Dealing with mental illness: Two steps forward, one step back for a lifetime because we deserve it

[AZLD4Candidate]

Yes, I have been very open about myself on this website.

It started when my wife was denied entry into the country because of whatever reason CBP invented at SEATAC. It continued with my struggles to get my wife her green card and the fact I had to give up teaching in the US and my attempted run for AZ House because I couldn't bare dealing with being separated anymore because of the US Government.

It dictated how all of that broke me emotionally and psychologically and I suffered a suicidal nervous breakdown because of it. I am bipolar (severely). I am Asperger's. I have body dysmorphic disorder after being called fat, ugly, and disgusted by most EVERYONE I have come in contact with, including family. I suffer from extreme PTSD from childhood abuse, intensity bullying, anti-Jewish violence, and workplace bullying/abuse.

I have stated many times when there is a mass shooting that being an asshole isn't a mental illness. Mentally ill people normally direct their trauma inward and attack themselves. The most common:

1: Bipolar - we are crap in our own eyes and the only way we can deal with how low we are is to abuse ourselves because we deserve it.

2: Borderline - our personality was stolen from us before we developed it so we attach ourselves to whomever says they love us even if it destroys us, then we will push you away and hope you will stay but we know we deserve to be hurt and abandoned because we deserve it.

3: PTSD - we can't process the trauma we've encountered, so we abuse ourselves because we deserve it.

4: Eating disorders - we can't process the trauma we've encountered, so we take it out on our bodies because we deserve it.

5: OCD - we can't process the trauma we've encountered, so we isolate ourselves and push people away because we deserve it.

We are substance abusers because it's an escape. We end our lives because it's an escape for those we know we are destroying.

And we deserve it. After all, according to society, all we need to do is get over it, grow up, get help, and we'll be fine. It doesn't work that way. We are always fighting that monster in our heads that controls us. We hear it louder than anything else. We hear that monster's words and ideas louder because it's how we see ourselves when we look in a mirror.

Compliments are fake. They aren't real. The monster told us that and we listen. Praise is just a way to set you up for failure. The monster tells us that and we listen. The monster controls us. I know in our world of "free will" and "you decide for yourself" that society rejects this idea, but as someone who has bipolar run in his family, as someone who has attempted suicide a few times, as someone who has pushed almost everyone out of his life because he doesn't deserve happiness, I am here to tell you that free will doesn't exist in mental illness.

The monster says it, we believe it. The monster controls us, we do it. Medication, therapy. . .all wonderful, but to be honest, it doesn't do much. The monster is still there because mental illness is just that. . .mental. We don't know anything about it. Medication either stabilizes you, makes you a zombie, or deals with symptoms, not the cause or root. It's like cold medication. No cold medicine cures the cold, it just deals with the "cold symptoms."

As I write this, I feel myself sinking into another depressive episode. I feel it coming on. I feel the anger. I feel the hopelessness. I see the darkness growing. I am on medication, but it isn't stopping it. I am on cymbalta, paxil, trazodone, and ativain.

Mental illness isn't about "getting help." It's so much more. But thanks to how we treat mental illness in the world, we are looked at in the simplest, easiest ways possible:

1: you like feeling this way because you're used to it.
2: you want to feel this way because you just want sympathy
3: you refuse to get over it because you're weak
4: you just want drama in your life because you feed off it
5: you are a man. act like one.
6: you don't have a problem. you are the problem
7: you're too much negativity. go away until you can put a smile on my face
8: you're an adult. deal with it like an adult will.
9: shut up and suck it up. everyone has problems.

So, next time someone claims mental illness when someone does something horrific, remember that those of us with mental illness destroy ourselves.

As I write this, the darkness is growing. I feel there is no escape. The monster has control now. And it's telling me how to think and feel. And it tells me I deserve it all.