Collapsed Identities

[Narwhal10]

Pernicious Anaemia/vitamin B12 deficiency can be the basis of psychiatric symptoms and diagnoses and developmental disabilities. I am terribly sorry that my knowledge of the latter is limited.

A wonderful retired Mental Health (MH) lecturer has publicly written about the challenges they personally faced. They tried to make their students have a holistic approach. However, by the time their pupils had reached their final year, they would be so accustomed to psychiatrospeak (the jargon used in MH) that service users are ONLY described in an oversimplified manner. This lecturer asked the students to detail the relationships they had with the people they worked with and the individuals themselves.

The lecturer heard that people were portrayed entirely in terms of a Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) category. The aspects of their lives are seen as irrelevant, contexts of their lives are ignored and a person’s identity is dismissed.

The ‘schizophrenic’ is often given an overlay of chronic, burnt out, despairing and a SOCIAL judgement is added such as the PERSON was devious, exhausted and inappropriate.

The lecturer discussed this with colleagues who shifted the blame saying that is how it is in practice. The ex-lecturer furthers that it happens not only at an institutional level but an international one. They also discuss the entrenched attitudes and dogma of the psychiatric medical model which makes assumptions and preconceived ideas of those with MH labels. It features ubiquitously in research and journals.

In 1973, a book was published about a woman called Sybil. She was diagnosed with Dissociative Identify Disorder. By all accounts, she had 16 personalities.

On-line, I use different pseudonyms depending on which health website I access. A few times, in person, health staff have said, ‘I’ve seen you before.’ If I’m feeling cheeky, my little joke is, ‘From the TV.’

Years ago, I used to have amazing banter with a guy I worked with. I was known as Clyde, the orangutang that stars with Clint Eastwood in Every Which Way but Loose. 😜

[Cherylclaire Forum Support]

Yes, yes - I remember reading that book, about Sybil. Some of the personalities were quite young, two were twins, others were older, there to look after the younger ones, be their voice. Fascinating, and sad.

This experiment also strikes me as both. How can you communicate, confide in people when they don't "see" you, in your entirety ? "Collapsed Identities" a great title.

Back when I first became ill, what scared me most was the loss of self I felt. Where was I ? Would I come back ? Loved ones wondering the same - feeling angry, cheated. Me feeling same. So hard to get through. B12 deficiency can be so very life-limiting.

I have started reading alone - finally, a pleasure again.

[Narwhal10 in reply to Cherylclaire]

Great to hear about reading Cherylclaire. Reading requires concentration. If you have words jumping around the page, your eyesight is so bad you cannot focus . A person may have headaches or migraines.

After my 11th B12 injection, I just had so much static in my head that if I moved I would retch. So, reading was totally out of the question.

There is a loss of self and everybody has a natural grieving process. Why can’t I do this ? Why does it hurt to dress myself ? Why do I feel like I am staggering as though I am drunk ?

To end on a positive note though, I am currently reading a book by an obstetrician brought up in the Gaza Strip. It has what I believe has a wonderful quote in:-

‘So know that victory is with patience, and relief is with distress and that with hardship comes ease.’

🌷

[Cherylclaire Forum Support in reply to Narwhal10]

Reading requires concentration and a memory; two of the things I'd lost.

No, not lost: just temporarily mislaid.

That quote is a fine one. I've just started A Trip To The Light Fantastic by Katie Hickman. She is an extraordinary traveller and writer, and she's about to join the circus in Mexico. All because of an old black and white photograph she had found in Belgrade of an ageing circus artiste....

"....The woman, for all I know, is dead. And yet there was a moment when I first looked at her picture, and I knew I knew her...... It was a vision, not just of a woman, but of a whole world. It would not go away. "

Well, I'm in !!