After my wife received her mental health diagnosis, things got worse before they got better.
Doctor visits were a bit of an issue for us, as we began to navigate this mental health journey. I love my wife, and wanted to know what was going on and how I could best help her. I would go in with her to her appointments, to listen to what was talked about. If I thought there was something to add that I had seen or heard, I would speak up. I even made a list of her meds for her to bring to doctors’ visits, to keep all the medical professionals informed of the changes.
She was taking a lot of medicines, so I would always put her meds in the container for her. I was deathly afraid she would take too much, mix them up or miss a dose. I watched her meds “like a hawk” and I thought I was helping.
Eventually a friend asked me to join a Fresh Hope group. My wife was not ready so I went by myself, hoping to get some answers to help her. And I found that the Fresh Hope group really helped me.
I did not realize it, but my own fears were part of the problem, including my fear of completely trusting God.
My wife had perceived my actions as me trying to control her. Once I understood how she was feeling, I began to let go of some of my fears about her abilities to manage her own mental health care.
After some prayer, I ended up letting her take control and get her medications ready by herself. (I would still occasionally check them.) After a while, I learned to trust her again. And with continued prayer I started trusting God!
Then I started to let her go to the doctors’ appointments by herself. I would just ask what they talked about instead of going with her every time. I did go in a couple of times – when meds were possibly going to be adjusted. But we talked about it beforehand, so she knew what to expect from me and she allowed me to come in with her.
I think mainly these two little changes were the beginning of us starting to heal. We eventually regained our trust for each other. Communication and learning about the disorder was a key. A willingness on my part to see that I needed to change what I was doing to help her and by letting her do her own part to get better was another. Eventually my fears were relieved, and my lack of trust was gone. The Bible says “Perfect love drives out fear.” 1 John 4:18.
So, my advice, based on my own experience, is to take a self-inventory of your inner fears that can be used as a personal indicator. How you react to your fears or insecurities might just be hurting or affecting those around you, those you love. But small changes can affect those relationships. You can only control what you do.
For those times when you are so fearful your loved one may hurt themselves, it is best to try and talk them into going to the hospital on their own. However, it’s ok to get help from others if necessary, because sometimes we overreact, and a second opinion might be needed. Another person, someone safe and trustworthy, might be able to listen when you can’t, when your concerns are making it hard to actually hear your loved one over your own fears.
The Fresh Hope group has taught me that a lot of little changes on both our parts can add up to big changes. These changes need to come from both the diagnosed person and the loved one. We can’t put all the blame on the person with the disorder.
I think it’s important for families to learn together. Some of us were brought up in very dysfunctional homes. But we can learn better ways of doing things from other people if we are willing. That’s where a Grupo de apoyo Fresh Hope comes in: we can learn from others in similar situations.
Big problems can happen when we keep putting things off. Hard-to-deal-with issues can be like piling unwanted stuff on a shelf. Eventually, that shelf is going to get loaded up and heavy, and come crashing down. And then it can be even harder to pick up those pieces. So small changes now can make big differences in your life.
Life can get easier and more fulfilling with these small changes. In the middle of hectic confusion, it’s hard to find hope. What we need is a place to become aware of the real problems, so we can do our part to solve them. The Fresh Hope books, Fresh Hope: Living Well in Spite of a Mental Health Diagnosis and Holding to Hope are good places to start. Joining a Fresh Hope Support Group to learn to recognize the problem areas is a place where recovery can start and where you can begin to have hope again.
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