not that i like moral high ground when i see it, but i seem to have run into it a lot in the past few days.
As mentioned on the Blog That Got Swallowed By A Mismanaged Site, i was diagnosed with bipolar disorder going on 900,000 years ago. one of my coping mechanisms with a lot of things has been to seek those in similar situations and learn what i can from them. i've been associated with a revolving-door-type group for a long time (maybe more than five years, but roughly that.) i think one of the biggest weaknesses the community of mentally ill faces is the fact that it hates itself. i'll get to that, but first let me elaborate on "community", which i don't entirely mean. i mean "culture". Because, frankly, if one is diagnosed with any Axis I mental illness, it's inherent in that body. it doesn't get therapied out. which isn't to say i only identify as someone with Bipolar Disorder (i.e. "i am bipolar"), but it is certainly one of the things i identify myself as *being*...a lot of people diagnosed this way will say "no, you aren't bipolar, you *have* bipolar," as a sort of soothing & clucking, but that's mostly shit. and it's shit because it's A) wrong and B) borne out of judgment. sadly enough it's judgment of one's own being. as if my grandfather would've ever said, "you aren't scots, you just have those roots." nope. but for whatever reason, people with bipolar want to deny it. certainly the brunt of stigma comes from the Ill-Informed. (please see: that fuckhole tomcruise, others). i don't mean to write another post on that, one was plenty. back to my group.
today in a discussion someone mentioned that she, even after having been told by her new boyfriend that he's the proud owner of hpv, was still too afraid to tell him she was bipolar. and a chorus of "i don't tell anyone"s ensued. and i, being astounded that an sti causing genital warts was in some way Less Frightening (more on that below) than a mental illness that can be treated and managed, couldn't stop myself from asking "why don't you tell anyone?" the answers were even lamer than i could've dreamt. a rainbow of fruit replies came back, from: "they'd think i'm crazy." to "i'm afraid he'll think i'm nutso and just out of the loonie bin." no one gave their working definition for "crazy/nutso" etc.
the logic blows my mind. the only thing holding anyone back was fear of judgment. so in order to remain unjudged, a bipolar must Not Tell. there is a gripping fear that the Being/having of Bipolar will always be the straw that breaks whichever camel's back, be it new boyfriend, new job, new city.
i don't use my illness as an excuse for not thinking. sometimes i do not think clearly, and i have people around who alert me to this if i'm in a mood state. but i am educated, well read, inquisitive and intelligent, and those are as identifying to the people who know i am bipolar, whether or not i'm in a mood state. i do not introduce myself with "Oh, nice to meet you too, i'm bipolar, would you like me to tell you about that?" but i make an effort to inform people when it gets to be more or less clear that they'll be around for a spell that yes, i walk in the ranks of the DSM-V. every employer i've had since i was diagnosed knew, that's for damned sure.
so, that bit about hpv revelation vs bipolar revelation: i was walking the dog and wondering if i bear a certain judgment against people who have stds. and i convinced myself (it was a harrowing debate) that i didn't, which made me wonder why i was so appalled at the idea that for this couple in the throes of mating why was bipolar the worse of the two. but they aren't two. being "disease free" is a big deal in personals ads, no one says "please come sans your mental illness". the stigma of sexually transmitted things is lessening with education and dissemination of the Tenets of Condom Usage, and i'm sure the commercials with The Beautiful People frolicking on the beach advertising herpes supression therapies don't hurt. ("see, even that nice-looking girl could get it...it must not be so bad.")
for sheer comparision, in ontario in a year, for schizophrenia patients less than $5/ person is spent on research. HIV/AIDS? $187/person. and no, i'm not saying rescind the funding for the HIV/AIDS research to fund the research benefitting the mentally ill: i'm saying the lobby is there for the HIV/AIDS patients, and it's a giant echo chamber for schizophrenics.
if people from within the culture of the mentally ill work to rid the ever nasty stigma upon it, it will have to start there. start by not brooking denial, by facing the facts. the reversal of the judgment of a larger culture will not be automatic to that larger culture. which is to say, the other world sees us hating ourselves, one and all, and does what it can to perpetuate that.
socialism rox