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Mental illness defined: Can you imagine
what it feels like?
Editor’s note: This story was submitted
by a UAS student. Because of its personal nature, names have been
omitted.
Try to imagine
for a second that you are mentally ill. What comes to mind?
Do you imagine yourself as schizophrenic, or does it feel like a
bad acid trip? Maybe you imagine yourself back in time on a rollercoaster
in Disneyland when you were 10 years old, and it was so scary and
fast that you crapped your pants. How embarrassing! What if it felt
like being raped at a “friends” house where you thought
you were going to be safe after a long night of drinking? That happened
to one of my best friends and I couldn’t do anything to stop
it. Can you feel a mental illness yet? I can. I was hospitalized
for my mental illness symptoms all week. Yup, that’s right,
I have a mental illness. A problem with my thinking and thoughts
that I cannot handle.
I’m not looking for sympathy or for anything really,
but I guess I should explain what my symptoms are. I question everything.
All my life I have asked “why this, or why that” and I’ve
never accepted anything at face value. Even events of my life that
most people do not question, I question…everything! It is a
form of hallucination called “distortive perception patterning.”
At least that’s what I will call it, because the doctors can’t
call it anything. In fact, the label they have given me is actually
“not otherwise specified.” Can you imagine what it feels
like to have a doctor tell you that you have a disease but they
don’t know what to call it? That it is so unique, only you,
just you, not anybody else in the whole world has what you have.
Well, along with thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of people
who on the outside seem fairly normal to most, but has been diagnosed
as mentally ill, not otherwise specified.
To get back to my disease, “distortive perception
patterning,” I see patterns in everything. Somehow I believe
that EVERYTHING fits together in such a unique way as to show me
every second of every day that God exists. Some call that an “obsessive
compulsive” behavior, others call it “manic depressive”.
Some even say it is psychotic or even schizophrenic. Thank goodness
a trained doctor, a medical professional does not say those things
about me! Then I’d be really crazy! LOL!
Maybe you have had some sort of contact with me on campus
or elsewhere in this beautiful city that I call my home. I’ve
lived here since the 3rd grade. You may have seen “signs”
that I’m “not right in the head,” or “different.”
Well I’m not ashamed of my disease anymore. I am scared of
it, scared as hell, but I put my faith in God that one day I may
be healed of this curse that makes me question, and ask why. I pray
every day that I have the protection of my Lord and Savior Jesus
Christ around me. Sometimes, some days, like last Monday, I felt
like He was all that stood between me and complete insanity.
I’m terribly sorry if this is too personal. I don’t
want sympathy. Everyone has his or her own battles to fight, everyone
has to win the “war” going on inside your heart about
which “side” you are on. Maybe my problem is simply that
I can’t believe that God would want me on his side after all
the crap I’ve put Him through. Wait, then I think that’s
unfair! I didn’t put God through crap, I put ME into crap.
I got myself into this mess, and what I realized this week during
my hospital stay is that I’m the one dragging myself through
the mud. Nobody else is forcing me to do anything! I’m the
one who can choose to let go or to hold on. I am responsible for
me and what I do or do not do for myself and others! Wow! If that’s
true, can we play Quidditch tomorrow on God’s soccer field
where everybody wins, and nobody is a loser? God replies to me,
“NO! Many are called, few are chosen. Some will follow me because
they love me truly, but “others” will still heed the call
of my enemy.” Well count me as a “some,” not an “other”
please!
Maybe my problem is still that I ask why to God, why
can’t we all get along, have peace, here and in the Middle
East, and “live long and prosper” as some would say? God
speaks to me again. “In my time, in my time.” Whew, thanks
God, can I take a break and just go to school and have fun again…?
Oh yeah! That’s what I was doing before I went to the hospital…
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