Seems I’ve imagined Him all of my life
As the wisest of all of mankind
But if God’s Holy wisdom is foolish to man
He must have seemed out of His mind
Even His family said He was mad
And the priest said a demon’s to blame
But, God in the form of this angry young man
Could not have seemed perfectly saneGod’s Own Fool, Michael Card
For me, my religion is part of me, it defines who I am, it affects the choices I make, the opinions I hold. There is nowhere God is excluded from, no relationship he is not part of, no time that he’s asleep or on the loo (if you ever doubt that God is above a bit of potty-humour, check 1 Kings 18:27, or for that matter 1 Samuel 5:12.).
Yet, almost without exception, I’ve found that mental health “professions” seem to have slept through all their RE classes at school, not to mention all those “equality and diversity” drives that the NHS seems to like putting up posters about.
Some of the corkers that most stick in my mind, are the nurse who told me it would be preferable if I talked to my family rather than people from my church, as my family “would be there for years to come”, as opposed to the people with whom I actually had things in common, who were just “a bunch of strangers”. I think quite a few concepts had flown right over his head, but the most glaring was the fact that my familly don’t believe in a life after death, which kinda shifts the “sticking around” balance back in favour of church folks.
Then there was the worker who, while assessing me for their service, asked me about social contacts etc. I told her that I wanted to go back to church, and get involved in my bible study group again. “Oh no!” she said, sounding a bit confused. “You can’t talk about that yet, religion’s at the end of the form”. Which left me wondering if, not social, were those needs… unsocial? anti-social? non-social?
And then there’s the ones who never even bother to ask, even though faith and my expression of it is a very good indicator of my mood. When I’m down, God is still there, and my faith is too, but the gates are down and the blinds are closed – I lose my ability to pray in “words” and my ability to remind people that these things are important to me. When the illness speaks to me, and tells me things, I may easily mistake it for God, who has spoken to me in the past. An easy mistake to make, but a potentially deadly one. When I have strange experiences, I may not be sure whether I need an exorcism rather than a psychiatrist. The ironic thing is that over the past few years, I’ve suffered from having very puzzled (and seemingly unconnected) people randomly telling me Jeremiah 29:11 is a significant verse for me. But then, I never am quick to take a hint when it’s really needed.
To be honest, all that these experiences have done is to make me feel stigmatised, part of a minority – that if I talk about anything related to my faith, it’ll be written off as not-appropriate, or a load of rubbish, or that I’ll be deeply offended during vulnerable times.
But apparently it’s not just me… pages 14-17 of this paper strike a lot of bells with me.
I guess that some of you guys might not be able to relate to this post, but if you do then I’d be really interested to hear what your experiences are.
Our Trust also has separate boxes for “spiritual and religious expression” than it does for “social contacts”; but I’d like to think most people would realise the cross-over.
I think it’s a tricky area for them though, because there’s always that faint suspicion that you’re just psychotic really… or at least a little “odd”.
I’d say that on the whole I get treated better because I’m a recognised “invisible minority” and so they have to be nice, as opposed to CofE, or other “common” christian denomination which is seen as the “majority” even though it isn’t really, because they don’t have the same anti-discrimination box to tick.
Having said that, I’ve had the concept of PD banded around without people taking my culture into consideration. And Old Therapist refers to me going to “church” consistently throughout my notes – I’m sure she thinks it’s “the same thing”, as so doesn’t matter, but it has really infuriated me.
It’s like they do just have a small box on the back of the form for “all that nonsense”, and a small compartment in their head for the same purpose. Which I guess is the secular view, for me Judaism also affects every part of me life as your faith does yours, but other than faint suspicion over the fact I keep Kosher… and that’s if people even bother to ask. Shrink never bothered, neither did Therapist, crisis team weren’t around long enough to ask. Actually MH nurse was the only one who asked (for data collection purposes re diversity awareness), and didn’t sneer when I said I couldn’t make friday evening appointments – actually she asked if it was ok for me to have appointments friday at all, because she didn’t want to spoil shabbat. Old Therapist used to tell me that seeing her was “more important”…
Anyway I’ve ranted on on your blog for long enough, sorry. Lack of voice (or now lack of sustained voice), means I have a lot to say. And it’s an issue thats niggled me a lot too.
Take care,
Differently
I realised I completely forgot to mention the chocolate teapot, who told me that the reason I don’t drink alcohol much or plan on having sex before marriage is because I’m too anxious, and I needed to “let go” more.
That sure tells Paul where to go huh?
Actually your comment about G-d never sleeping reminded me of Psalm 121 “He never slumbers and never sleeps” – which is one of my favourites. (Don’t know if that was where you were quoting from…)
Take care,
Differently
I get this. Although I never mention my faith to the professionals. Because I know I’d get treated the same way. I do mention the support I get from my church and they have actually been quite keen on that.
I understand all too well the bit about getting a bit confused about our faith. Down, I still cling to God but I can’t hear him, he’s far away. Up, I think I hear him all the time and, as you put so well, that could be the illness speaking. Discernment is hard with this illness.
Having said I never mention my faith, I just remembered that when I was last in the psychiatrist’s office, and he asked me if I was likely to act on my suicidal thoughts, I said no because I believe in God and that because of my faith it is not my right to take my own life. He seemed satisfied with that and didn’t question me.
Wow, Chouette and Diff, you have both been treated appallingly, and I say that as an atheist.
(And Karita, I can see why you don’t usually mention it).
I used to be an arse about it, but since I grew up (allegedly
), I recognise that other people have a right to their beliefs, no matter what I think of said belief.
I think that if any health professional trying to push religion on clients who are not religious is unacceptable, equally, so is belittling, dismissing or pathologising a client’s religious beliefs if they do have them. The health professional’s job is not to agree or disagree – their personal beliefs don’t come into it.
On the whole I don’t think that people’s personal religious or spiritual beliefs are relevant to their healthcare, however sometimes they are. Mental health care *is*, or should be, for want of a better word, personal. It’s about treating the person, not just symptoms. (In reality…but it should be).
In the context of recovery, religion is absolutely relevant. If it helps the person then great, any decent mental health professional would encourage that – I can’t understand why some seem so uncomfortable, as you have both experienced.
Of course it is a social activity. I am sure studies show that people who believe in a religion have better mental health…I was going to do my Masters project on that link, but it actually started to seem so obvious. *So* many people said to me ‘of course religion helps mental health!’ and brought up a sense of community, social interaction, identity, and so on. All those things that we are supposed to have to recover. They don’t *have* to come through practicing a religion of course, but it’s a valid way.
In fact, much as my younger self would have scoffed at this, spirituality (not necessarily organised religion) is a human need.
Psychiatry is a religion all of its own, labelling obnoxious kids “oppositional-defiant” … etc etc. Don’t be too hurt by what their priests come out with and follow your own religion. You’ll be much happier.
But hey, youre doing that anyway. So good on ya!
I’m in the fortunate position that my shrink is a christian, and my cc has a very good understanding of christanity.
But I refrain from saying things, things which i associated with God or satan/evil. because I think if I admit them the mh ppl will think that all of my faith is part of my crazy.
I don’t know what I’m trying to say here, just yes i think…