Can Crazy have friends?

 

It's hard to make friends when you feel like you don't belong.  "you need to build a support system, so just get out there and make friends."     How?

Mental illness is still a taboo subject, and it is agonizing to try and decide when to tell your friends.   Will they still be your friends after you tell them?   And this is just friendship, what about dating?   At what point in a relationship do you drop the "Oh yeah, by the way, I am crazy" bomb?  Do you wait until you think they love you?   Do you tell them towards the beginning?

 

 

One option in all of this is to just have relationships with people who have the same problems that you do.   This was often the method employed in mental health care systems.   "Come and socialize in a safe place with people just like you, so that you won't get hurt out there in society."    And, on some level it does work.    I don't have to worry that people will find out that I have a mental illness.   I can talk to someone with a similar experience to me. But I also don't ever get a chance to leave Bipolar at the door.   I don't want to take Bipolar out all of the time; take it to parties.   Take it on a date.   I want to forget about it sometimes. I want to feel like I belong.  I want to have friends that don't have Bipolar and friends that do.

 

Again, what if we compare mental illness with illnesses of the physical body.   This time, let's take diabetes.   Diabetes is a good example, because it changes your day to day life.  Usually there is some sort of daily medication or intervention of some sort.   People with diabetes also have to change some of the ways they live.   They have to learn to take care of themselves.   They have to live a life of wellness.   Just like people with mental illness.  But that is where the similarity stops.  Diabetics are not encouraged to only hang out with other diabetics.   You can talk about diabetes.   It is accepted as a 'real disease' and doesn't hang out in the shadows at social gatherings.    Diabetics can have friends.   They can date.    I'd bet that some of their friends have diabetes, and that some don't.

If they were to go into the hospital, or get really sick because of their diabetes, their friends would visit.   They would get cards and flowers.

 

What would happen in society if mental illness was accepted as just another illness?   What would happen if it came out of the shadows?  Then, I guess it would cease to be a 'big deal'.   The medical care for it would be equal to other medical care.   It would be a given that people who have it belong in society.   They would be treated with respect and dignity.   They could have friends.   They would probably go in for services more often, because services would not equal shame.

 

Here is an enlightening video from Ruby Wax.   She is a comedian that lives with depression.   Funny right?     I love this video because she points out how modern life lends itself to depression.   And she makes you think twice about stigma.

 



 

 

Well, I have to get going.   I am going to go have lunch with a friend.   A friend that does not have a mental illness.   A friend who knows that I do, and still wants to be my friend anyway.

Someday, it is my hope that it won't matter anymore that I have a mental illness.    And I won't have to agonize over telling my friends.   Hoping that they will still want to hang around me once they know.   Until that day, I like to ponder this quotation from Rumi:

 

You are not a drop in the ocean.

                                               You are the entire ocean in a drop.

 

When I think about this quotation, I feel less isolated.    I feel more connected.   And, I am probably a better friend and a more interesting person at the party, because Bipolar isn't at my side, whispering thoughts in my ear.  Thoughts like, 'you don't belong here'.    Or, 'once they know they won't like you anymore.'     The thing is, those thoughts can be true.   Stigma still exists.  But I am going to keep on trying to change that.   Even if I change minds one friend at a time.