|
Living a full life with mental illness by Sr. Ann Marie Emon, OSF
As a child, I wasn't sure why Mom stayed in her housecoat all day staring out the window,
drinking coffee and smoking cigarettes. I did know she loved me. She also had great
faith in God.
As an adult I learned Mom's illness was schizophrenia and that some of my aunts and cousins
also dealt with mental illness. I didn't even consider that I'd inherited some form of
mental illness until I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder in 1995.
Bipolar disorder (also known as manic-depressive illness) is a disorder in which a person's
mood changes in cycles. The person feels periods of elevated mood, periods of depressed
mood and times when mood is normal.
Looking back I can recognize symptoms of depression. In high school one of the Sisters
often told me not to look so sad. Sometimes at night I'd cry quietly so no one would hear
me; I didn't know why I was crying. Concentrating became more difficult.
Now I recognize hypomania in myself. Hypomania is a mild form of mania that has symptoms
of feeling unusually "high" or euphoric: talking so fast others cannot follow you,
having racing thoughts, being so easily distracted your attention shifts between many topics in
a few minutes, doing reckless things without concern about bad consequences.
In college I got tagged with the phrase "free associating." I talked on and on
jumping from one topic to the next and back again. It got to be a joke.
Learning to be a teacher brought out the creative part of me, but keeping up with college
courses, lesson plans, church duties would result in fatigue and tears. When I cried my
tears came spurting out like an avalanche.
Many years later I went to my primary care physician. She did heart tests and blood work
and said I was fine. I walked out of the office thinking, "No one dies of
fatigue!" so I pushed on. A year later while I was in a difficult ministry situation
I found myself crying when I brushed my teeth and when I drove. I remember grocery
shopping and leaving groceries outside my car while I tried to muster up enough stamina to put
them in the trunk. At worked I was missing appointments. I started ruminating about
suicide. I got scared and went to the emergency room.
I called the superior of my religious community and told her I couldn't do it any more.
She was completely supportive. Mid-year I quit my job, got a spiritual director, started
biking for exercise and got massages weekly. But I got worse. Finally I saw a
psychiatrist. It was April 1994 and I was diagnosed as having a major episode of
depression. I fell deeper and deeper into depression until I was hospitalized for 12 days
and diagnosed with bipolar II disorder. In bipolar II disorder a person has only
hypomanic and depressive episodes. If a mood stabilizer is not prescribed with an
antidepressant, the antidepressant may trigger a "high" or set off more frequent
cycles. That is what happened to me.
I had six years of hospitalizations, cognitive therapy, hypomanic episodes and six different
combinations of medications before I started to live in recovery. I have learned that
recovery is an interpersonal dynamic process of embracing hope and defining oneself.
The way I can show my gratitude is to reach out to others with mental illness. I have
chosen to be involved in a Partnership for Faith Based Initiative with the Medical University
of Ohio, the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill of Greater Toledo and Rescue Mental Health
Service to bring the mental health community and the faith community of our diocese together to
learn and support one another. I believe God wants me to minister to those who deal with
mental illness. Many opportunities have come my way, and I know it is just the
beginning. The faith my mother had is the root of my belief in our good God who will
always love and sustain us, bringing good out everything.
|
