You are not alone

The reality is for every person with a mental illness, there are even more individuals like me, desperately trying to care for and help the ones they love as they travel this lonely, terrifying road together. Mental illness influences circles of people: families, friend groups, communities, not just the one with the diagnosis. Trevor suffers with mental illness and our family suffers from it.  

So I’ve set out to tell our true story, not for shock, but because when I saw what was happening to my husband, I was terrified. I had never seen someone act in such ways outside of a movie. Only one person I knew had ever talked about what a panic attack looked or felt like and that was in a brief, formal training session. I didn’t know how depression can mute a loved one’s personality and energy, how OCD can taint the most mundane and innocent conversations of everyday life, how the low swing of bipolar disorder can deplete someone of the energy to go on, or how any and all of those things could influence a family’s dynamics. I didn’t have the vocabulary to even communicate what was happening to us and without names or words, I lived in fear. Fear of the unknown, fear of doing the wrong thing, fear of being misunderstood, fear of being alone. 

I have learned the hard way that our mental health is a real and powerful component of our existence as connected human beings. We simply must learn to treat it as such. And please know, if you suffer with or from mental illness, you are not alone. You’ll hear me say it again and again. You are not alone.