I don’t think anyone is trying to claim that physical anguish is non-trivial. But one of the many additional hurdles that the mentally ill face is a general perception that mental illness is simply attitude, or something that can be easily changed. After all, if you look at most sufferers of mental illness you can’t tell that something is wrong with them.
Other issues that come up, include a stigmatization that I think is only matched by HIV victims; and different (and lesser) treatment standards for mental illness compared to any other chronic illness. Just for an example: an insulin dependant diabetic will have no trouble with medication charges, and usually no maximum annual payment for such medications. Schizophrenics do have to worry about that.
An amputee will be expected to have many, many sessions of P-T in a given year. Often with no cap. Most medical plans place a cap around 20 sessions of therapy per year. Which includes both medical visits (for adjusting medications) and therapy to actually try to change the habits of thought that have built up in the time that the mental illness was untreated.
I don’t equate physical pain with mental anguish. But I think that the secondary costs of physical ailments are much, much lower than those for mental ailments.
I was very close for a while with a man who suffered chronic bi-polar disorder as well as dissociative identity disorder due to extreme sexual abuse suffered as a child.
The impact of his illness on not only himself, but his friends and family is incredible, and sad. He is such a highly intelligent and wonderful person, but his illness seems to cause him to make decisions and take actions that stops him from having a happy and healthy life.
Well, there you go. Would you trade your depression for HIV? I’m not too fond of mine as you can imagine, but I think I’ll pass on that deal. Was that a fair comparison? Hell if I know.
And you may well be right, although my smug answer to the economic issues you have raised is that I’m actually Canadian. In any case, I was just giving my opinion, which was not meant to refute yours or anyone else’s, but only the notion that no one with a history of mental illness would still choose it in this poll.
To be honest? If I could dump my depression, and its related complications for HIV? I’d have to think long and hard about it. But a large part of that is that it sounds too good to be true. Of course, when I talk about my mental illness, I think it’s worth stating that mine is pretty far out on the edge of the bell curve. I haven’t had a job in years, and have convinced a skeptical gov’t agency that I am permanently disabled because of my depression. At this point, unless I really start to change, soon, I don’t think that HIV could kill me any faster than my current life is going to - so there’s really no change for me on the ground.
And if I were HIV positive without the deadly patterns of thought I have from 20 years of chronic depression, I might actually live longer, since I’d probably care more about taking care of myself.
Now, one thing that has to be considered, just as not all physical ailments are created equal, nor are all mental ailments. So, my perspective is from an extreme condition to begin with. I am aware that things could be worse, there are any number of physical ailments that I would say “No, thank you,” in response to a trade. But in the year 2007, HIV is not one of them. Hep C, might be. A case of nectrotizing faciitis, definitely. Anything that will result in being immortalized in medical literature with a condition named for me - pass. An amputation for relatively simple reasons, in exchange for my depression and related conditions - where do I sign up? (Though I’d prefer it to be a leg, not my right arm.)
I didn’t mean to sound shrill. It was just my intent to counter your opinion with my own and some facts that I thought you might not have considered.
I had a dear family friend that was suffering from dementia/alzheimers. She was nuttier than a fruitcake and didn’t seem to notice. It was awful for the rest of the world, but it was pretty in hers. As soon as she no longer had moments of lucidity when she realized the state she was in, life was good for her, albeit hell for everyone else.
Let’s also postulate how you would answer that question if you had a severe, debilitating physical disease. Your mind could watch your body slowly wither away, you’d be no longer able to move or talk or communicate in any way. That would be a sheer hell, IMO.
Sure, no problem. I did have some prior appreciation for your situation from reading this post yesterday. I didn’t pull the HIV gambit in order to make a point, I was genuinely curious. In fact, I had to give it some serious consideration myself. This may sound glib coming from a stranger on the internet, but I sincerely hope things turn around for you. I suspect we have more in common than you think, more than I feel comfortable admitting even on an anonymous message board. No one deserves to live like this, so please accept my apology if you felt I was trivializing your own experience with mental illness.
Not that I love being physically ill, but I would choose that over mental illness any day. The problem is a lot of long-term chronic illnesses are accompanied by depression and anxiety because it just sucks to be sick all the time. I never started relating to my grandmother so much than when she began deteriorating rapidly from fibromyalgia. The crux of the battle–to go on despite pain, or to give up and wallow in it–is the same.
The only thing I really know is that depression robs you of who you are, and it takes away your will to live or accomplish anything. I’ve met some pretty damned determined paraplegics but your odds of meeting a ‘‘determined’’ severely depressed person are significantly diminished. Mental illness is insidious and it will take from you everything you love, including your desire to achieve. Not to mention the complete stigma still attached to it.
e.g.
Graduate school admissions board: We noticed your grades slipped during your third semester–what happened there?
Option A: Oh, well, you see I was hit by a car and fractured three of my ribs and shattered my hipbone so I missed a great deal of school trying to recover.
Option B: * Oh, well you see I completely lost my will to live and tried to kill myself and missed a great deal of school in therapy trying to recover.*
There’s no need for an apology. I never thought you were trvializing anything. I was mistaken to think that you might not have been aware of the depth of troubles mental illness can bring, but that’s far from saying that you had been trivializing anything.
Having a front row seat to both severe disability and not-exactly-stellar mental health, I would have to say if some Sky Wizard came down and gave me the option of either, I would just shoot myself.
Being or becoming dependant on others is soul sucking, to say the least.
