I realized something this week when my partner Ben had a moment of terrible reflection. He spoke of a time my daughter, who is older, led his daughter astray a little. When he began to talk about it my first reaction was to defend my daughter. He let me know in clearly that he had to get it out and when he did I realized how completely wrong I had been. This moment triggered a period when she would not have contact with her father for over a year. This was all years ago and he had never had closure about it and the thing that brought it up was the news that she is moving back in at the end of the month. I was able to apologize and it started me thinking. I am beginning to see our relationship in a whole new light. I think that I am finally growing up.
I always had a little chip on my shoulder with my partner. I did not realize it, but I did. It's because I never trusted him. I never really trusted too many people. Very Few. I always had this terrible fear of abandonment. I believe it is a symptom of the way I was raised. My parents were both mentally ill. They had four children and both had to work full time for most of my childhood in order for our family to get by. Some times they worked two jobs each. They both suffered terrible loss and abuse in their childhoods and saw the world as a hard place. And through hard discipline they sought to make us kids as hard as possible in order to help us survive.
They also had a tendency to leave me behind everywhere we went. My parents had what the folks back home used to call itchy feet. They loved to wander around. We moved around a lot. We went camping or driving every weekend. Wherever we went it seemed they would forget me. At roadside fast food joints, at Disneyland, At the zoo, I would become separated from the group and and become lost. I am sure they didn't really leave me everywhere they went. It just seemed that way to me. The last time it happened I was fourteen. We went back east to visit the folks and we all went out to breakfast. I had a panic attack. I ran screaming down the street after them. They did not notice. It took about 15 minutes for them to figure it out and come back for me.
I now understand that my parents were overwhelmed by drugs, alcohol, mental illness, poverty and a bunch of kids they tried hard to avoid having. And in their attempt to prepare us for the world by making us hard did not help. The only time they ever showed affection of concern was if I were sick or injured. So I learned to make myself sick and make myself hurt to get the attention and affection I wanted so much. After a while they got to be so drunk all the tie that they could not even manage that. My injuries, which is what the problems usually were, began to make them angry and by the time I fell out of a tree and lost consciousness they had stopped getting me medical treatment in these cases.
I still show symptoms of this. I recognize it now. Until I had suffered real chronic pain I had a tendency to make much of any hurt or illness. I was still looking for that care and attention. I believe that my current health problems may be an offshoot of this. I did not take care of myself. I do not know how to explain it but I know I let my health problems go. It was not only my self destructive tendencies. It was a need to be sick in order to get some positive attention. The first thought I have when I feel that I am becoming sick is that I hope it puts me in the hospital.
So, like I said, I have a terrible fear of abandonment. I never trusted Ben because my experiences in life taught me not to. My first husband left me for another woman and that only reinforced the abandonment issues. I now realize that I married someone like my parents who did not have it in him to give me what I needed. And I, being mentally ill, could not give him what he needed.
Ben changed that. We have been together for 6 years now. We spent over a year living apart. We divorced. I went in and out of the psychiatric ward at the local hospital. He stood by me. I went without an income for several years and we ended up homeless and he stayed with me. We fought and yelled and screamed at each other and he is still here. And I realized this week that a great deal of the troubles. Even, maybe especially the worst of our troubles, came about not just because we are both mentally ill but because I was on a quest to make him prove he loved me and would not abandon me. It is hard to face the fact that I hurt someone I love but I did. Any yet he is still here. He never hit me. He never intentionally hurt me. And he thanks me for making him a better man.
This week: Our younger daughter, who I am going to call Gretchen, and who is Ben's daughter and my stepdaughter, told us she will be moving in at the end of the month. She has been unemployed for 6 months and just went back to a telemarketing job that she quit previously because she hated it. and I am going to brag here for a minute and say. I love this girl as much as my birth daughter. When she had a bad flu she came home here to get better. When she talked to her friends she said, " I am at my parents house."
Our older daughter, who I will call Heidi, is almost certainly bipolar. She is on her second crash and burn cycle in less than 8 months. She began the job and was so, so happy and ecstatic. She caught the flu and had a panic attack and almost lost the new job. I asked her to consider the possibility and do some reading up on it. She does not want to do psychiatric drugs so I convinced her to look for the patterns in her life. I said that if things spiral too far out of control she should consider meds and that in the meantime she should get to know he cycles and get all the information possible. I advised her that if she gets depressed that she should work hard, get exercise, fresh air and remind herself that it is just something she goes through once in a while.
I myself do not take meds for my bipolar. The medical marijuana does alleviate some of the symptoms for me but I work very hard at being self aware and can honestly say the last time I was manic, I realized it. I felt a little bit of a crash when I realized it. Then I determined to use the extra energy to get things done, let my partner know I was manic, and monitor myself. I did okay and did not go off on a zinger like I have in the past. I am very worried.
Last week: Last week I made a mistake and called the NAMI the national Association for the Mentally ill. I am sorry for that mistake. I received a couple of emails about it from a gentleman who let me know no uncertain terms that he felt that me referring to others and myself as "the mentally ill" was no different than the calling Jewish people "The Jews"(As in I am behaving like a Nazi to this person). I am sorry to have offended anyone and want to make a little disclaimer right here.
I Am a mentally ill woman and am not a mental health professional. I do not speak for any other mentally ill person and will not unless specifically asked to. I am not trying to give advice to any mentally ill person and am definitely not trying to discriminate against anyone. I believe that by writing about my experiences I can help the mentally healthy understand what life is like for mentally ill persons in America and how politics affects us. However, I could no more speak for other all mentally ill persons then I could speak for all Native Americans, Women, Veterans, etc. I can only speak for myself and I try very hard to speak the truth with humility as it is an important part of putting my life in order.