One of the hardest things about having a mental illness is being around people who do not. No matter how much they try to understand, at the end of the day, they still hold you to the same standard that they would someone who was not mentally ill.
That isn't to say that we shouldn't be held to certain standards, but it gets complicated when you consider severe mental illnesses like schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. People tend to forget that medications don't just magically make your symptoms disappear; they just lessen them. You can be medicated and still have a depressive episode, have auditory hallucinations, have mania.
The worst part about being around people without mental illness, especially when you live with them or they are your family, is the constant feeling of guilt.
There is not a day where I don't feel guilty for the burden I am on my family. I am aware that I cause a high amount of stress, and I know it puts pressure on my family. But every time I see a sign of me being a burden, I get more upset and more stressed. I leave out information out of fear of causing more stress, and when it comes to light, anger erupts from them.
I, and many people with mental illness, have to live every day with the fact that they feel like a huge disappointment to their families. We are not who you wanted us to be. And it's not just a simple matter of us deciding to change. Our brains don't work that way. We tend to screw up, and every time we screw up, it reinforces that idea that we will always be this way, that we will always disappoint the people closest to us.
We also live with the guilt of our actions during our episodes. I don't know that I will ever be able to forgive myself for how I've treated people, especially my sisters, during my episodes.
There's a nagging worry in the back of my head that my sister goes to school 3 1/2 hours away because she needed to get away from me, a thought reinforced by her recent visit home as she declined to spend much time with me.
I don't know that I will ever be able to get rid of this guilt I feel in the pit of my stomach for something that really, I am just barely learning to have control over now.
People with asthma aren't expected to function at the same physical level someone without asthma is. People with diabetes aren't expected to eat the same diets as everyone else, even when taking their medication. People with many other chronic or serious illnesses are not held to the same standards as everyone else because realistically, they cannot be, not for lack of wanting to, but for the simple fact that it just isn't possible for them to be.
So why, when people with mental illness are medicated, do we expect them to function as "normal"?
I will never be "normal". I have made my peace with that idea. The guilt I feel stems from the fact that I know my family expects me to be normal, even though there is no way I ever can be. I can be a productive member of society, but I'm never going to be high functioning. My illness is, at times, incredibly debilitating, and I just wish that people would realize that it's not because I'm lazy. It's not because I'm ungrateful. My brain doesn't function properly. It never will.
At heart, being the only mentally ill person in a neurotypical family is very lonely.
Sometimes, I feel like they view me as the villain in their lives.
