The new normal?....

As I have begun talking about my family and professional background, I have been given feedback about focusing on ‘ancient history’.  Now, I get that.  Today is a new day.  My Mom and her problems are not currently in my life.  And what is past is past.  Really.  She died many years ago.  I’m not even currently working in the field.  I don’t case manage anybody right at the moment.  So, why am I focusing on this?  Well, I have partially covered this in another post.  I believe in shining the light of day on difficult issues.  And I want to provide a forum for discussion for those dealing with mental illness today.  And finally, I am healing myself and my relationship with my Mom in these pages.  Acknowledging what was, and celebrating who my Mom was to me.  I have grown.  And I see her more clearly today than I did previously.

However, after a conversation this afternoon, I have recognized another reason.  For me, mental illness is normal.  I have spent much of my life involved in relationships with mentally ill people. The first time, of course, was with my Mom.  Then I dealt with clients and their mental illness.  Finally, I have many friends who have varying degrees of mental illness.  I cope with my depression.  Sometimes more successfully than at other times.  And of course, my daughter has experienced an anxiety disorder.  So, in some ways I am surrounded by it.  And so, I am still working on the way through it, on the how to survive part of it.  I am still in the process of learning.  Perhaps on one level or another, that will be true until the day I die.  I don’t know.  But I know that if I approach it as an inquiry and an opportunity to explore and learn, I will grow.  In addition, when I write about it, I have the chance to help others.  So, it really can be seen as the possibility for growth. 

Normal?  What is normal?  For me, as a child, normal was interacting with a woman who was clearly not normal.  She was mentally ill.  She had behavior patterns that were far from what I saw in my teachers.  Or in my other relatives.  Or in the delivery man.  Or with the parents of my friends from school.  The lady at the check-out in the local grocery store didn’t look or act like my Mom.    Now, of course, you know that I wasn’t really aware of what the teachers were dealing with privately.  I didn’t know what kind of experiences the delivery man had.  These people could have been dealing with mental illness in any one of its many forms.  They could have personal experience.  Or they could be dealing with the mental illness of friends or family. 

But the fact remains that whether my Mom’s behavior was normal or not, it was MY normal.  It was what I saw and experienced every day.  And so I learned that dealing with mentally ill people and their symptoms is normal.  I still live in that reality, in some ways.  Can I change that normal?  Can I move into a normal that doesn’t involve mental illness?  What do you think?  Can you move into a reality that doesn’t involve mental illness?  How do we do that?    Any ideas?  Let’s have a conversation.