Sometimes I am too…
I realize now that my mother was ill… and her illness made her brain turn her into a monster. I have the same illness she had… but I am not a monster nor am I any of what she said I was…
I am not who my mother wanted me to be and I am proud of that… As I sit here and type these words… I am proud that I have found it within myself to be proud of what I have accomplished…. After all that I have seen felt and lived… the ugliness of life… I can proudly say I am a survivor.
I have schizophrenia… an illness that people are afraid off… mostly because they don’t know better… I admit, sometimes I am afraid of it too even though I’m living it… Maybe, because I’m living it…
There are some things that I may not tell… mostly because they are either very private or they are way too ugly to expose to another human being… or maybe both… For years I was afraid I was somehow “becoming my mother”… I had the symptoms… but doctors called it something else… said I was depressed, anxious and had dissociative identity disorder and Post Traumatic Stress disorder abuse of the abuse and the loss of my children…
So… I have an illness called schizophrenia… and I am not afraid to say it out loud.
You are a survivor. I’ve read some of your post and know you’ve had a hard time. Your mother was abusive to you and left some deep scars. I’m a survivor of physical, emotional and sexual abuse. In many ways I’m glad these acts happened when I was young. I suffer from Treatment Resistant Bipolar Disorder. I was diagnosed 30 years ago and Bipolar was not a part of the everyday conversation. I tried to hide it from employers, friends, everyone. I didn’t think there was help. My father committed suicide in 1992 and it opened my eyes to face my disease. I’m not afraid of you simply for being schizophrenia. I’ve been hospitalized several times and one time I was afraid of a guy. Your right, even with my mental illness I didn’t know much about schizophrenia. His behavior was different, he talked to people of his spaceship and walked around the rec hall non-stop. It’s not the illness that scares me, it’s the behavior. I can tell you’ve worked hard to overcome adversity on many levels. Like so many things people don’t understand, they form an opinion instead of learning. Have a great weekend.