a week. If you aren't satisfied, just assassinate me in lieu of payment.