My "Ray of Light" for today is directly linked with my last post. I am SO thankful that books like Stop Pretending are starting to become more and more available. As much as these books are a nightmare to read and definitely not light reading, I believe it is SO important that our society becomes more informed.
In my support group last week we were talking about how hard it is to have a disease that just isn't understood. One member was mentioning some struggles with needing some time off work and their employer just not understanding. If this member had said they needed to go in to get chemotherapy or that he was struggling with heart disease, the odds are the employer wouldn't have thought twice about giving the needed time off.
Depression, bipolar, and any other major mental health disorder are no different...but that's not how much of the world sees us. Often we get classified as "lazy" or "weak." Sometimes I wish other people could spend a day or two in our shoes. Try fighting through the darkness that makes you feel like you're drowning. Try convincing your body that everything's fine when your brain is SCREAMING that you're going to die. Try dealing with feeling happy and fine one minute and seriously the next, for what seems like no reason at all, you're as low as you've ever been. Then let me know who is "lazy" or "weak."
Phew...I need to wrap this up. As you can tell, I feel very passionately about this. I know I have it pretty bad, but thankfully I'm definitely going in an uphill direction, with only minor set backs, but I see SO many others that have been fighting with EVERYTHING they have and it's just not working.
So thank you to Sonya Sones and others out there that are doing their best to show the reality of such difficult and debilitating diseases.
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2 comments:
AMEN. I don't know if I ever told you this, but I used to get really awful panic attacks. They were overwhelming... almost like somebody (or something) else was possessing my body and I couldn't stop it. They were so debilitating and I had to go on medication for a while to even them out. And that's exactly what I remember thinking - just how real an illness it was. And no matter what, I couldn't pray or think or talk myself out of it. We're really blessed to live in an age where medication for these types of things are available, and I see them just as that - a huge blessing from the Lord. I wish more people understood just how real and medical these problems can be.
SO true! Thanks for your support!
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