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Mental Illness: Survival and Beyond
by Virginia Susan Wilson
90 pages; quality trade paperback (softcover); catalogue #98-0031; ISBN 1-55212-213-1; US$13.50, C$15.00, EUR11.00, £7.50
This book is intended to help the person hospitalized on a psychiatric unit for the first time. Practical matters, such as the searching of possessions, are discussed, along with the feelings that these experiences are likely to engender.
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about the book about the author introduction table of contents excerpt from Conclusion excerpt from Chapter 4: Now You Are a Mental Case catalogue info
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About the BookThe person hospitalized for a mental illness for the first time is usually bewildered, frightened and appalled. The admission process to a psychiatric unit is both intimate and disturbing. The first part of this book explains what the person can expect to happen, the reasons for the various procedures, and how they are likely to feel. This is intended to make the process less alarming, and let this person know that he or she is not alone. Later chapters discuss the issues of recovery and discharge, and the final chapter is devoted to coping mechanisms which the person can develope after the hospitalization. The various sections of the book are written so as to take into account the particular difficulties of each stage of the illness. So the first chapter is written very simply because it is very hard to concentrate on reading when the symptoms are acute. The later chapters contain more lengthy passages, intended for when the person has started to recover. Mental illness still carries with it a stigma in our society. So even after the person has recovered, there are likely to be difficulties arising from having been in a psychiatric unit. The implications of this are discussed, and some possible solutions are offered.
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About the Author
Virginia Wilson trained as a biochemist in Britain, although now she is occupied with writing. She has spent time in four psychiatric units, two in Canada, and two in the United States. As a result of these experiences, she developed an interest in public education about the problems of the mentally ill, and completed the manuscript of "Mental Illness: Survival and Beyond" in 1997. She works for the Canadian Mental Health Association (Metro Toronto Division) as a public speaker on behalf of the mentally ill, and visits psychiatric inpatients with her Therapy Dog, Ben.She has studied creative writing at Johns Hopkins University, and the University of Toronto, and is now attempting her first novel.
Introduction
This book is intended to give you practical help if you, your loved one, or your patient is hospitalized for a psychiatric illness. Practical matters, such as the searching of possessions and the allocation of "privileges" are discussed, along with some notes on how the hospitalized person is likely to feel during the various stages of the process. The aim of this is to help the person get the most out of his or her stay, minimize its length, and feel less alone during the process.The book is structured to accompany you, the consumer, through the process, given the difficulties you may be experiencing at each stage. So the first chapter is presented simply, only because I can remember being so distressed that I could not concentrate enough to read effectively. The later chapters contain more lengthy passages, and are intended to be read only after you have started to feel better. The last chapter is meant for that time after your discharge, when you have to cope alone.
When this book was first written, people usually stayed in the hospital for six to eight weeks. Today, many people are discharged after only a few days. This mystifies me. The new medications available now are very effective, but not so much as to cure someone in less than a week. The brutal fact is that many are discharged prematurely. More and more consumers are having to get by with very little help, and many of them are homeless. In response to this appalling circumstance, I have restructured this book to expand the chapters that discuss ways of managing a mental illness outside the hospital environment.
Although this book is addressed to the consumer, there are others who may find it useful. Psychiatric residents, student nurses, social workers and occupational therapists, may find this volume helps them to relate to their patients. Family members and friends might feel less bewildered after reading it. I hope that the policy-makers might derive some insight from it, but I suspect that this is wishful thinking. If any of these groups increase their understanding of mental illness, then consumers are helped, which is the sole purpose of the book.
Lastly I would like to state that I will refer to people with mental illness as consumers, because this is the term that they prefer. I have a slight problem with this word, however, because it seems to imply an element of choice. I believe that mental illness is illness, as real and legitimate as any other, and people have no choice about whether or not they will be afflicted by it. I do not object to the term "survivor" in this context. Recovery from mental illness is a matter of survival, and that is what this book is all about.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgements Introduction 1. Your Time in the Hospital The First Day The Next Morning Learning to Wait Choosing Your Food Relationships with Other Consumers Ward Meetings Black Humor in the Day Room Weekends and Holidays Your Legal Rights 2. Your Treatment Symptoms Section 1. Disorders of Mood Medications Psychotherapy Light Therapy ECT. (Shock Treatments) Section 2.Anxiety Medication Section 3. Disorders of Perception Medication Section 4. Obsessions and Compulsions Medication Behavior Modification 3. If You Are Terribly Ill Surviving Your Survival Delerium and Psychosis 4. Now You Are a Mental Case Your Attitudes Toward Yourself The Attitudes of Others Toward You Your Attitudes Toward Other Consumers Your Attitudes Toward the "Normal" World 5. Getting Better 6. The Rest of Your Life At Home * or Not The Need for Change Staying Well Section 1. Develop Your Arsenal Section 2. Monitor Yourself Section 3. Unexpected Changes Section 4. Contingency Plans 7. Conclusion Appendix Bibliography
Excerpt from Conclusion
The problems of the mentally ill are horrendous. They have, if they are lucid enough to be aware of reality, three layers of pain. Primarily they have their symptoms. These take many different forms, from cleaning one's teeth with Lysol concentrate, to feeling responsible for the Mt. St. Helens disaster. All these symptoms, however, equate to pain on a grand scale, and should be treated with respect by us all. Secondarily, the mentally ill have to cope with the physical manifestations of their illness. By this I mean those problems that result directly from the primary pain and its treatment, for example, injuries caused by a suicide attempt, and/or the side-effects of a psychoactive medication. The tertiary pain, which the mentally ill have to cope with when they return to reality, comes from their awareness of the way in which society perceives them and their problems. In a word, stigma. This is improving, but we still have a long way to go. Recently, at the first meeting of a writing workshop, when asked to introduce myself, I mentioned my problems briefly, told them about this book, and voiced my desire to continue writing. The young man sitting next to me, himself a former patient, exclaimed in surprise at my "guts" in "confessing" to my problems. Why should it have to take guts to tell a roomful of strangers that you have a mental illness? Incidentally, it was not guts, rather defiance and my firm belief that stigma can only be overcome by our taking this sort of risk. I did not regret telling them - they were sensitive and gracious people. Nevertheless, this illustrates the problems faced, on a daily basis, by the less privileged mentally ill.Excerpt from Chapter 4: Now You Are a Mental Case
This chapter has a rather brutal title. That is quite deliberate - unfortunately, you may have some brutal experiences ahead of you. You have just received the most stunning piece of news in your life. Some doctor has decided that you are mentally ill. In fact he or she thinks that you are so crazy that you have to be locked away, at least figuratively, even if you entered the hospital voluntarily. There should, in an ideal world, not be any need for this chapter. The diagnosis of a mental illness should not be any more unfortunate than the diagnosis of diabetes. In our society, however, the diagnosis of any mental illness carries with it a stigma. An article in the Times of London 13 once stated that:"[in] a brief public opinion survey of attitudes to mental illness, one third of the sample endorsed the statement that the mentally ill were likely to be violent, and murderers insane."I must confess that I was pleasantly surprised to read that only one third of the population perceive us as violent. So, this is what the mentally ill have to face. After your diagnosis there is a new need for acceptance of you, which was not there before. This chapter is about acceptance and rejection: how to achieve the first and side-step the second.
A. Your Attitudes Toward Yourself.
When I was diagnosed, I remember thinking that this could not really be happening . Mental illness is like that car crash that can never happen to you - until it does. After my diagnosis I went through several phases; self-rejection, followed by "acceptance-with-apology", followed, much later, by "acceptance-with-defiance". Now I have "acceptance-with-gratitude".
As the first person in my family ever to be diagnosed as mentally ill, I rejected myself as though I had done something foul on the carpet. Not only did I blame myself, but I also thought of myself as a malingerer. Although I knew that I was telling the doctors the truth, I could not believe myself. I knew that I did hear a Voice telling me to kill myself, I knew that I heard screams in my head, but these symptoms seemed too fantastic to be real. I thought that I must be generating them in some way so as to get attention, or to have an excuse for being such a worthless creature in the first place. For many years, during my bleaker periods, I asked my doctor whether I was really ill, or whether in fact I was "making it up". He patiently reassured me every time. Only through the unquestioning and enduring acceptance of the professionals, could I accept myself as a person with a problem. To have something biochemically wrong with your brain does not mean that you are not still a person. To accept yourself fully you have to believe in this fact. This is not easy, and the task took me years to achieve.
