My mother fought mental illness from the time I was eighteen years old. I was stunned when she first became so ill that she was unable to leave her bedroom for days on end. I had no prior experience with anything like her symptoms which included a level of paranoia. My brilliant, loving, steady mother became unrecognizable and it would be up to me to find her the help that she needed. Little did I realize in that horrific moment that she would struggle with bipolar disorder for the rest of her life.
I did not handle the situation very well in the beginning. I was too unfamiliar with the concept of mental illness. I made many mistakes but I learned on the job and eventually settled into decades of helping my mother through relapses and times when medications stopped working properly for her. For a very long time I kept her illness under wraps. I made up excuses for missing work rather than being honest about my caretaker role for someone with a mental illness. Society had taught me that people with such difficulties are all too often considered weak, somehow subpar.
It was not until over twenty years later that I tearfully blurted out the truth about my mother to a colleague from work. He immediately counseled me with all the right words. He understood the situation because he had once cared for an aunt whose depression was so deep that she had even attempted suicide. He listened to me without judging either me or my mother and then we prayed together. I felt as though a heavy weight had been lifted. I had needed to talk about my mother’s strength in navigating the demands of life while dealing with a chronic disease. Instead I had bottled up my feelings out of fear that somehow both me and my mother would be misjudged.
Once I had spoken honestly I found myself telling more and more people what was going on in my life. I found not just sympathy but also great wisdom from others. I also found that far more people than I had ever imagined were dealing with similar situations. I suddenly became a kind of spokesperson in defense of the mentally ill. I learned that by being open I was not just helping others but was also learning more and more about the commonality of people afflicted with mental challenges like PTSD, depression, bipolar disorder, and a host of other forms of mental distress. I realized that the human experience all too often leads to breakdowns that must be addressed.
I became an expert in the language of mental illness and how to express the challenges in words that did not demean the individual who was striving to become well. I began to view mental illnesses in the same way that I looked at heart disease or cancer. Having a mental illness did not make a person somehow weird or defective. It was simply a medical condition in need of the same kind of care and understanding as a broken bone.
What often made me the most angry about how people treated my mother once she was diagnosed with bipolar disorder was the way so many of her former friends shunned her. I realized that it was difficult to be around her when she was having a dark day or a bout of mania but there were good people who never left her side. She worked in an office full of people who beautifully understood when she needed time to regain her footing. They even went so far as to create a quiet place for her to rest when her medications made her drowsy. They were cheerleaders on her team who saw her has a brilliant and unflaggingly kind person who now and again became ill. I loved that for her.
I was sick when I saw that Ken Paxton and Donald Trump were poking fun at James Talarico when he was sick with the flu needing to leave behind the campaign trail or a time. They joked that they wanted proof of life, unwilling to accept that he had done the right thing by resting and taking care not to spread his illness while he was contagious. Because of their outrageous taunting a total lie took hold that Talarico had actually checked into a mental facility in Ohio. What enraged me the most was the insinuation that Talarico was somehow tainted if he needed help for a mental problem. It was the old trope that anyone who becomes overwhelmed or sad or anxious is broken and not to be trusted. It was the same kind of ignorance that left my mother wondering what happened to some of her former friends.
As it is, Talarico was not in need of medical assistance for a mental illness. The lie was dirty because it indicated a total lack of understanding and kindness for anyone who actually seeks help for mental distresses. It was more of the garbage being hurled at Talarico that has nothing to do with his ability to hold down the job of a Senator. The only thing that Paxton and his minions have is throwing mud at Talarico by questioning his manhood and religious beliefs. The irony of it is that if there is indeed one of the candidates with a sordid resume it is Ken Paxton. He is a man who has no idea how to be a true Christian or how to be loyal to his wife. Paxton is the one who steals and cheats and lies.
I know how mental illness can destroy a life if it is misunderstood. Fortunately my mother only lost the friends who were never truly friends. Instead she learned who loved her enough to help her through the hardest times. They knew her strength and her goodness and not even those moments when bipolar disorder threatened to take her down did they treat her like a freak. Truly good people never act that way and neither should Paxton, the president or those who want to drag Talarico through the mud. Evil exists in our midst but it is not coming from James Talarico.
