Quote:
Originally Posted by RunnerIM
I'm happy you guys posted. I do not want to offend anyone. I would like to understand this better.
I am one of those people that judge people on disability. I feel bad because I do. When someone tells me that, then tells me their diagnosis (people tell me this voluntarily, I do not pry, I'm just easy to talk to) my first thought is "are you serious?" I immediately tell myself not to judge because I have no clue what they are going through, but I still do. I'm bi 1, OCD. My lows are LOW. I have hallucinations, hear things and bouts of psychosis. If I'm on the wrong meds or they aren't working right. I myself can not handle stress. Can not function in certain environments and can lose touch with reality. I still work. My bio dad is schizophrenic and can't hold a job well, but then works for temp jobs. He refuses to sit at home. He does not take meds, that I'm aware of. I really want to understand better. I know I have no clue of your guys support, home environment, etc so I have no right to call anyone lazy. And actually I never think people on disability are lazy, I just feel They are throwing in the towel and taking the easy way out.
I truly do not want to offend anyone I want to be more empathetic and understanding of this illness and how it can be so dibilitating to some.
|
You remind me quite a lot of a former version of myself, honestly.
There have been multiple throughout my life when I should have been hospitalized, but I wasn't. I was abandoned and my life was train-wrecked. There have been multiple times when I should have been on disability.
However, I was raised in an extremely (irrationally so) proud and conservative family background. People on welfare were "moochers, leeches, fakers" and well you get the idea. Needing help was unacceptable, shameful, wrong. And everyone was expected to keep hush-hush about "shameful" things like mental illness, substance addiction, etc. Just pray to Jesus if you want help, and suck it up. Several members of my family should have been on medication, in therapy or on disability a long time ago. But that's not how we roll. My great-grandfather didn't need help. he needed The Lord. Well he shot himself in the head in front of his family because the voices drove him to the brink. Nobody talks about that, either, it's "shameful".
Well I carried all of this fear and pride and paranoia and severe stubborn pathology into my adulthood, of course constantly reinforced by my family all along the way. I suffered and was miserable and crazy and barely hobbling along, but hey I was doing it. Couldn't drive, couldn't hold down a job for very long, couldn't function, but hey I walked an hour to work in 15 degree weather, survived my shift, then went home and cried, smoked some weed and cried some more, had a major panic attack and then repeated it all the next day.
And truth be told yes I did feel judgemental towards people on disability for a time in my life. But deep down I was jealous, jealous of their ability to be vulnerable, that it was OKAY for them to not only be vulnerable and need help, but that they then received that help - from ALL OF SOCIETY - while meanwhile my own mother couldn't care less if I died in the streets. I was jealous on many levels.. I wanted the emotional freedom, I wanted to be able to ask for help, I wanted to receive help. But it just wasn't acceptable.
In retrospect I can tell you that I was a fool.