My brain is still absorbing all I have learned, ideas I've been introduced to, and the amazing people I met at last week's NAMI National Convention. (read Hold onto the Hope: NAMI National Convention) I'll do my best to share some of this wisdom with you here, as I file these amazing possibilities  next to the reality of my son Ben's current relapse. The nurse on the psych unit where Ben is still a patient calls to inform me that Ben has been in "an incident." My pulse jumps up by about 20 beats - what Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor would say is my amygdala sensing that "I am not safe" - and I ask for details.

There are times when the reality of the illness I live with, Major Depressive Disorder, feels unreal. There are times when it seems like a distant memory and as if perhaps the previous suicide attempts and months of darkness never happened. This is one of those times.

No parent wants their children to grow up and accuse them of paying more or less attention to them than one (or more) of their siblings. But if one of your children has a psychiatric illness, the scenario is more likely to become reality than not.

After last week's post, Gus123 had this to say: if a “regular doc” finds out one has a mental illness diagnosis, they will blame all one’s ills on “imaginary” causes, discounting one’s judgement and intellect, regardless of the true nature of thing. He hit the nail on the head. A study revealed that almost half of all patients with schizophrenia reported that their family doctors took their physical symptoms less seriously when the doctors were aware of the patient's psychiatric diagnosis. My experience is that they do the same for patients with borderline personality disorder.

It's becoming more and more common for children to be diagnosed with mental health issues. We see labeling and medications dispensed now more than ever before for children who may not have been considered anything other than "unique" or "challenging"  in years past. There's no doubt about it, children suffer, too. But our guest, Dr. Marilyn Wedge, says that she has never, in 20 years of practice, seen a case that could not be resolved by family therapy.

Recently, a man I have come to respect and care about attempted suicide. I am grateful he is still here to tell the tale. His suicide note was online and his pain was so evident it tore at my soul. I was tremendously relieved to hear his friends had rescued him in time to save him. But I was then left with the problem as to what to say to this man. The last thing in the world I wanted to do was make the situation any more difficult for him. What do you do when someone you care about just attempted suicide?

On Friday I went to the pharmacy to pick up some medication. It was a long wait, and I wasn’t feeling well. Around me I heard people talking, phones ringing, and the various noises of the grocery store that houses the pharmacy. The sounds seemed to come from a distance, and I felt profoundly disconnected from everyone and everything around me, as if I was an observer in a dream that wasn’t mine. It wasn’t a particularly comfortable experience but it certainly wasn’t an unusual one. I have Dissociative Identity Disorder, and I've lived with chronic, severe dissociation nearly all my life. The episode I described illustrates the combined forces of depersonalization and derealization, two forms of dissociation that often appear together. And despite the fact that I have DID and my dissociative experiences, taken as a whole, are decidedly abnormal, dissociation itself is something just about everyone experiences from time to time.

I can only speak for myself and my experience of leaving my abusive ex-husband. Your results may differ, but I hope my experience gives you a heads up and, in knowing it won't be easy at any point, the courage to continue your course. My ex didn't stalk, didn't beg me to come home, didn't turn on the charm to trick me into returning. He felt I betrayed him. He used my decision to report him to the law and the military as an inexcusable sin. I exposed him (falsely he says). I think that he feels he left me.

Today my doctor said to me, "You know, you deserve to be happy. You deserve to recover." I sometimes question if I do deserve to recover. I'm not proud of some of the things I have done in life. I have not always been the kindest person. I have sometimes ignored people who needed me. I have put my husband and loved ones through years of anguish and fear as I slipped further and further into anorexia nervosa and failed at recovery many times. I have made them cry as they thought that I could possibly die from my eating disorder. I blocked myself off from their fears and pleas, and continued to pursue thinness ruthlessly for years like a person possessed. All of these things make me question my worth and if I deserve to recovery. But there's something more. My doctor, a wonderfully perceptive man even when I sometimes sit silently and dive back into the safety of my thoughts, said I have this space within my brain that allows the eating disorder to tell me that I do not deserve to be happy, healthy, and free. This is so true, and I sometimes want to scream at the voices to stop and leave me alone.

Last night, Bob returned home after spending a week with his biological father. It's always an adjustment, but last night's return seemed to go more smoothly than homecomings past.