Hypermoral, hyper-religious

One of my mental illness symptoms is hyper-religiosity, which I have truly managed as well as I could, no matter how much people might still point out that I am annoying and uptight sometimes.  I know I am, and I know that my scrupulosity is a fault as much as it is a burden and source of pain. But I was thinking today that some of my excessive moralizing might have served a practical purpose, and as much as I have had to fight it, I have also had to use it.  I have a theory that it isn't just part of my brain on overdrive, but it might be something I have had to do to try to counteract other weaknesses that seem like character issues.   Both my mental illness and the medicine I take cause lethargy and reduced motivation and alertness, so I really have to convince myself that chores are important in order to exert any energy whatsoever.  I mean I practically have to view everything as some integral part of the whole world's salvation or at least my own survival and behavior record to even get up from a chair and fix some cereal.  And I am actually wondering if this might be a theory about schizophrenia, which sometimes includes extreme negative symptoms of apathy and inertia, as well as grandiose delusions for some people.  I mean maybe the herculean effort that it takes to get out of bed does make people think they must be some kind of important hero.  I do not know if that is how the delusions form, but I just today started wondering if some of my hyper moralism and excessive religious thought is from building too much strength as I have had to continually tap into my moral reasoning and religious faith in order to do any basic chore at work or at home. The fact is that there might be a reason why people like me imagine ourselves getting a reward on Judgement Day for merely considering doing a load of laundry, or find ourselves quoting the band of brothers speech on the way to the coffee shop.

Advice: People who don't live in glass houses should throw stones.

   I am currently finishing compiling a book and want to be done but have one more blog post to add to my mental health blog. I just want to say something that I recently figured out, which is different than some of my thinking was for a while.  What I am talking about is self-improvement advice that is designed for people with healthy minds.  There are a lot of sayings about how everything comes down to having a good attitude, and there is writing that praises cheerfulness, and advice about efficiency and not wasting time and all kinds of suggestions for people to be successful literally in every moment of their days.  And over the years, I have read some of these books, and some of these facebook posts, and heard some of these sermon references and thought, okay, that is great, but they clearly just don't understand.  They just don't understand what it is like to truly be human which I define as crawling into a corner crying every day.
    But I recently grew a little bit in my thinking, and realized that it is a little bit self-absorbed of me to think that everyone else who is striving to have a meaningful life and do good or even great things needs to tailor every message to those of us who have debilitating mental illness.
    The fact is that people who have strong minds should also play to their strengths, which literally could be everything they do, and they should be free and inspired to achieve all they can and boldly fling any perpetual good attitude in this oppressive world's face.  All of us are dependent on those superstars, and why should they wallow in the self-pity of others.  It is absurd, and when I read the encouraging advice that is for them and even might seem insensitive to my own ongoing loss that comes with depression and okay, psychosis, then I will be happy for them and be thankful that they are giving their all.  It is not fair for me to think less of people who waste their sanity and then also look down on people who have the luxury not having to waste anything.  So when people say on facebook that attitude is everything, or that making their bed is the key to a successful life, I am going to be thankful that I live in the same world with those people, and that they have included me to the extent that I can overhear any of their conversations about their clean and good habits that allow them to accomplish the most extreme human achievements, like writing thank you notes, having friends ride in their cars, and having clean dishes to eat off of.  That sounded sarcastic, but it isn't sarcastic, which probably matches some great advice out there that I don't know about because it wasn't posted on a Starbucks cup or Coke can.

Big Picture Strategies

    This idea is, like a few other posts, something that could go on the theology blog, but I am putting it on the mental health blog because I think that it could especially help people who have trouble with some of their goals and skills of living because of mental illness.  And sometimes some of the troubles people have are because of their mental illness and they don't know it, like feelings of laziness and undone chores, or habits that people can't seem to break.

   But anyway, in my twenties, I felt like such a failure all the time and there were so many things that I just couldn't fix.  For instance, my car was messy for all the years I had a car, and I could rarely have passengers. I also have had trouble eating well and often found myself eating fast food or frozen meals that I didn't really want instead of taking the time to cook, or sometimes, I felt like I splurged on groceries to cook when I should have eaten a frozen meal.  I mean some of that is just always feeling like I could never do anything right when really it was probably okay to just eat whatever I could. 

   But anyway, I mention those examples because those categories where people like me feel like we can't ever get anything right do add up and make us feel like we can't accomplish anything.  And having OCD just makes people more scrupulous about everything, including religion and socializing.

   But I found that especially because of working and going to school, that what I would call "big picture" interventions or some kind of large framework activity, totally changed my life, helped me be a generally more productive person, and took my mind off the details.  It is as simple as saying that I kept a job and did some school programs. Maybe it would be better to say it that way than making it sound like some kind of advanced mental health strategy, but I do think there is something about the structural nature of what helped me that is good to share for people who get trapped trying to improve their lives in perpetually microscopic ways that never quite work out.

   What I am saying is that some of those microscopic things get worked out automatically when there are bigger goals that people actually care about, like art, or writing poetry, or being part of a sports team or writing group, or doing some kind of volunteer work.  And I also found that some of my smaller self-improvement goals really were impossible, and I let them go.  I was more able to accept my imperfections (which actually are pretty significant) because I had other stuff going for me.  And I think a lot of people might say, well, hmm, I think it might have been better to go ahead and keep a clean room or eat less sugar or read the Bible in less haphazard ways, but I want to say that really there aren't that many critics who really do have other people's foibles and faults on their list of things to worry about, and nothing has helped me more than signing up for school and going to classes and making a few bigger decisions that result in some of my life schedule already being decided for a while.  The big goals also help distract me from depression and suicidal thinking, and while so many people don't have money for extravagant education , or access to a broad selection of arts programming that they can be a part of, it is likely that there is some kind of thing, whether it is church or volunteering or a mental health group, that can be worked in to people's lives so they set their alarm at 10 am for a purpose instead of setting their alarm at 6 am to try to prove to themselves and to the wind that they are still disciplined.

Good mourning

A friend of mine's stepmom once said that she thought that Post Traumatic Stress Disorder should be called Post Traumatic Stress "Order" because of course people would have nervous breakdowns from such horrible experiences. And as much as I do think mental disorders mostly truly are disorders and medical conditions, I occasionally go ahead and let myself think about life and conclude that any amount of broken mindedness and broken heartedness is not only appropriate in this sad world but possibly the only right state of mind.  I mean, for people to read the news and somehow live on without severe depression must be some kind of mental illness that they should be institutionalized for.  And I even see a case for thinking that the most outrageous delusions and hallucinations might arise from a very accurate assessment of a reality that is too tragic to accept at face value. I don't mean to sound like I am wishing panic attacks on people, because of course I am not, but I think that every now and then it might be good for everyone to go ahead and admit that it does seem like a lot of the people in the mental hospitals are the ones who really seem to "get it" and understand life with all its heart wrenching ways.

A helpful OCD and psychosis intervention

   I am putting this post on my mental health blog even though to me it really could be on the theology blog.  This post is about one of my strategies that helps me get through situations when I feel like I fall short of important standards in front of everyone.  A lot of behavior details matter to me, and I do think that small interactions can be very important and very representative of people's character and regard for other people.  But I do have some crazy neurosis and psychosis, so when I go wrong on a little detail and say the wrong thing or don't stick up for my faith and beliefs, or give a false impression or forget something important, I feel terrible and also feel ashamed in front of imagined onlookers who probably have their own goals to think about. It is a recipe for torment, but I have found a great mental and spiritual solution that works almost every time to help me accept my imperfections.  The thing that works is simply taking a few moments to think of letting someone else get the honor that I would have gotten for keeping certain standards.  You know, for everything I get wrong, there are people who would and who do get it right, and who don't bail on people and don't let people get picked on in their presence, and who do a better job of reporting suspicious packages at the subway. So when I fail, I have found that because I am so driven to be perfect, I actually can understand and feel happy for other people who actually achieve that vision, and I can successfully console myself by thinking about someone else getting some kind of glory, and some kind of reward, and some kind of credit in our world or even on the actual Judgment Day in heaven.  Some of this could be material for comedy, but to me it is a serious thing deep in my heart and I am thankful to be able to get such relief for every failure and to know that some of the service in the world and the good deeds from each other that we all rely on and sometimes take for granted are actually not that easy. And failure is a reminder of the cost of all the successes, and a comforting guarantee that I can look forward to other people's rewards as much as my own.

Lowerarchies

    In my early years of mental illness, I was in agony all the time but was able to hide a lot of my illness to the point where a lot of people just thought I was some kind of selfish loser with a bad attitude.  I always kind of wished that I had less pain and more visible symptoms so I could get credit for being mentally ill but felt better.  My illness now is a little bit like that, and though I am definitely heartbroken about a lot of it, I would like to say that I was kind of right about some of the way I thought that it might be nicer to have a more obvious illness with less pain.  And my symptoms now are very crazy schizophrenia symptoms that are considered by many to objectively be the worst mental illness that a person can have.  But as a person with that privileged status, I would like to say that any mental illness and even heartbreak that isn't mental illness can zap people as much as any other category.  Depression and anxiety seem so normal, almost like healthy human emotions, but they can both be entire disorders that devastate people beyond comprehension.  I have had all kinds of different depression feelings before, and some different kinds of anxiety, and I just want to say that they are not lesser mental illnesses in any way than the stuff that makes me talk to myself and hit myself in the middle of a job interview. And I still think no matter what I say, people will never understand how painful depression can be, and how debilitating anxiety can be, but I will still say that if people tell me they are so sorry that I have schizoaffective disorder and a whole mess of other symptoms, I might genuinely say sometimes, that "at least it's not PMS."

Dogs Know

   I am putting this post on the mental health blog, because I do not mean for it to be argumentative.  It is just something that I want to say about animals and people. And I am not just sharing an opinion, but speaking from years of experience as a person with depression and anxiety, and as a person who aspires to eventually do some pet therapy with my pet guinea pigs.

   A lot of people like to talk about how animals have an extra sense about things, and can sometimes perceive when something is wrong, or when there is a person who means harm.  Well it is true and family dogs save the day all the time, and service dogs defend their dog owners from bothersome encounters very often.

    But I think that healthy people who don't have a deep experience of chronic rejection and emotional pain may not realize that dogs do not know everything, and just because a dog barks at you doesn't mean that you are a bad person.  And telling everyone that this is the case may really hurt people.  Some people already feel like bad people when they aren't, and when some grumpy dog barks at them, that's all it is.  The dog has not discovered the true nature of anyone's character.  And there are mean dogs who attack children in neighborhoods every day.  And who is the bad person in that scenario?  Usually a bad neighbor who didn't give a flip about anyone else's safety, though of course sometimes there are genuine tragedies and accidents.

   Especially in my early years of depression, I found myself feeling a fear of being unliked by dogs many times, and feeling that based on other people's belief that dogs are the ultimate judge of character, and that if a dog growls at me then everyone has the right to conclude that I am really a bad person.  In reality, the dog might just sense my fear... of seeming like a bad person... because I am a good person who is taking a risk by being near an animal in a social situation.
   I am not making a big deal of it, but I have never heard anyone call people out on this whole gleeful suggestion that dogs make the final call on the state of people's hearts.  It is something that healthy people who aren't scared of having their feelings hurt by a dog take for granted, and it is something that no one understands until they have had social status so low that to be merely ignored by someone's dog can be the final proclamation of their guilt and worthlessness.

Hyper Abuse

    Ok everyone, here is the post that everyone has been vigilantly waiting for: a post about vigilance, and maybe even hyper vigilance.  Hyper-vigilance is a type of anxiety problem and a symptom of trauma. A lot of people talk about it in the context of PTSD when something horrible has happened and from then on the people who suffered are constantly on the lookout to protect themselves from anything else like it.  But I want to say that a lot of people are in chronic stress situations that do warrant some kind of unreasonable vigilance, so people's anxiety can be both appropriate and inappropriate at the same time.  I consider myself to have been in situations like this for decades at a time, and I may never really understand why that turned out to be part of my life.  For me, it was the stress of being mentally ill and keeping a retail job where any wrong move or bad word could cost me medical insurance for the rest of my life, and result in homelessness, death, or bankruptcy, and in my mind, cause a subsequent loss of the ultimate privilege of pleasing God with a productive Christian life.  Other people find themselves in situations that I think extract even more of a constant vigilance, such as caring for children with special needs, or caring for children at all in such a dangerous culture and world.  It is wearing on people in ways that I think no one else ever understands, even when other people are living their own lives of hyper-vigilance.  And I think that it can be confusing when there are official mental health symptom labels that by definition suggest that maybe some vigilance isn't justified, though most people assessing those symptoms usually do have some clue about the true suffering. 

   But what I am saying is that people are misunderstood when the unreasonableness of the persecution or the excessive responsibility makes people think that the emotional reaction of total fear or constant alertness is what is unreasonable.  Frankly, church people make this mistake very often, and I also think a lot of mindfulness people who lead meditations where they literally say things like "you have no problems" and "everything is how it is meant to be" are even worse than the bad Christian counselors. But the fact is that you are supposed to be scared when a giant python is squeezing the life out of you or your loved ones, or when a society of thousands gang up on you to take everything you have as soon as you acquire anything, or when an evil government holds your people hostage and grants little moments of relief in exchange for a gradual compromise of everything you believe in.  Some evil warrants sheer terror, and some people are terrorized not just in horrible events but in their everyday lives for years.  People who say that there's nothing to worry about are unworthy of what has been preserved by the monitoring and endurance of depressed people, and many of us have been so burnt by our own brain chemicals that we simply don't have any energy left to feel sorry for the shamefully ignorant people who told us that it was a sin to be anxious.

Help for Future Wounds

I am just telling this little story because I think it is interesting.  I recently bought a roll of gauze at the drug store for a wound on my hand, but then the wound healed and I did not need the gauze.  And when I was straightening up my apartment and found the gauze that I no longer needed, I started thinking that maybe God knows that I am going to have a gash my hand in the future and that is why he arranged for me to have some gauze on hand.  Get it? On hand? But anyway I am saying what if the whole reason I got the gauze was for another injury coming soon.  Like a guaranteed gash on my hand that could happen any day and is part of destiny. It made me feel scared, and then I figured out that I was being a little bit mentally ill and those thoughts were irrational.  I think it is kind of an interesting story, because people do have illogical worrying sometimes, and I think it is good for me to catch myself doing it because a lot of my worrying doesn't seem illogical.

Suicidal Prayer Credit

I think many people will say I am wrong about this and that it is bad theology but I think I am right enough to give people this idea so that they can have the same hope and endurance that has benefitted me.  The idea that I am sharing is simple, which is that if people have lived through any amount of suicidal thinking, it might be a good idea to just pray even a few of the biggest prayers you can think of for everyone you know and for your society because it could be a very special thing that you are still alive, and this might add some power to your prayers.  That is where people say okay no wait a minute you don't earn prayer power through your own efforts but I am not sure everyone really knows how everything works and I think once there have been significant threats to people's survival, and especially a chronic danger or a questioning of whether it is worth it to go on, then that is a clue that people's mere presence and existence is not something to take for granted, and just the effort of a few extra moments of thoughtfulness might be something that God is willing to match a millionfold. Is that so weird?  I am saying that when I have gotten through or am even in the middle of discouragement so bad that I think I can't go on, it takes five seconds to ask God for a million feasts and forgiveness for everyone who has ever lived.  I mean it is times like that when you ask for salvation for all mankind, or for everyone ever to have the relief that you can no longer even imagine.  Do other people not have a hunch that their prayers might be worth a little extra after twenty years of struggling to stay alive?  It actually is hard to do sometimes, because depression so often brings a feeling of being so bad that God would never answer any prayers.  But couldn't the suffering also be proof that something good is at risk, and might that thing be something as simple as one little prayer prayed for everyone at the right time?  I do not think I will ever regret trying to add prayer to my despair.

Seen and Unseen

There is a book called Blindness, by a guy named Saramago, or maybe a movie that I am getting it confused with, but basically the concept is that everyone goes blind except this one lady who can still see and she gets mixed in with all the blind people and is able to help them because of her sight.  I really liked the book and was thinking the other day that some of my experience with mental illness is like being both a blind person and the seeing person in that same scenario.  And it might not be my mental illness as much as it is an Asperger's profile with extreme gifts and extreme deficits.  Basically what happens is that I am a terrible helpless mess a lot of the times, but also a very capable strong person who can save the day for everyone around me.  There are days and times where I lean more in one direction, but mostly I am just a mix of these things every day.  And the effect it has is that I see for myself how disabled people are treated, but I know the cost and intent of that treatment as someone who is also not disabled.  I could probably write a much more thorough essay with examples, but I think that just mentioning it is enough for now.  I think in a way we all have kind of a spy quality to us as humans, and Christ himself said that what you do for the least of these is what you do for him.  So people are all kind of in a Shakespearian Twelfth Night play where people's true identity is eventually revealed and justice happens as people are exposed in their compassion or snobbery.  But I do think that there is some weird way where as a mentally ill person I experience this more than normal, and I see people include me with strength that I have used for other people before, or I see people dismiss me or even abuse me when they do not know what kind of insight I have into their absolute hypocrisy.

Mental Health Certificates

    I would like to share an idea that I think is already happening in some ways, which is for there to be more programs that offer mental health certificates, peer counseling credentials, and other mental health degrees that can be earned by people who have learned about mental health through suffering and survival, such as through a lifetime of managing mental illness symptoms or trying to heal from trauma or grief. I think it is a well known fact that many people who have struggled with almost any kind of emotional pain do find their way into the social work field and medical field as helpers, and one of my therapists from a long time ago said that therapists were often called "wounded healers."  It is true, and maybe no one needs to say it, but I have gotten the impression that there are a lot of mentally ill people out there who take their medicine, sometimes post comments on website discussions, may or may not have a part time job or hobby, but have no real formal recognition of the mental work they have had to do and the conundrums they have had to figure out in order to survive.  I mean just a class, or a few classes, or a year long program that helps them meet other people, could help them end up with a great certificate or degree to feel good about and possibly to help them find another official opportunity to share their life and learning with others who might be just beginning to navigate the challenges of depression and anxiety or other disorders.  Some group outpatient programs might consider offering an education component like that, too, which also incentivizes continuing treatment. It is also an alternative to putting a diagnosis on a resume, which is another thing that people might consider more often. The fact is that patients themselves often do not realize what kind of accomplishment is mixed in with all the days of sleeping late, going places when you don't feel like it, and drinking extra coffee, and a certificate on the wall could really be a reminder that at least some people have some idea of their true success.

Some people get to go to McDonalds after the hospital

   Well everyone, for this post, I am going to share my favorite term that I learned from social work school, which I completed in 2016. The term is "disenfranchised grief." I think that one of the most talked about ideas right now is the idea of "privilege," which has to do with unrightful societal benefits.  That wasn't really the idea that most resonated in my soul, but when I stumbled upon the term "disenfranchised grief" in an article about people who have had to go to jail, I felt that years of thinking had finally found a representation in another context.  The term has also been used in other articles, and I think it was first thought of by someone named Doka in 1989.  It was weird for it to be just a sidebar that I gleaned from reading about other topics, because to me it almost epitomizes what I think is a core struggle for all kinds people, including everyone who is hurt by things like privilege.

   Disenfranchised grief refers to the uncomforted mourning of people who have losses and suffering that the people around them and the rest of the society either do not care about or do not understand.  I think almost everyone can relate, but for some people, it is a defining feature of their whole lives or of certain major experiences.  People with addictions often have loss upon loss and not only have no sympathy, but take a lot of blame for their problems which happened from a spiral that at some point, they had little control to prevent. Legal troubles and going to jail or being in the military and having family life disrupted can be situations that are disenfranchised, or even "anti-franchised," though people in the military are often called heroes and there might be some support that others might not have.

   Really, anyone in any situation can find their pain deemed irrelevant by other people when it is never mentioned in church sermons, or never mentioned in the media, and when personally no friends seem to truly be there for them.

   I think that even with this concept that almost anyone can probably relate to on some level, there are people who seek out those who need consolation, and a lot of people can eventually find someone who cares and understands. I think that is what social work and mental health services are really about, and I remember getting training for a Crisis Line and the leader told us that what counts as a crisis is different for different people.  I mean that is so simple and yet it is so foundational if people really want to show any kind of compassion for anyone else in the world.

   I wanted to share it on my blog early on, because I think even the existence of a term like that reverses some of the damage and offers "franchise" both to all the neglected losses, and to the additional heartbreak of disenfranchised grief itself.

Mental Health Blog Intro

   Well everyone, I am starting a new blog about mental health.  It is crazy to think that this could become the main way I share my ideas and stories about living with mental illness, because I have a lot to say and have had some crazy experiences and some experiences just being crazy. You really aren't supposed to refer to people as crazy, and some would say don't call yourself that either, but I have always been pretty happy to be in that category.

   I remember when I was in elementary school, we had field day each year right before school was out, and the fifth graders always did a certain relay called "the String Man," which involved choosing one person from your team to stand at the end of the field and then everyone took turns running to put oversized crazy clothes on them, like a hat and a tie and a giant coat, and for the finale, a ping pong ball in the mouth. Even though I was a little scared of the ping pong ball requirement, I always wanted to be the String Man, and when I was finally in fifth grade, my dream came true and my group let me be the String Man.  It was an honor to be the crazy person in front of everyone, and I mostly feel the same way about my mental illness now.  Different people have had different experiences with losing their minds, and mental illness is often a path of continual heartbreak and humiliation.  So I do not want to come across in any insensitive way or make light of people's pain.  But I genuinely have always thought mentally ill people were cool and interesting, and I am overjoyed and thankful beyond any capability of expressing it to live almost my whole life with a mind that makes mood rings shoot sparks and that keeps reality from dominating every conversation like I do when I am manic.
  I am a fool and a weirdo, and sometimes an outcast, and sometimes a spectacle, but every day I generate more prayer and ideas, more material for comedy in heaven, more potential friendship for others who suffer, and most importantly, most nobly, and most spiritually... carbon dioxide. Just staying alive is literally a lifetime achievement accomplished every day. Reality is different for mentally ill people, and not just because of delusions.  During a depression, microwaving a bag of popcorn can become a heroic act of strength, and for someone with social anxiety, looking out the window can be a triumph. Our suffering is a mystery to some of the sanest, smartest people there are, and as we endure our hardship while being so often misunderstood, there are opportunities for great wisdom found in mental spaces that most people will never have access to.  Some of those spaces happen to be hell on earth for years at a time, so let's not paint a picture that is too optimistic.  But let's do paint some pictures and eat some good food and keep on going just in case we have a day where we find that we are the people responsible for telling the people who judge us that they are raving lunatics.