Time to Know the Truth

It is said, “Age is wisdom”, and as we grow older, “how time passes by”. I am a 56 year old mental health consumer and I live this experience of age and time, with curiosity and wonder, even as I am living with a mental health illness. Why? I have missed out on the experience of education, growing with good friends, understanding the world as it traverses through time and the experience of work in my youth and early adult years. I missed out on the glory of time since I was young because I was in a hurry to race the clouds in the sky, to experience what I thought I never would. I was wrong. As longevity increases I find that age and time has a great impact on my present life and this is related to my mental health and age. As I have grown older, I think more carefully, without hallucinations and fears, as I have grown older, I care more about my health, eating healthier foods and taking earnest walks when I can without thinking about riding somewhere or calling someone to give me transportation. I care more about life without shouting at sky and I listen more attentively without closing my mind off to those who are trying to relate to me. There are some setbacks when it comes to relating age and mental illness; and its estimated that within 20 years there will be a greater number of adults, 55 years or older who will suffer from psychiatric disorders, which is a rate growing faster than our present population.
There are reasons that reflect both negative and positive reasons such being on the negative side, “aging baby boomers have a higher risk of developing depress, anxiety disorders, and substance use disorders than people born before World War II.
Psychiatry Online Psychiatric News News Article In other words there is the greater risk of late onset mental illness, the positive side is there is improved treatment for mental illness and healthier life styles which will give patients with mental illness a greater chance to live into an old age. At this present time, consumers with serious mental illness have only a 20 – 25 year shorter lifespan than the greater population at large, also the reduced aspect of stigma against mental illness will cause older people to find treatment and accept their illness, without fear.
As we grow older we give in to intellect and wisdom, and as always should be the rule instead of the exception retreating from the fruits of time, hiding within the carousel of our illnesses.