My dad might have a mental illness and my mom is depressed. What should I do?
I'd recommend doing your very best to bring as much joy and light heartedness to the situation. My dad had dementia and lost his leg to diabetes. His last 4 years of life where not very pretty. A good morning was eating breakfast without choking and getting to the toilet before it ended up in his shorts. My sister and I spent a lot of time being with him, and seeing to his care 24/7 through different services and full time caregivers. it could have been a really depressing situation, depending on how you looked at it. But we chose to laugh our asses off at all the silly things that made dad, dad, even when he could hardly remember anything, and although I think we were careful to not disrespect him, we definitely tried to have fun with him, around him, and foster a general atmosphere of joy, fun, lightheartedness and gratitude. It worked, and I think he, the caregivers and my sister and I benefited greatly from it.None of us are born or live in some state of perfection - FAR, FAR from it. We learn how to live life more fully by balancing our efforts to be responsible and hard working with humility, grace, forgiveness and the lightheartedness to laugh at ourselves, to find joy and lightness in every day, even when things are difficult, and this chapter in your life and your parents life is no different. In fact, it may be the most important time ever to see the glass still quite full, to focus on the little things and all that you have had in life worth appreciating, and seek wisdom on what it means to age gracefully and accept our path towards death with dignity and gratitude for whatever we have had, and still have in this precious life.I don't want to minimize whatever you facing, I can only tell you that these are the things that worked well for me and I think are the best way to deal with these issues. Yes, there are lots of decisions to make about dad's care, about how to help mom cope, how to manage costs and needs, but through it all, I truly believe that how we look at the circumstances of life is what defines our experience. From Anne Frank to Nelson Mandela there are so many who've gone before us and faced tragedy, loss and unimaginable difficulty with grace, dignity and even joy because of their ability to focus on the positives, to make the best of the circumstances, so I try my best to do the same, and it has always served me well. I hope it serves you and your family well, also.
How do explain to my unintelligent father that mental illness is not something that you wake up and cure but it is managed some?
Yeah, cause depression and anxiety are better treated with drugs and more drugs, right? The drugs offered by psychiatrists for mental illness have cured exactly no one. Those drugs keep you on Big-Pharma's customer list for your entire life. Everyone is different, and "cheering up and letting go" may not be the answer for you. But it is up to you and only you to figure out how to make yourself healthy. Change your lifestyle, your diet, your work, your home, etc. No one else is going to truly make you healthy. Stop worrying about what your father thinks, stop being a victim, and get yourself healthy.
I think im depressed, im 14 ?
Jeez Rebecca! Of course you're feeling down and moody. Staying in bed and listening to music instead of being with your family is incredibly normal for a 14 year old, so no problem there. Being expected to do all the housework, do your schoolwork, and worry about your family and all their major health issues is too much for one kid to handle. At least one of the adults in your family should be considering how much you have to worry about and do, but it doesn't seem like anybody is. That was an unfair and dumb assumption your father made, of course you've worried about your mother dying. He's taking all his stress out on you. Why? Because it's easy to take your stress out on a kid. They blame themselves and absorb all the criticism, so it's very satisfying to blame them. You shouldn't be yelled at. You shouldn't be accused of not caring about all these adults who are falling apart on you. You've already been shouted at so of course you're afraid they will shout more. Something no adult in your life is recognizing is that your feelings count and they're important. Do you have a school counselor? I don't know if they promise to keep things confidential. Someone at your place of worship? If you don't want your parents to know, it has to be free. School and place of worship are the only free places I know of. Hang in there Rebecca. All the adults in your family are wrecks right now, but you don't have to be.
Why do teenagers all think they're depressed?
And why is teenage "depression" so apocalyptic? I'm fourteen, and really I can't stand teenagers. They're an irrational, melodramatic lot that mistake hormones for actual feelings. I know far too many kids that think they're depressed, and I KNOW that none of them actually are. I know what depression looks like, all too well. My father suffers from severe Seasonal Affective Disorder, and my mother is a counselor for the public Mental Health. Everyone on my fathers side of the family is prone to mental illness. I've been around Mental Health professionals all my life, and I know quite a bit about these things. It really annoys me that my friends have the nerve to think that because they had a bad day they're depressed, have they not heard of hormones? Well, they're always in love or depressed. It shocked me the other day on Y!A, I answered a question that a teen asked about thinking he himself was depressed. To me, the kid sounded very stressed and not like himself. So I merely suggested trying to eat healthily get lots of sun and just try and stay calm with all the stress going on. I then read the other answers, the majority of which were along the lines of this, "OMG! You need to see a doctor right away! You could totally be depressed, maybe you need medication!!!!" ... Honestly, this kid did not sound clinically depressed to me in the least, yet everyone was treating it as this huge thing that could completely destroy him. A stable human being is not that fragile. It baffles me the way the notion of depression is treated in this society, please tell me that some people still have reasoning skills.
Should I have kids? Mental Illness?
I come from a long line of mental illness my dad has clinical depression, so does my dads siblings, and my grandma. I've had severe depression since I was a kid. Would it be safe for me to have kids? I don't want to bring a child into this world with a mentally ill brain.
Can bi polar/depression be inherited? My father has both (drug abuse contributed) and his great grandfather is said to have had mental illness as well.
At first (20 years ago) all articles related to bipolar disorder said no, it was not inherited, now they say yes it is. This only confirms my suspicions that I inherited it from my mother who inherited it from her father. Fifty years ago, people just referred to those people as “mean”. Exactly how I referred to my mother. Today I understand that she had bipolar disorder but never sought treatment for it much the same way she ignored my manic and depressive symptoms as a young teen.Mental illness ran throughout my maternal side for many years. I can recall hushed whispers telling of a relative who “killed themselves” from my mother and grandmother. This tells me that bipolar disorder and/or depression can be traced back as far as 150 years. So to answer your question yes, it can be inherited and people left untreated have a high probability of turning to alcohol or other drugs.