New member- confused!

Hi @EJ5 & welcome to the Forums!

That sounds really tough- I can certainly understand your confusion, and I imagine it'd be difficult coming from a loved one too. I have a family member with MI and limited insight- for me with them, as difficult as it can be, I find it helpful if I can distinguish their MI from them and label the two, so with things like delusions for example, 'this is their MI speaking'. I'm sure this is something others have experienced too and hope you find them soon.

Before the work or RD Lang in the 50s, it was often thought that talking to patients in a MH hospital was very dangerous activity and staff could get a disease from them. This has been debunked by the "Talking cure" used by psychologists, social workers and counselors and some psychiatrists as an adjunct to drug therapy. But the former attitude was the roots of the dreadful stigma towards people with MH issues. There is no doubt being with someone with MH issues can be stressful especially when there is an episode. If 1 in 5 people have a MH episode each year, one can see how common it is. In many ways the best approach is to explore respectful pathways for treatment or change.

Hi @EJ5 and welcome to the forums 👋

As @TideisTurning said I found it really important to be able to distinguish my soon2bx's MI from who he was as a person, but with a counsellor's help I have come to understand that the MI is a personality disorder that runs to the core of him and can barely be altered, if at all, and even this would take a wealth of insight that appears to be beyond him. It was with that understanding that I was able to wish him well, but stand aside and let him go ..... which happened as the result of an unrecoverable betrayal in any case. When that happens your focus must rest on "applying your own oxygen mask first", or a patient and carer can become two patients and no carer ..... not because their illness is contagious, because as @Mathew76 pointed out so well, it's not ..... but because we forgot to raise our shield against the damage that can be caused to us by their behaviours and choices if we don't.

Self care and self protection needs to be paramount to the role of a carer, which is where I advocate carer counselling along with mi-sufferer counselling.

@EJ5

Faith&Hope said ". but because we forgot to raise our shield against the damage that can be caused to us by their behaviours and choices if we don't. " and that is so true.

I had actually reached the point where I believed he was deliberately trying to gaslight me as part of coercive control. I had a talk with his psychologist about it in the hope that she could raise the issue of the way I was feeling like an abused spouse, but I learnt a few more things about his very complicated neural make-up that put it into better perspective.

I was using the wrong shield. I was running myself ragged trying not to make him angry and failing quite miserably. I would be admonished for things that he thought were obvious that even after explaining to me several times I just didn't get why they were wrong. It felt like the goalposts were constantly shifting. Was he doing this deliberately to undermine my confidence and set me up to fail?

While the bipolar comes and goes (I chart his moods) it turns out he is much more autistic than either of his sons, but such things were not diagnosed in the 60's. Now I am much more aware of how literal he is, and how literal I have to be, and how anything that deviates from the plan he's made in his head activates a trauma response. When confronted with flight or fight, he never flies.

Now I have the correct sheild/oxygen mask/mental tools to deal with him much more calmly. I think part of protecting ourselves is learning as much as we can about them and what they struggle with. See if you can get his permission to ask his doctors.

Good luck

S

That's really sensible @SJT63, and a fit with the illness in question 👍. I hope that is helpful for you @EJ5 . Part of counselling support is understanding the patterns and rhythms you're working with, so you're not blindsided and confused as much. It's working out a working relationship with the person themselves, and with the illness as well.

It also further confirms for me that I was using the wrong shield for my situation, without knowing about personality disorders and how they function. I suspect a degree of Aspergers here too ...... but in any case, there wasn't "flight" as an option for my s2bx either, although that might be what has just happened now in response to being embroiled in the legal system where the "fight" response can't reach me directly. I am able to stand back and know that I did my best, and part of doing my best was not understanding what I was up against. If I had I think things would have ended much sooner and in a different way ..... this way, although awful in itself and hard-going, also feels like it will have been the kindest option in retrospect. And that is an important value for me too.

So glad you have found the forums @EJ5 ..... there are amazing carers, and lived experience people here, ready to share their hard-won wisdom.