I wanted to clear some things up about myself and my family and why I am not with them. It seems appropriate to discuss this with the holidays coming up.
I write this blog because I have difficulty putting my thoughts into audible words. It takes me several hours to write a piece like this. I write out several thoughts, then I have to put them into an understandable sequence and expand on them to make them comprehensible. This is one way I communicate with my case manager and medication nurse, my two major mental health caregivers. I have to because I can't fully explain myself during my appointments.
Dealing with a mental illness is a lot like being in recovery. It's something that you have to battle every day. Complacency about the problem leads to a relapse, which in my case can be fatal. A relapse for me means I eat a gun, or step in front of a bus, or something else equally gruesome.
I am still emotionally unstable. I haven't been stable since the first time I crawled into the closet. It doesn't take much to push me into the closet. The only thing the medication does is level my playing field to a hill instead of a vertical cliff. With everything I do to make myself as stable as possible, it still isn't enough. I still have to head into the closet on a daily basis to combat the overloads I experience.
My family has serious fears about me. My instability has already put them through multiple terrible incidents. Serious issues exist between my family and I and because I cannot stabilize the load I already have. It would literally be suicide for me to try and take on the additional burden of my families problems. Especially since I do not have the capability to actually do anything to help out. The most I could do is commiserate with them, which does nothing but stir everybody up. I can't do anything to help out because I would get halfway through solving the problem, then fall apart and abandon the project, leaving things worse than if I had done nothing at all. I know this because I have done it before on several occasions.
My wife and son love me, but they are scared to death of me. For the sake of everyone's survival, I cannot be in their life. They have cut themselves off from me for their own survival, both emotionally and physically. They are already in a bad situation right now, for multiple reasons. But as bad as things are, it would be worse if I was around.
More people commit suicide around the holidays and I can see why. This should be a time of great joy to spend with family and friends. My family is only 2.5 miles away, but for all practical purposes they might as well be on the moon. I see little reason to celebrate anything this year. With my family afraid to deal with me, there isn't a lot that keeps me going.
The only thing that does keep me going is the fact that my family is dependent upon my disability money. If I blow my head off, that money ends. And for as bad as things are for them now, it would get a thousand times worse.
I'm stuck where I am with little hope for improvement. I don't have any bootstraps to pull myself up with anymore. The drugs barely work and therapy doesn't address the issues hindering my progress. Even though I don't have my family any more, they are the sole reason why I get out of bed in the morning. They are the reason why I must continue to exist.
It's not a lot, but it will have to be enough.