You Can’t Fix Them So Don’t Try
Sitting in the terminal of Hobby International Airport, my mind was busy processing some information for the first time in a few days. The solitude beyond my earbuds was comforting.
After about 30 minutes of staring out at the runway, I felt someone lightly tapped my shoulder. I turned the volume down on Outkast’s Aquemini and she whispered “are you okay, sir?”. I nodded. She gently squeezed my forearm and walked away.
I appreciated her concern. Something was indeed bothering me. I’m sure it was apparent in my facial expression and slouched posture. But in that moment, my desire to be alone with my thoughts was overwhelming.
In the last few years, the issue of mental illness has become a popular, ongoing conversation. It’s particularly become a trending topic within the black community — a population that had long abandoned the notion that mental illness is a problem we need to confront.
I, myself, have written about the sensitive topic quite a bit, both on my personal blog and for publications that invited me to write for them. One of the articles I wrote was how to deal with discussing mental illness when you’re in a relationship. One of the crucial components of the dialogue is accepting that people aren’t projects for you to work some magic on.
As humans, we are unfinished products. We are wired to be constantly evolving. We mature emotionally and mentally in the same manner that our bodies change physically. Over time. What makes people with mental illness slightly different is that they find themselves chasing the carrot. On the outside, they have it altogether. On the inside, they are always chasing. Unsettled. A sense of stability is within reach yet miles away.
There’s a nature that exists in some people where they want to help their partner. It comes from a good place. It’s heartfelt. However it’s often self-serving. The problems that arise in relationships organically can stress you out. Bringing mental illness into that compounds the pressure.
A significant other wants to fix you and your illness because it’ll validate that their love is enough.
Because that’s all many of us want. We want our presence to be needed and our absence to be mourned.
Mental health is a “me first” commitment. I didn’t fully get this until I came to learn the history behind my own mental health struggles. Once I had the foundation, I understood that no one could love me the way I needed to love myself. In order to feel comfortable talking openly about my anxiety and depression, I needed to connect the dots within my own brain first. No woman — as smart and as beautiful and as loving as she may be — could stand in the gap for me. I had to get to a place where openness was liberating. It feels great to be able to say I’m close to that point.
Mental illness isn’t pretty. Whether you’re on the more manageable side of it, like depression or on the more debilitating side suffering from schizophrenia or PTSD, many people have no idea what mental illness can truly look like. In general, I think people view mental illnesses as a mood or a phase. This is why people often use phrases that imply self-sufficiency. They think you can pray it away or just cheer up. They recognize basic symptoms like insomnia or prolonged sadness or not eating/eating all the time. That kind of stuff is a piece of cake. But many suffer from the ugly, “annoying” symptoms. The symptoms that drive loved ones away because they don’t know how to handle it. It’s those symptoms that will send us to scrape the bottom of the barrel for any type of reprieve.
And sometimes, all you can do to actually help is to let them hit rock bottom.
It’s a beautiful thing that the stigma of therapy and seeking counseling is being shed. For every person that shares a story of survival and redemption, knowledge of mental illness and its effects are colored in a new light.
The best contribution you can make to a person’s mental health journey is inspiring them to heal and repair themselves.
They deserve to be loved entirely.
You deserve to be protected from inevitable heartache.
