Topic Tuesday **closed** The road to recovery: Reengineering and rebuilding yourself

Good evening everyone and welcome to this month's Topic Tuesday - the road to recovery.

I though I kick start the conversation by asking you what your opinions are of Jackie's story? Is it something that you can relate to, and if so how, or how not?

@Paige @Rosie @kristin - tagging for a friendly reminder as you indicated that you might be attending tonight.

@Crazy_Bug_Lady @Alessandra1992 @PeppiPatty and @Former-Member, I've tagged you, following on from this dicussion, I thought it might be useful to hear about how Jackie managed work and her MI.

@Alessandra1992

I hear ya, being able to give back is a great privilege.

I think getting support, and connecting with others who get what you're going through is pretty important. I'm curious, how you found going to your first session. I imagine that is could feel really overwhelming. Have you got any pointers for people thinking about going to group support?

I can relate to Jackie, as she was in quite a powerful and high-paying job and found herself with schizophrenia. It is a great personal disaster when you have a career trajectory and lose it. I guess that's why she called it 'reengineering and rebuilding' for her recovery.

Its an interesting way to put it as 'engineer' refers to designing planning and constructing and 'build' has the definition of make, construct or form using parts and materials.

Its interesting the different symbols and metaphors people use for recovery.

Realising that at some point in time I needed to accept that being a 'success' didn't necessarily mean I had to be part of the 'standard' workforce - changed the way I felt about myself in terms of being a contributor to society. I still struggle with my own perceptions of what a good citizen should offer their community (and that often leads back to thoughts of employment). However, I try to make a difference where I can - and for me, it is most likely going to be in non-conventional settings (as far as workplaces are concerned).

@Rosie yeah, I thought he same thing when I saw the words 'reegineer' and 'rebuild'. When I saw these words I thought it conveyed starting anew, and creating something, or pulling together many pieces that can feel fragmented and scattered.

I'm curious to see hear how other people frame and perceive their 'recovery' or 'staying well', and what it involves for you.

@simply_me raised a great point about redefining 'success'. I think're-engineering ourselves can sometime mean letting go of notions of success - hanging on to them, in some instances, can just create angst. I've certainly had to reassess my ideas of success, and it's been immensely helpful.

To my point before, what have been people's ideas of success been in the past, and how have they changed over time to the present date?

I guess for me, I used to look at bench markers by a certain age (i.e., have a house at 30, kids at 33 etc), but now, my main measure of success overall, is just to be happy and surrounded by people who are supportive and accepting.

I guess the first step was taking medication for me. I had to admit there was something wrong to make the next moves to reengineer and rebuild, to recover and stay well.

Having lived with a MI for what seems like forever - I don't actually consider the word 'recovery' in my situation. Staying well or avoiding becoming unwell are definitely themes I can relate to. For me - recovery equated to cure - and I was never going to achieve this - and would spiral down due to yet another failure of achieving complete wellness. Sometimes reframing what we regard as success and failure can have a major impact on achieving a goal or specific outcome.

@Rosie and @simply_me

I think how we understand wellness and unwellness can indeed have a huge impact on how we care for ourselves, and how we perceive ourselves.

@simply_me, that's a great point about the word 'recovery' - it can imply an end goal, and doesn't fully capture the acheivements that it takes to stay well on a daily basis, nor does it reflect that there will moments of unwellness too. I guess it could set some people up for disappointment.

Perhaps, it can be useful to set up realistic goals for wellness? What are your thoughts?

One thing that I'm particularly interested in is how did you let go of your old notions of success?