[Seán Himmelb(L)au]

Many people don’t understand mental illness. We all make jokes about schizophrenia, about crazy people, about retards bouncing off the walls of padded cells in straitjackets, foaming at the mouth. But mental illness is serious, it rocks families, it kills people, and it’s time we talked about it and it was no longer a taboo subject.

I can speak from personal experience- my Dad, for as long as I can remember, has suffered from depression. There is no ‘cure’, except taking tablets and seeing councilors. It doesn’t always go away, some people just learn to live with it. At least with a physical illness, you know it’s your body letting you down, but I can imagine how maddening it would be for your mind to be going crazy inside, emotions running high all the time.

The things I remember about my Dad when I was younger were his mood swings, going to the doctors, coming back and having heated discussions with my Mum, and resigning from his job before he got fired because he punched a work colleague he thought was out to get him. His paranoia, his happiness and his strictness on and off, they made life so difficult for a kid who didn’t understand why his daddy was acting like this.

I used to have night terrors worrying I would end up like him, alone and paranoid, stuck in a claustrophobic mind. As soon as I was old enough, my dad, my Dad told me what was up to him, to my mum’s disapproval, and it used to scare me no end. However, I was glad I knew, because I know what has happened to my Dad and what is happening to my brother now. Imagine someone tightening the wrist and ankle holders round someone you adored, and not being able to do anything about it. Imagine this being stretched over a period of years, seemingly endless my dad still takes medication now). Imagine walking on eggshells because your Dad is possessed by someone else- an ill person you want to help, but there isn’t any way.

“Is your brother okay?” my brother’s girlfriend asks over MSN, after talking to him on the phone. She repeatedly asks me and I try to console her “He’s okay, Mum and Dad are with him.” Those two are wonderful together, they make each other so happy, and they love each other to bits- but now his illness could split them up. He cut his arm a couple of weeks ago, and it still isn’t healing. I can hear him shouting at my parents, saying no-one cares, and how it would be better if he just wasn’t on this earth, and I can hear my parents frantically trying to reason with him. I tell her he’s alright again, and then get my coat on, sneak downstairs, and let myself out. I walk up to the top of the hill above our house, and look at the town laid out below me, and scream until my lungs hurt, sick and weary of this- there is nothing I can do for either of them- I don’t know what to say.

I creep back through the door and hear my brother shouting at my Mum and Dad how he doesn’t deserve the BUPA councilor they arranged for him to see from my Dad’s health insurance. It meant we would be able to book an appointment straight away instead of having to wait on the NHS for several months.

My chest still hurts, but it feels like I’ve got the hopelessness out of my system, so I go and watch TV. Everybody slowly congregates downstairs and watches with me. I don’t want to be extra nice to him, he’ll think I’m treating him like a child, so I just relax and swap silly jokes with my Dad. It’s like this all the time, I have mood swings too, one moment I’m happy, trying to forget what is happening to my whole family, then I’m angry that it is happening, and then I get home and end up crying after arguing about the stupid things. I get too silly trying to forget, and then too angry, and then too sad, back to silly again. It’s always in the back of my mind, this problem. And the feeling of not being able to do anything is so overwhelming.

I know I haven’t addressed the full spectrum of mental illness here, but I think this is a perfect example of how such things affect normal, everyday people, and how there should be a higher state of public awareness. The experiences I have gone through, and still am going through, make me want to help others through charity work, talking to the families of mentally ill people myself, even if it’s just to help them cope. And hopefully, one day people won’t make silly jokes about it, they’ll try and help people, and be understanding, because it is a really vile, horrible thing to go through for both the sufferer and their family.