Part of the reason I write this blog is to document my particular struggles with mental health. Having to deal with some kind of challenge that’s within the range of mental health is just as common as dealing with some kind of difficulty with any kind of physical health. In other words, either category is EXTREMELY…
Read more Treatment for mental health is hard because diagnosis is even harder
Four days after the devastating news of Robin Williams’ suicide, I’m still feeling the loss of someone I never even knew personally. Perhaps it’s because his genius acting work has been a part of my life pretty much ever since I can remember (oh, yes, I was watching when he first hit the airwaves with…
Read more One of Robin Williams’ final gifts? Getting us talking about mental health
I just came across this brief article about a Jewish rabbi visiting a newly built temple of my faith, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints: “What I learned from visiting the new Mormon temple.” I am always interested to hear what others think about visiting our sacred sites, and I enjoy discussion and interaction…
Read more Partnering with and struggling against at the same time
Thanks to the magic of WordPress, I just found out (a couple of weeks into the party) about the 2014 Blog for Mental Health. How nifty! I began this blog nearly two years ago because I wanted to share my own experiences with mental health, among other things. I’m happy to see others speaking out…
So I was appreciative this week to receive a book to review called Pros of Prozac: A Faith-Based Memoir of Overcoming the Stigma. Given my experience in book reviewing and my personal interest in mental health issues, this book was a welcome read. It’s a little slip of a book, just over a hundred pages,…
Read more Glad to read about others’ experiences with mental illness
Few things give me greater satisfaction than having friends (or even just acquaintances) come to me as a resource when faced with questions relating to mental health. Perhaps in part it’s nice to know that, despite my sometimes quirks or slightly “off” behavior, they still consider me a valuable source of information and even wisdom.…
I’ve been thinking about this idea for a long, long, LONG while, and I’ve put it in words now after reading some others’ blogs. Here it is: My mental illness is NOT an excuse for people with whom I interact to just write off anything I say or do that they disagree with. And yes,…
Read more Don’t use my mental illness as an excuse to write off everything I say or do
In some of my most challenging hours, I’ve told my husband I feel it’s unfair to him he’s had to deal with me and my mental health issues. (This cuts both ways, though, since I’ve also told him during similar moments that if he thinks it’s hard to deal with me — which he’s never said…
Read more We never fully know what we’re getting into, do we?
I’ve just had another week (couple of weeks? month?) that ended horribly for me mentally. I ended up nearly incapacitated with hurt, anger, and hopelessness, curled up on my bed in a puddle of tears and surrounded by tissues that I’d flung wherever. And something that has struck me (yet again) is how difficult it…
I’ve been fascinated for years by how our own minds can turn inside-out on us. Memories can and often do turn out to be slippery and even downright wrong in any “normal” individual. Brains getting eaten up by dementia lose familiar people and chunks of time entirely. Brains that are schizophrenic or otherwise split can…
