Hi @Historylover
I am doing a bit better then yesterday thank you.
You said -
As for asking anything of people, even ever so politely, such as keeping social distancing I've learned that that seldom goes well. I don't bother
I wasn't exactly trying to be polite to this guy at the gym yesterday. He annoyed me in the way he appeared to deliberately invade my space. There was a bit more to this issue than just social distancing. I decided to move away from him immediately as he was making me feel quite uncomfortable. In doing so I said to him as a rebuke, "Have you ever heard about social distancing". I didn't expect him to be happy about this but this guy was a bully and much younger and bigger than me. He started to threaten me with physical violence. In my younger days, I would have stood toe to toe with him and 99% of the time I used to find that bullies would back down. If they didn't I could look after myself anyway but that was when I was much younger. I am now an "old guy" and increasingly find that some people take advantage of my age and infirmity to try and manipulate, bully or otherwise force their agenda. I find however that this applies to only a small minority of people. In my experience, most people are reasonable, decent and generally "do the right thing" at least to the limits of their capabilities.
When I encounter people who do not do the right or expected thing, like yesterday, I run into problems. I often fail to navigate that space effectively. Yesterday I ran into a double whammy, first with this bully and then with the staff at the gym who were definitely out of order in the way they responded. I might add I have had quite a few problems with this council run gym which has excellent facilities and is affordable but attracts a few "macho weirdo" types both as customers and staff. I have sent a complaint to the manager about the staff yesterday and received an apology and an undertaking to investigate. There are a few of us "oldies" who go to the gym. My agenda is to make the gym a place where people like myself who are elderly and/or have personality idiosyncrasies or similar as a result of mental illness or other disabilities etc can go and be safe, respected and free from abuse. I must have lodged at least a dozen complaints over the years and overall I think I am winning. Unfortunately, due to my own MH problems, I often get knocked around quite a bit in the process.
I have experienced "voices" and "delusions" (audible and visual hallucinations) as far back as I can remember and still do to this day. Back when I was young and even nowadays when there is a lot more readily available knowledge about these sorts of issues, it is very easy to be diagnosed as having a serious mental illness rather than just being considered a bit strange or weird. Once caught up in the mental health system, my experience is that it is far more damaging than the original problem. IMO you only need to spend a bit of time on this forum or read the recent Victorian Royal Commission report into mental health to see that.
It is common knowledge that people with MH issues are subject to a lot of stigma and discrimination. In Victoria where I live this has resulted in a lot of institutionalised bullying. In my experience it has got worse, not better over the years and has reached epidemic proportions where many people with psychotic MH problems are being forcibly given high doses of dangerous antipsychotics. The medical profession lie through their back teeth with claims that this sort of "chemical incarceration" is safe which it definitely is not. It also, more often than not, doesn't help in any way with the underlying problems. What it does do is result in premature death. I have had friends who have died quite young and very suddenly from these causes. Of course these deaths are never reported as drug related. It is always heart failure or something similar. The idea of state administered or approved genocide of the mentally ill keeps coming to mind.
And everybody is standing around saying these things shouldn't or don't happen - but they are!
@CrazyChick said in another post a week or so ago
Things that I learned [In a psych hospital] helped:
being compliant - even though I wanted to leave the hospital, I had to learn to stop asking or trying to leave & to do what they asked me to do. It seemed counter-intuitive that to leave the hospital the best thing I could do was to stop trying to leave the hospital.
Writing down my thoughts in a logical way. I wrote a long letter to the psychiatrist/s explaining what of their assessment I agreed with (leaving out the parts I didn't agree with - so it sounded like I was agreeing with them). I explained clearly why I didn't like a certain medication, and what unpleasant side-effects I was getting. I detailed which medications I was willing to have and other non-medication strategies I could use to manage my mental health issues. I presented my letter at one of the meetings with the psychiatrists and a plan was made to discharge me without a treatment order. I had to agree to some things, but didn't have to follow those things exactly.
These are pretty much my own experiences of the MH system's attempts to enforced learned helplessness and compliance. In order to get around it I quickly learned, like CrazyChick, that you have to kowtow to them. Anyone who tries to rail against this system is very likely to come unstuck and finish up making their situation worse. Punishment is definitely dolled out for complaining or objecting.
I recall reading somewhere in DSM-5 (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders version 5) that not cooperating with authority is a symptom of mental illness. Perhaps that is true.
So perhaps it is a safer, easier and more rational to just step aside and let the bullies and other toxic people trample all over you. This seems to be what the majority of people with MH issues do which is why we collectively have little or no voice with which to speak out against injustices. A passive response obviously has its consequences but so does speaking out.
Regards
Willy
