Discussion We will be able to detect the source of mental illness just like we can detect cancer/virus tx

[bubbletea]

We're always finding new discoveries in science and medicine.
In the 1900s, doctors didn't know to wash their hands before delivery and didn't understand why women were getting infections.
Now, its such an obvious thing to do.
In the 1950s, people were using heroin as cough medicine. Now, it's been debunked.

I feel like our approach to mental illness and psychological symptoms is the same level as not washing hands before a delivery and not understanding where all the infections are coming from.

The woman in the documentary describe something I felt and other (female friends) with mental struggles and suicidal ideation have described- that there is a monster/devil inside.

I really feel like during emotional moments I am taken over by another entity and unable to control my actions. It really feels like someone else has taken over the steering wheel and I'm just along for the ride. Then I have to deal with all the consequences and take responsibility for "my" actions that didn't feel like mine at all.
If I tell people that it wasn't me, I'm just avoiding responsibility.

I feel like the monster has taken control of my life so much to the point that I look at my life - my friends, my boyfriends, my relationships, my choices in the past, and none of them are recognizable as my own choices.

It feels like I've made friends, dated certain people JUST to keep the monster at bay and satisfy the monster from eating me alive. Or made certain decisions to feed the monster's greed and sense of importance and ego.

:(
I feel like when the monster is sleeping, I'm actually just a frail child that loves animals, empathic to the point where ANYONES situation can be felt like my own (which is why it hurts me when I see the news or walk by homeless people.. really really bad that I feel helpless and I can't do anything about it) And likes to make other people happy

But theres another side of me that's extremely manipulative and condescending. I think that I'm better than everyone else and this side of me is extremely entitled. As much as I know to feel things in other people's shoes, I know exactly what to do or what to say to hurt them to the core of their being.

Anyway
I feel like, even 100 years ago we didn't have the technology to detect certain diseases. But with the invention of blood tests, x rays, MRIs etc, we can look at a sick person and be like that's the source of their problem. As long as we remove it, this person will stop showing these symptoms.
I feel like mental health will be the same way. It's pretty much invisible right now and all I could do was treat the symptoms with antidepressants and alcohol, codependent relationships, and regression into a child like mentality.

It always felt like I was really ill but people were making me feel bad for an illness. Like it would be frowned upon to look at someone with cancer or a broken leg to say
"You got yourself into this mess, you need to help yourself."
"Just SMILE. Other people are born without parents. Other people have it so much worse!"
"This is just a mindset problem. Your negativity brought your illness and you can change your attitude and make it go away."
"I'm so sick of you getting fevers just because you have cancer"
"You have cancer? Everyone else has problems too, not just you."
"Just forget the moment you fell and broke your leg- that will help the broken bone just disappear like it never happened."
"Why do you limp like that? What's wrong with you? Use both your legs properly. You're an adult, not a child."

It's proven that our past experiences create the web of neuronal connections that become the library we reference to interpret current situations in the present. Telling someone to forget the past is like telling someone to forget a language they acquired for survival.

It's very hard to unlearn a language you've been speaking for years unless you move to a completely different environment and never hear the language again. But even then once you are exposed to the same language you remember everything. Acquiring a new language as a first language at adulthood is extremely difficult.

The relationship "language" I've been speaking since childhood is really really bad. Yet that's the only language I know how to speak. And the people that come into my life are the ones who speak the same language - so people who only know how to curate dysfunctional relationships. Healthy individuals and I don't connect. Its just like how I wouldn't be able to marry someone who speaks Russian when I speak English.

Plus, even if I try to learn "Russian" and forget "English" so I can assimilate with mentally healthy individuals, "English" will keep being reinforced through interactions with my family.

 

[lululoo]

I agree with you about the relationship language stuff.

I'm a little confused if you are trying to say that there will be greater biological understanding of mental illness? I disagree with that. I don't think it's primarily a biological issue.

There is so much research on the developmental traumas that lead to mental illness, but it gets ignored. The narrative about genes/biology/other factors is much louder.

I think as time goes on we may develop a greater understanding of the ways and the extent to which developmental trauma (and adult trauma too!) causes mental illness. But I'm not sure we will ever find a true fix for it. Just as there are physical traumas that the human body cannot reverse, there may be psychological traumas that the mind cannot overcome.

There is so much in the modern lifestyle that our minds are not adapted for. Throw in additional traumas and maybe the mind is just broken.

Some people do recover though so I don't mean to discourage anyone who is still thinking about recovery. Just for me personally it hasn't worked out that way. My body is also broken in a way that is not reversible (fibromyalgia).