Firstly, personally I certainly don't see my MI as a curse at all. I am absolutely fine with it.
Even though I have been relentlessly pursuing paid work, it has nothing to do with recovery. One reason is the shame of not working, which is not logical, and the second is the fact I would like to be able to eat, which is logical.
I neither see paid work as some sort of magic elixir to "cure"me or restorative in any particular way, other than those pragmatic reasons I have just mentioned. It may be an indication I am feeling more "well", but not necessarily so.
Recovery to me has meant different things at different times. I have been in and out of clinics erratically since my teens.
My measure of recovery then, was determined by the length of time between serious episodes. effectively I would be unwell, then recover to a point of functionality, measuring recovery success on the time it took until the next one.
Recovery could happen because of effective medication, psychotherapy, a mixture of both or nothing specific at all.
I am not sure how well many in the medical professionals really understand the MI recovery process at all.
A number of GPS are disinterested and nervous about becoming involved with the illness.
A view often espoused by GPs is that it should be up to the profession psychiatrists, psychologists and other mental health practitioners to deal with. I am of their view that GPs should be part of the management process for recovery.
What is recovery any way. Its meaning has to be determined by the person going through that experience.
I have had various strategies handed to me, not against my wishes per se but more not taking my wishes into consideration.
I think we sometimes can be talked into undertaking treatment strategies because we are not always empowered to make those decisions. This is because of the special place medicos hold within the context of our experiences with our own mental illness.
So maybe in some instances medicos can interrupt recovery by their preconceived ideas about what recovery should mean and how it is measured.
Surely the restoration of an essentially functional state uninhibited by destructive behaviour or mood would signify recovery improvement. A state where a person is comfortable living with a situation gauged by their own feelings of wellness, recovery, if you will.
I remember, stupidly, being convinced into undertaking several sessions of ECT and spending then next few weeks worrying about whether I would end up like Frances Farmer the American actress who had a primitive form of this practiced upon her, against her will, with disastrous consequences.
For me recovery is absorbing the essence of my MI, understanding it, and using its positive attributes as to reinforce my individuality and worth.
I have never felt like a victim and have never been bitter about being schizophrenic. I often wonder whether I have appropriate insight in regard to my illness, wondering if this has dimmed a realistic perception as to what it is all about. But I think I do understand it and on balance am comfortable with how it sits with me personally.
Volunteering and associated activities for me are attractive from a public good perspective, socialising, accepting responsibility and a whole host of other benefits but I have never found them integral in any way in helping me recover.
It would be an absurd situation if the only method of measuring recovery success was for a person with MI to be gainfully employed in paid work. What about the large number where paid work is unattainable or simply work is not for them. It may not be their goal.
I value enormously the value of advocacy groups but I think it is important that no one loses site of the individual wishes and aspirations of each individual with MI. The aspirational primary objectives for people with MI of affordable housing, medical accessibility, opportunities for employment etc etc are essential. But they must be relevant to the person concerned.
Apart from anything else, the practical barriers to employing people with MI are so profound that it is in no way it is a realistic proposition for most of us to attain that goal, so for those that want it those barriers need to be lowered.
But for the large number of people who cant work or don't want to work, strategies have to be put into place to ensure their needs are dealt with just as legitimately.
It is a valid decision when people make this choice. A decision about whether they have recovered should not be based on employment readiness or placement but by enabling them to access services within the context of not needing to work to feel that they have recovered.
Where I live in rural Queensland there a no jobs, non existent public transport, poor infrastructure and poor health services. The participation rate for people with MI is zero.
Recovery is such and individual perspective it probably is the case that recovery programs need to be totally individualised bearing in mind the specific nature of our own illness and experiences.
I have no family support system, so it is not an option for me to use that infrastructure to bolster my recovery path.
When I think about it, my closest friends all have an MI of one sort or another. I find that level of understanding to be more comforting than supposedly normal people offering sometimes manufactured sympathetic but uninformed support.
So when I distill it, recovery for me is being in a mental state which allows me to have a positive outlook on life for a prolonged period.
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