Loving crazy people (page 2)

R.Crusoe

To me psychotherapists are like elders trying to tell a JW why what they do is not the way somebody else higher up thinks it should be done for the majority of the time without ever entering into a personal relationship which is what is lacking from your life - soulmates of like minds!

Sure some will understand you but it's why certain individuals seem irretrievable!

A post about EGOISTS within the last day or so showed how some whovehad a rough time see much more than others about how the whole cycle of society works and when family treat them with a non-egoist agenda and they don't respond, it's put down to their disorder. And the individual senses it like shit on their sandwich! So meeting up with family can often feel like a bad feeling for both sides and especially the one left alone.

That's the trouble - each person has been through an institution and the ones who either arrested thenm or sent them down or set them free have all had a completely different reality which stands out like a white arse on a beach full of sunbathers!

My only experience of a solitary empowering psychology that I came across so far has been in a place I least expected it - one which looks at the individual as a small but essential part of the daily life on our Earth and ways that individual can find to locate positive energy and lose negative energy! May seem laughable to many and I can hardly believe I like it - but completely on my own terms otherwise no point after all the crap of religioso land!

So I may be Wiccan this time next year, but I make no pledges for it is not for me so to do with the limitations of what I know!

Good luck to you all!

Crusoe - one crazy SOAB!

Abandoned

It's difficult to love people with emotional challenges. The biggest issue, in my opinion, is the increased need to enforce boundaries. That's one of the common denominators among those with emotional issues. I believe it's roots are in the enhanced self-centeredness that also seems all too common. The two together, make a situation where boundaries have to be re-defined on a daily basis. Not that the definition from the day before is no longer valid, but that the emotionally challenged person needs constant reminders that they even exist.

chickpea

CBT = cognitive behavioural therapy..... she has also been thru EMDR (eye movement desensitization reprocessing) and DBT ( dialectical behavioural therapy).... even though we still assume the financial responsibility for her therapies, we are pretty much out of the loop unless she asks a therapist to call us (after all HIPAA requirements are satisfied)

http://www.nami.org/Template.cfm?Section=About_Treatments_and_Supports&template=/ContentManagement/ContentDisplay.cfm&ContentID=7952

yumbby

Uhh, I just felt sick when I read your post, it just hit so close to home. I've been on both sides of the story, I cared for a mentally/physically ill mother for years and then myself have become quite sick: bipolar, pstd, anxiety disorders and I just feel so much guilt and shame at how much pain and suffering I've caused my loved ones by being crazy and just causing them unneccesary grief. The one thing I've taken away from it is that you can love and take care of someone who is mentally ill as long as you keep a distance to protect yourself from that black vortex that seems to suck everyone possible in around it. You have to take care of yourself first.

Crumpet

I just feel so much guilt and shame at how much pain and suffering I've caused my loved ones by being crazy and just causing them unneccesary grief.

This totally struck a chord for me Yumbby. And then its a vicious circle. You hate yourself more and hurt yourself more and in turn hurt others that you do love dearly, and then you hate yourself for doing that and feel unworthy and withdraw further and further. It is a very helpless feeling.

My mum was slightly crazy. My dad would call it her "hazard" time. She would just become this spitting, hissing vile monster at times. I remember her calling me terrible things when I had accidents - you know breaking a lamp when I was a child or repeating something that I had heard at as school that I didnt understand. I didn't understand why she didn't love me. I don't think she did either. My other two sisters she adored, but there were times she couldn't conceal her hate of me. I've figured some of that part out now. I think by the time I was 16 and left home she did love me, but it was too late by then of course. The horrible, horrible thing was I really loved her. I still do. You just never knew each morning whether you were going to wake up with nice-mummy or scary-mummy. Somtimes when she'd been particularly abusive to me my father would take her into another room and they'd argue and she'd come out and apologise, but I knew it was because he had made her do that so it lacked any sincerity. Children are so forgiving though.

CHL I feel sad for those kids growing up in a situation that resembles anything like I've described above. I'm the product, in part, of that and look how broken I am. I don't think I've ever really acknowledged or understood until just now, how utterly damaging ultimately that has been. What you said about realising that actually we never get it - we never know all the solutions all of the time, though we think this will magically happen when we become grown-ups - I don't think I knew that properly either til just now. That's a scary thought. If no one knows then how can anyone help?

Chickpea- your daughter is blessed to have you.

wanderlustguy

I thought I'd come to an age where I'd 'get it'. That is the illusion. No one 'gets it.'

You might rescind that one when you hit mid 30's. At 33 and on into now, things are coming into much sharper focus. Everything makes much more sense.

In my opinion, of course.

coolhandluke

there are flashes of brilliance WLG, and they seem to come with more frequency and longer lasting clarity. but no one has every answer. i think we do the best we can

Maddie

I have a brother with a mental illness and no family to care for him except me and my hubby. He is stable on his medication now so in lots of ways he is much better, but his quality of life is still not what I would like him to have. He hardly ever goes out or mixes with people unless we take him out or visit him or see the mental health workers. A few years back he was much worse and would phone me up all the time saying that he was going to commit suicide.I spoke with his psychiatrist and realised that I needed to set some boundaries as a lot of it was for attention. I love him dearly and do what I am able to do for him but it does upset me that more can't be done for him.

Maddie

chickpea

i truly believe it cannot be overemphasized that boundaries are imperative for the sake of those who love individuals with mental health issues.....it offers what little stability there can be in such an unpredictable type of relationship.... not only for the alleged "sane" individual, but i think, too, for the person struggling to live with their impediment..... boundaries can be stabilizing for them, reinforcing for them what kind of behaviours will be supported and what kind will be rebuffed or redirected.....fine line and incredibly difficult not to get sucked into every crisis

i feel for ya, mates.... deeply and fully

Loving crazy people

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