three to four weeks

A little bit "stream of conciousness" writing about my demons. For your benefit as well as mine, but please... no pity.

Imagine you wake up every day in pain. It's severe enough that you don't even want to get out of bed you feel so bad. But you have responsibilities that cannot be set aside, so you get up

That pain stays with you throughout the day. There are moments, sometimes even an hour or two, of relief, but like an overbearing house guest, the pain never leaves you alone.

You go see a doctor who knows your condition, prescribes medication to help with the pain and asks to see you in 3 to 4 weeks. After all, that's about how long the medication will take to really work. Oh, and by the way, it's likely that this medication will make your pain worse. If it does, get in to see the doctor sooner, and also, we have a whole slew of medications we can try in case this particular one goes south. But again, each time it will be 3 to 4 weeks before we'll know and your pain might again get worse instead of getting better.

It's not that the doctor is incompetent. No, he's one of the best in his field. You just have to endure life altering pain for days and weeks at best and months and years at worst before you may find any measure of relief.

It's exhausting. It's terrifying. It makes you want to weep. In fact, you often can't do anything but weep.

And it is my life. Every day for months now. Life with a diagnosed, but not successfully treated mental illness.

I'm writing this post for two reasons:
1) because it helps me to write. I can process, make some order out of the chaos in my head. Search for meaning in the moments of mind-numbing anguish. It helps me to write.

2) because maybe you know someone with a mental illness. Maybe you are someone with a mental illness. If you have it, you need to know you aren't alone. You aren't the only one contemplating the deepest abyss and overcoming it hour by hour, day by day. If you know someone, maybe you can understand a bit better what it is they may be facing. You can give an encouraging hug. Some words like, "I see your suffering, and I'm cheering for you." Words that might lift up hands which hang and strengthen knees which are feeble.

I'm NOT writing this post for pity. Unlike others I've talked to, I have almost zero shame about my mental illness. I haven't worn myself to the bone thinking that I'm depressed because I'm just not good enough or because I'm weak. I don't wish to hide the fact that my mind is broken any more than I might wish to hide if my arm were broken. Even my therapist and psychiatrist have made comments concerned about the stigmas associated with these illnesses. And while you could state with some certainty that I'm not exactly of sound mind, all I want to say is, "Who cares?"

I've learned from multiple sources, (parents, family, friends, books, and even TED talks) that mental illness is really the same as physical illness insofar as it's just a part of the body experiencing malfunction. It's different in that the human brain is, as my psychiatrist put it, the most complicated system in the entire known universe. And we haven't exactly cracked the code of fixing it when it's broken.

All that is to say. Be kind to those around you. You never know what darkness they may be facing. It may be that your kindness is just the thing that gets them through one more hour, one more day, or one more round of meds that may not help. Be kind, be encouraging, and above all, be patient.

As Tolkien might say:

Even darkness must pass.
A new day will come.
And when the sun shines
it will shine out the clearer.

photo cred