A Path to Recovery

Joseph Campbell’s work and interviews championship the journey of the mythological hero. He highlighted the sublime role of the Hero who has no path to follow but must make his or her own path through the sometime dangerous woods of life. In the last 9 years I feel I have been a hero. I have forged my own path with the help of therapy and medication through the deep depths of Psychotic Depression. And after several years, I now have the ability to see the gift of mental illness. I have shown my children, one can survive anything with the appropriate help and as Chaucer wrote :love conquers all.

I have survived 18 months of Psychotic Depression. I was dealt with visual and auditory hallucinations, and paranoia. I heard noises from the furnace floor register in my bedroom at night, people were watching and monitoring me, my reading was impossible because the print was a blurred glare. I smelled and tasted obnoxious odors and tastes. I ran away to Canada but returned home. I was lost and alone in my illness. I wanted to die. I was hospitalized four times and in day treatment. All of this was due to extraordinary stress and genetics.

The next year the medial insurance changed and it wasn’t until the spring that I began therapy again. This was very help full when my sister died. She had refused Hospice and it was a very difficult time to deal with death without a roadmap

That was four years ago and despite one or two periods of distress when I tried to return to work; I am healthy. I still am in therapy and I take my medication daily. My children have almost recovered from the hurts of my illness and most days I feel good about myself. I am trying to reinvent my life in light of this illness. It has been hard to surrender because surrender has not been a word in my vocabulary. I did not surrender to my learning disabilities but now I have learned that over reaching and over achieving are not in my best interest anymore. I tutor a small number of inner city children which mostly works well. My writing is much slower than I would wish but I still get published

I take yoga (though I am not good at that), try to meditate, write, pray; but the most important aspect of living with a chronic illness has been the great psychological and persistent medical treatment. The two go hand in hand along with prayer and meditation.

I just happen to have learning disabilities and a mental illness and despite everything : am a good mother and special human being. My next goal is to allow myself to totally accept this. I also would like to share my experience and show the community Psychotic Depression can be treated successfully.