How does a Mental illness start?

Some of you’s probably heard my story here it is for those that have not.  It was nineteen eighty seven and I was in prison waiting for my appeal to happen.  I knew I would get out once my appeal was finished.  The reason was the Judge did not give me the law and everyone has a right to the law.  She wanted me to do time that is why she did not give me an appeal bond.  The appeal lasted two years.  That was on my mind also so was they had just moved be to east wing in the prison I did not want to go.  I know they had more freedom and wore street clothes but all that did not matter to me.  I had my friends in south wing and I was happy as far as being in prison goes.  I and a friend ran a gambling house it was just for fun for me.  It passed time and I did not lose any money.

I took the gambling house to east wing with me.  I had other problems going on at the same time a guy that I later found out I had just met a couple of times was going on the outside saying I was a snitch and that is something a person did not want going on. I had finished an accounting course and was now taking computer programing there.  I raised the limit on my gambling house and a guard I knew wrote me up.  I later found out he did it to save me he thought so I did not get hurt although at the time I was angry that he wrote me up. In computer class I had just been made a teacher assistant because I had finished my work early.
All this was going on and I went to the hearing for gambling and lost of course. They gave me three days in solitary and start all over from the lowest wing.  Well I went to the hole very angry and that is the last thing I remember because next thing I was on another wing and was mentally ill.  Although I did not know it at the time that I was mentally ill. Also did not know where I was at first or anything.  The next thing I knew I was cutting myself with a razor. I told the guard on duty what I had done cutting myself.  He next put me in a cell where they watch you and the next morning I was taken to the infirmary at Canon city.
A psychiatrist talked to me and at first thought I was mentally ill although he later changed his mind and just thought I was sleep deprived. He put me on Halcion sleeping medication although I did not start this medication until one night before Christmas. The psychiatrist came on seen me when I was better and asked where I would like to go for the rest of my time. I had been watching the inmates there and said right there behind the walls even though I could have gone back my friends all stuck by me there.  Although I had changed I was not the same person and will never be.  I changed with the mental illness.  I went back to the infirmary once more and that is when they started watching that I took my sleeping medicine.
My counselor at the time told me she was not going to recommend parole when I came up for it because she said I was a danger to myself and others.  I did not know what she meant at the time.  I knew they could not hold me once my appeal came through so I was not worried.  I wish now that at the time she would have explained it to me.  She was from Pueblo so she knew about mental illness.  I finally received a job there in the library and won my appeal six months later.  I did not know that I had a mental illness.  I will talk about the streets and how I became mentally ill the second time next week.  I sort of had a mental illness in the county waiting for my appeal bond although I had friends that took care of me there.

Life is Hard

Well last week I was off for a few days and I thought I would be able to blog anyway although my computer went down just as I was trying to write something. Isn’t that the way it usually goes?  Here is an article to also read about mental illness I think it is interesting.  Why do I say life is hard when I now use positive thinking? If I say that than what I go through now is not as tough as some of the stuff I went through just to make it.  Whenever I am walking in the cold all I have to remember is the time I was at the state hospital and I had to walk in a blizzard to and A.A. meeting just so I could get released from the state hospital.
It was cold and I was frozen but I did it. I prove I would do anything for my freedom. Life is a lot easier than my past although that does not mean everything is roses. I have bad days where everything goes wrong.  I know that those days will pass and everything will turn out OK.  It’s not very easy believing that it will turn out right when it looks like your world has turned upside down.  Just like when I was at the state hospital you take every day on its own and plug through until it changes and it does sooner or later.  You just have to keep trying until you find the answer.  It is easier said than done.  My computer was acting up as I am trying to write this blog.  I went to another computer and the same thing.
The only way I was able to fix it was to rewrite and that is not right when you have what you want to say and then you cannot write it because you’re having problems with the word program.  Although I found a solution and now I am back to writing this blog and it seems to be going better.  What I am trying to say is that there is always an answer to all problems you just have to keep tinkering to you find the right solution. As I wrote two weeks ago it is called being resilient.  We all have that and can use it.  We all been through a lot and came out better people for it.  I know when I walk in the cold now it is not as bad as when I was at the state hospital.  I just remember that night and I can do anything.
This illness does rob you of who you were before although I think it gives back a better person who has to realize that they have to take a different road than the one they were on.

Freedom

Recovery: Choice: Freedom
In the year 2004 there was founded a “Freedom Commission on Mental Health”. Their final report was about Recovery, being the “common, recognized outcome of Mental Health Services”. There were topics and reports written on subjects of Recovery such as, Recovery in Different Cultural Aspects, the differences of Mental Health and Addictions recovery and topics pursuing the individual in Recovery, the family, community, organizations as well as providers.
It was stated during this commission that, “Mental Health Recovery is a journey of healing, a transformation for a person with a Mental Health illness to able to live a meaningful life in a community of his or her choice while striving to achieve potential.
Recovery is: Self Direction
Empowerment
Strengths Based
Peer Support
Self Esteem
Responsibility
Hope

Self management and control over one’s recovery is a part of recovery which is a part of the experience. Responsibility is a rung in Recovery of the consumer, in making decisions and maintaining attitude when making adjustments in one’s life. When it comes to submitting yourself to medication, to help gain control of the self and adhering to the principals set forth by you the consumer, the doctors and staff help gain control over the illness which interferes with your health you have made a step to becoming refined without the discord of abandon.
Recovery is not easy, it is choice which leads to freedom from the barriers of mental instability and helps gain the strength to move on into other stable realms of life, through Hope, building self-esteem and sobriety.
By Donald Sammons