I’m going to “unpackage” and breakdown the vicious cycle of struggling with mental health disorders. I will bounce between my own experiences and the struggles of others.
Over six years ago, I was professionally diagnosed with type 2 bipolar. I have exhibited symptoms since I was a teenager. It was only after our family left a SRE that I was encouraged to seek help from a trained mental health professional.
I became associated with a strict religious environment (SRE) at age 17 and lived in those circles for nearly 25 years. For the record, I do not regret this. Many fond memories and experiences and many great relationships ensued. I have great appreciation for many folks in those circles.
Where I find fault is when someone has to struggle in silence. There is a culture where mental health disorders are often spun off as an excuse for bad behavior, or they are accused of harboring a secret sin or lifestyle. On more than one occasion, I was interrogated by a leadership figure. They called it “peeling back the layers of the onion.” They were so desperate to find something hidden in my life. They played these “interrogations” off as “giving counsel.”
I was humiliated… they had my wife convinced I was “damaged goods” that I needed to confess my sins, I need to “come to the feet of Jesus” and a bunch of other smooth catch-phrases I am forgetting about. I didn’t need to hear this. I needed to see a professional. Not be someone’s pet project who was looking to put a feather in their cap.
Here is the ten-step cycle I have experienced myself and have seen others go through:
1- A person knows something is “off”. They are depressed, often in a dark place. They feel alone. If they dare breath a word of how they are feeling, they are told to “cheer up” or “snap out of it.”
2- Depending who they confide to, if it is someone in leadership, it will either be completely downplayed or a big deal is made of it, that of which requires interrogating the struggling individual, hoping they break and confess to some dark secret. This tactic will often be disguised as offering “counsel” or such thing.
3- The above tactic will surely bring the full extent of the distress to the surface, as they are being treated as if they are in the wrong, or they are imaging things that are not real. Due to the nature and culture of a SRE, it would be quite frowned upon to seek help outside of the leadership.
4- The person continues to struggle. They are made to feel very small. Depending on how word gets around, they will be noticeably distanced. People will avoid association with them. It may be played off as “bad nerves”. They are told they are emotionally weak and “wait until they get hit with life’s realities.”
5- The person struggling, after seeking help from within the fold of a SRE will eventually take matters into their own hands and look for relief. It might start with their own doctor, on the down low of course, and get a prescription. They may start abusing OTC meds, slowly turning to illicit means of drugs and/or alcohol. Anything to escape their own minds. Anything to “punch out” from the real world or fad away from reality.
6- The leadership at the SRE will eventually become wise to the pills or the self-medication and use discipline on the person, shaming them for turning to relief from a situation that the SRE and its leadership caused in the first place. Fancy how that works? Leadership turns an already struggling person into a complete mess and now they want to turn screws down even harder using church discipline. This is not love or compassion. This is all ego and power.
7- Hopefully at this point, the person flees such an organization and is able to find a spiritual home somewhere else, where mental health disorders are recognized and better understood. They will be encouraged to seek help from a professional and get the therapy they should had many years before.
8- That person sees a real mental health professional. They get properly diagnosed. They may require continued therapy, perhaps some medication. In my own experience, knowing what is going on and having someone understand your situation is huge!
9- Keep in mind, your previous SRE will want to make sure you stay silent on how you were treated while in their fold. It will start off friendly at first… a gift basket at Thanksgiving, a random plate of cookies, or some other peace offering of some sort. If you refuse to keep silent, they will resort to nasty underhanded tactics: spreading false lies, using their networking connections to harass the rest of your family, making false reports to child protective services. They will stop at nothing to protect their homegrown narrative.
10- The last step! This is where you learn to forgive people who will never be sorry and accept an apology you’re never going to hear! Bitterness will eat a person from the inside out. This was a hard step for me, very hard. I had to learn to lay the entire situation in the hands of God.
That’s all for today. May God add his blessings! – Steve
Milepost 81 