Redefining Mentally Ill

[Recovery4Me]

So really the only thing that makes someone abusive is not
mental illness at all, it's them being bad people.

Well offered. Thank you for your share. Mentally ill labeled people have often been the most honest people I have known.

There was this Special Olympics clip I saw on the net years ago from Spain. The teens were running a race and a young girl stumble at the starting line due to being startled by the starting gun. She cried out and they all stopped, walked back to her, helped her up and walked arm in arm across the finish line.

The crowd roared, the tears fell and in the moment...I understood what supporting your friends really meant. One of my greatest lessons came from the Mentally Challenged (?). Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

 

[Deleted member 12723]

I have found the responses in this thread very interesting and educational.

I prefer to say I have a emotional injury. Many in fact.

The truly insain people in this world in my opinion are those who practice evil upon their targets of abuse. They do not see what they do or did as wrong at all in any way.

But they are usually the pillars of society and admired greatly and even are greatly supported when their evil acts are exposed to the public.

 

[shimmerz]

Mental illness doesn't = hurting people, victimizing others, etc.

Forgive me. I know this. I was thinking more parents and children. I have personal experience with someone who learned I had PTSD ask me if I was prone to attacking people. I laughed - otherwise I would have hit him. Not my M.O. :} Please consider that statement retracted. Thank you so much for bringing it to my attention @Justmehere and any of you who may have rightly taken offense to such.

Please note however, that I consider mental injury (damage) different from mental illness as I pointed out above. Doesn't negate the issues you brought up but I had to clarify based on your last statement. :)

I as well believe our entire society is affected by the way we are forced to live, the stresses we are put under and the 'hidden secret' of violence amongst other things. The list is too long.

 

[Recovery4Me]

@shimmerz :hug: It is a wonderful thread to explore honest feelings and gauge our pulse on ourselves as well as others. Hang in there beautiful!

 

[Justmehere]

I have personal experience with someone who learned I had PTSD ask me if I was prone to attacking people.

Ugh, that was a dumb and painful comment he made @shimmerz! :( I've heard others say the same. I wish they would say that stuff about the people who hurt us! Not us.

By the way, I wasn't offended at all by your words. I totally get what you were saying. I was just offering a different (and not well worded) perspective. This is a great topic and thread.

 

[shimmerz]

It was very well worded @Justmehere. I thank you! I hope that others get something from it. In all seriousness it has changed the way I am looking at this situation. I am just so grateful to everyone. :hug: all around! Make them a double!

 

[shimmerz]

Saying that you aren't mentally unwell

I think what I am trying to say is that I am mentally unwell (obviously) but mentally damaged by those who were mentally ill. This may seem like a small distinction but to me it is quite large for reasons I stated above. I feel like using the term mentally ill for people who have been victimized into self protective behaviours and fear responses should be treated differently within the mental health system (and the system at large) than those who victimize others. IMO thisis less black and white thinking than calling the victims of the perpetrators the same label as those who injure others - with my stance being that these perpetrators are given the golden seal of approval by error of omission. Call me damaged and treat me for such and call them perpetrators and treat them as such. To me it is like the difference between PTSD and Complex PTSD. To me it comes down to societal attitude and treatment.

 

[joeylittle]

I feel like using the term mentally ill for people who have been victimized into self protective behaviours and fear responses should be treated differently within the mental health system (and the system at large) than those who victimize others.

The only thing you are leaving out here is the third category; those who are mentally ill and not guilty of victimizing. I have major depressive disorder. I absolutely call myself mentally ill. MDD has never caused me to harm someone. But I also have PTSD and in a recent flashback I shoved someone so hard they fell back into a table. I've also (sadly) attacked my therapist before. So this:

I have personal experience with someone who learned I had PTSD ask me if I was prone to attacking people.

Describes some of my symptoms. I do agree with you that it really sucks to be the one left holding the PTSD bag, while there's some other horrible awful person out there simply getting off on hurting people. I wish they were all caught and punished. But it's not going to be that way. And that somehow can make our burden worse.

I just wanted mainly to speak up for the mood disorders and psychotic disorders - these are mental illnesses, there is something different/wrong about the way we work neurologically, but we aren't criminal by default. (I know that's not what you're suggesting, @shimmerz ; I'm just adding to the conversation.)

 

[shimmerz]

@joeylittle I as well will fight tooth and nail to keep someone from putting something inside my mouth. I did it once without warning, learned and then let everyone know that this is what I would do. It comes from an honest place. I expect that you get no enjoyment out of the fact that you hit someone. This is not the scenario I am looking at.

it is those that continue to harm because they either derive pleasure from it or feel impotent or because they are not willing to look inside themselves because they don't care what they do to others.

I so wish the attitude wasn't 'that will never happen' when we speak about taking someone to task who has harmed others. It needs to happen or this entire civilization will implode upon itself. Perhaps it already is. I expect that change needs to happen. People who beat children need to go to jail - children shouldn't be sent away because of the sins of their parents. And maybe screen foster homes a bit. Out of the kettle into the fire should not be an option for children.

It is the intention here - I am assuming you are getting help @joeylittle - you are showing that by being on this forum. That means your intention is good although your reactions are not. We are told over and over again that when dealing with trauma we need to get to the core of the problem (the root problem). I suggest that we as a society need to get to the root of the problem when it comes to perpetrators and not stand for it anymore. Jeez - they have witch hunts on for smokers, for drug dealers, for digital piracy, can they not prioritize child beaters for F sake. When is enough enough? Societies priorities suck.

 

[Lady of Longbourn]

I have Bipolar Disorder type 1. I am know I am mentally ill. I can't run from that.

I am trying not to feel you are putting your abusers into the same box as me. I think you said something about 'retracting that statement' but I am still confused by all the comments to be honest. I am not really sure how you are supposed to redefine 'mentally ill', what you seem to be saying from what I can work out is that you don't want to be labelled 'mentally ill' along with people like me?

Those people with:

I just wanted mainly to speak up for the mood disorders and psychotic disorders - these are mental illnesses, there is something different/wrong about the way we work neurologically

Which is true be definition, bipolar disorder is a mood disorder caused by chemical imbalances while PTSD is not.

 

[Lady of Longbourn]

I agree with you; the abusers who hurt and damage others are the ones mentally ill.

Can this be less of a blanket statement? There are plenty of people with mental illness (myself) who have never hurt anybody. I would rather not be put into the same category as the abusers please. I know there are some abusers with mental problems but the majority of people with mental illness have never hurt anybody.

 

[joeylittle]

The stigmatization of the mentally ill is so surprisingly real. I honestly forget sometimes. I live in a small world where I can afford treatment, I have great doctors, it's not uncommon for people in my line of work to have a mental illness...so to me, calling myself mentally ill is just normal. My brother is bi-polar, my father schizophrenic. I'm depressive. And just echoing @Ayesha , because I think it is very important to say repeatedly: I have not harmed anyone, except for myself.

Maybe the bigger question is, what is really so wrong about acknowledging that one has a mental illness? I guess I can understand why someone with just PTSD could feel resentful about being thrown into the mix with the rest of us; as many people are pointing out in this thread, the purely-PTSD did not draw the chemical imbalance card. PTSD was forced upon them.

It was forced upon us mood disorder and psychotic folk too. We just started with a chemical imbalance. And we are just people struggling with an illness (or two). Mental illness.

Is it really that scary, or bad, or uncomfortable, to use the term?

Or is is more like the sufferer vs. survivor argument?