I've got another bit part written about this which I haven't yet sent to the blog. I'll skip forward a bit.
There is an idea that mental illness may be associated with good things. There is another idea, one which may not immediately seem obvious. There may be value to mental illnesses.
As you may gather from the other stuff I've written I think it is fair to say there are certain questions about what mental health and illness are actually describing.
What's perhaps more important at this point is to see the value of the stuff which is assumed to be negative, for example depression.
Just to put it in context before I write a point about which some might suggest I need to understand first...I'm sitting here in a park with two bottles of wine. I haven't showered in a few days now. It is night. I am alone and drinking myself into oblivion every night. I write while I drink. I am unemployed, isolated and miserable but fighting every day even though I would rather give up.
This state is one many would find it difficult to take value from. Each person's misery is unique but some have an intensity to endure for such long periods it is akin to a living, silent torture which no one can see and few could understand or bear themselves.
The negative stuff which are (poorly) measured by pscyhiatric science and far too reliably predict the prognosis in terms of life outcomes have a brutal reality which each person has to suffer through. Psychiatric literature can too easily dehumanise what are very human topics.
So, as I sup the first bottle of discounted wine, I am not finding it easy to write about the positive aspect of mental illness.
I can think of stuff from studies. For example the d2 neurotransmitter is associated with self reported altruism. These findings would concur with people like Gandhi, Jesus and Mother Theresa who all heard voices. However so did Churchill and he started the large scale bombing of civilian populations. One of the measures used in PANSS or BPRS is guilt and I wondered whether this was a Christian fascination which drifted into psychiatric science or a byproduct of those who have altruistic characteristics. I would expect altruistic people are more likely to feel guilt about things which other people don't feel guilty about, and in an extreme this might be the sort of thing which gets seen as bizarre behaviour (one of the components of schizophrenia if I remember right). The d2 neurotransmitter tranmission is what the dopamine hypothesis of schizophrenia and antipsychotic treatment is based upon. Hmmm...the study might actually look at the d4 rather than the d2 receptor. D4 is also one that some antipsychotics target.
Sexual promisciousness, infidelity or more sexual partners have also been associated with the d2 dopamine receptors as has creativity. I wonder if sex and art are related in other ways?
These are just a few neuropsychological findings which suggest positive things. Some might say that being sexually promiscious is not a good thing. Certainly promiscious women could be pathologised with schizophrenia with their libido made part of their pathology before the sexual revolution of the late 20th century. Psychiatrists may still use sexual activity to help them define schizophrenia.
The problem is sexual activity and infidelity are not things which are illnesses. In rare cases they might be but in the main they're just traits society makes subjective judgements upon, judgements which can be enforced as objective when they become made into or part of mental illnesses.
People who are schizophrenic have a stigma about them because..well...because of many factors. The psychiatric descriptions don't help. But what if there's good stuff in these people which no one knows about because all they know is the bad.
I would guess of the small percentage of schizophrenics who work most are in the charity sector. I would guess many may also end up in religous settings and in times gone by these settings would have dealt with them anyway.
Schizophrenia is a diagnosis many would fear to havee. It was the same way with bipolar. This was my first serious diagnosis, I.e. one associated with a hospitalisation, over 9 years ago. It was as crazy as schizophrenia but with less public stigma.
A few years ago I went to a writer's session. Afterwards I was talking to someone about my mental health and revealed I was bipolar. She said the most amazing thing. "You're so lucky."
Anyone who knows what bipolar is like wouldn't wish it on anyone. She'd probably seen the Stephen Fry documentary. It didn't glamourise manic depression but did a lot to destigmatise it and conveyed a tiny amount of the destruction and pain. It reinforced the association with madness and creativity though and this is what this girl had cottoned on to.
For whatever reason, madness or not, I do write a hell of a lot. Others also find creative outlets for themselves and their inner demons.
There is also another aspect of positiveness in mental illness. It is sometimes hard to see and believe you me right now I feel it hard to write about.
Mental health crisis can bring about a significant life change.
Mental health crisis can bring about a significant life change.
It's so important I said it twice. People who've been hospitalised will understand this but there are other forms of life crisis. These are moments of sharp change in a person's journey in life.
Sometimes the negative experiences which create the change can be an important turning point. Sometimes they're not.
I think most people can understand they've had a journey in life to get to where they are. There have been some good and bad times. It is assumed it is the good times which are important and I know they certainly feel a lot better when they're happening. The bad times, if we can stand them, also have value.
There are a lot of famous people and celebrities who were also mentally ill. I'm sure many of them would agree their madness was essential to their value. Be it the obsession of genius or the willingness to fight an impossible battle which is madness and stupidity combined.
the mentally ill may usually do worse in life but this isn't an absolute truth. Some do better and some excel. Some excel in ways we of today will never recognise. Van Gogh is the example I would use. His imagine adorns Madness Explained by Richard Bentall. He was a schizophrenic and a failure as a painter, at least in his lifetime. Today, however, his work is highly regarded.
There is a quote from a British psychiatrist (john or william sargent?) Which goes something along the lines of,
"If Jesus had been born in the time of psychiatry he'd have been treated and gone back to carpentry."
Whatever opinion you have of Jesus I ask to with hold when you look at that paraphrased quote. I hope it communicates an idea.
Sent from my smartphone
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