Mental sickness

Well, my test results from my physical came in the mail today.  Everything was normal.  On the one hand I'm very happy about that as it means that nothing is physically wrong with me.  However, there is a tiny part of me that kind of hoped for something other than it being purely psychosomatic.  I knew that it was but now I just have to accept it.   My sleeping problems and my waking problems are all in my head... just like all my other problems.  Can I cut my head off and get a new one please?  This one is defective.  Sadly, we don't have that technology and how could I even determine what kind of new head to get?  Where would it come from?  Could the make a replica of my current head but without all the weird glitches or would I have to get some dead person's head the others get their organs?   Okay, I took that way too far.  Sorry about that.

Anyway, armed with that recent knowledge, all I can do is continue trudging through my mental trenches.  When I'm caught up in the battlefield of my past while dreaming, I need to just make myself get out of bed.  Maybe splash some water on my face or brush my teeth or eat or something and then see if I'm still tired enough to go back to sleep.   I can no longer delude myself with "there might be something physically wrong with me" to justify my sleeping longer than necessary so we'll see.  Hopefully that will work out.   I'm tired of my psychological issues.  Earlier today, I sat down with my parents and it's hard to hear them say they feel helpless.  Of course, if I were them, I'd feel the exact same way but sometimes support and encouragement is all you can give until the person can gain the tools to help herself.   For a portion of our discussion, I explained all that I had learned about trauma recovery and how it can be a long, arduous process with many setbacks to some.  It was weird saying that what I was going through was normal in this strange world but it's still hard.

Mental illness is treated so differently here.  If I had gotten into a terrible car-wreck and hurt my back few would question my slow recovery or the recurrence of symptoms that creep back up due to a simple sneeze.  Even if that sneeze happened years later and caused the prior injury to deliver a fresh brand new wave of pain, no one would question my inability to go to work or to get out of bed or to get back into bed.   Especially if I was seeking treatment and received a written confirmation that due to my symptoms there are days I would be unable to do perform my daily responsibilities.  People understand physical injuries.  They can put themselves in the person's shoes somewhat.  No one would ever say, "my back wouldn't be affected by a sneeze years later" and certainly no one would ever ask, "God, that happened a long time ago.  Can't you just forget out about and put it behind you?"  No one says these things about physical injuries but they are so quick to say them about the mental injuries.

Luckily, that analogy has helped many people understand a bit better when they ask me a question like that.  People who experience panic truly understand.  The get how incapacitating and scary it is.  They know how your hands clench with numbness and you lose sensation in your feet.  However, for those who never experience that can't possibly understand.  I certainly didn't until I had my first one.  I'm not blaming anyone here.  Mental sickness is still relatively new and only just beginning to be accepted and it's very difficult to understand.  I'll never understand what it would be like to hear voices (at least I hope not) but that doesn't make those who do hear the voices "less strong or less capable" than me.  It's a sickness, like physical sickness.  Luckily though, mental illness tends to not be as contagious as the flu.  God, that would a CDC nightmare!