regression

  I hear a lot of talk about mental health these days. Apparently, it's a big problem for many people. I personally believe it is a self-fulfilling prophecy. When you are constantly told that you have issues and should seek therapy that is exactly what you will do. It is also a convenient way to explain the actions of others that we don't understand. A means to gain some measure of solace or closure. They must have been suffering from a mental health crisis. At the same time, we are seeing mental health issues manifesting themselves in others and insisting that it is normal behavior. We justify that by calling it tolerance or inclusivity. The reality is it is abnormal behavior. All of that can lead to confusion and cause others to develop a mental health crisis of their own. A crisis that will surely be mislabeled as prejudice or some form of phobia. Hate will often be associated with that. 

  Okay so just what is mental health? Traditionally you have mental health problems when your behaviors run contrary to the expected behaviors in a society. That is how we used to know if you were nuts. Off your rocker was a common term used to describe that. People were confined to institutions for that. And yes, abuses occurred quite frequently. The reason for that was attempting to cure what can't be seen. No one really knows what to do. Mental illness can be a sort of addiction, that's my thinking. I also believe no one is cured of addiction or mental health issues unless they do so themselves. Any of these programs, institutions, therapists and interventions that don't succeed share one thing in common. The official line will be, it isn't a failure of treatment, it's a relapse, the fault of the individual. Credit is only taken for success!

  The problem with this concept of mental illness is that it can't be seen or diagnosed by someone outside of the individual. Oh, there are many trained professionals with their college degrees that have studied the problem. There are many that claim to know what to do but the truth is, it is all guesswork. If you were to examine the big book, the DSM you can see where opinions have changed over time. What was a mental issue no longer is, and what wasn't, is now. The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders is what is used to determine mental disorders. In Europe a different publication is used called the ICD. The two manuals don't necessarily agree. The "experts" argue about that all the time. In America the DSM is the standard and the ICD rarely used, the opposite being true in European nations. Both manuals are written by a consensus of mental health professionals and other "experts" in the field of mental health. Thing is, they don't all agree and periodically change the diagnosis based on current societal expectations. A man wearing a dress and wanting his organs surgically removed because of the way he feels certainly wasn't the normal thing not that many years ago. What changed?  Is that normal today? Many will tell you so, including the DSM. Quite the rewrite in my opinion.

  But the thing is simply that mental health is something that can't be seen or diagnosed with clinical certainty. It is a very convenient tool or crutch to learn upon, a way to shift responsibility. It's not my fault, I have mental issues. As is the case with a lot of things these days claiming to have a mental problem is a sign of courage and should receive special treatment and consideration. It's not your fault. It's okay because that is the way you feel. It can easily be validated by mental health professionals. Yes, and your car has issues, ask any mechanic. I can certainly look up all the symptoms, learn what to say to those mental health professionals to obtain whatever diagnosis I want. As long as I have the ability to pay, I will get treatment. Yes, I will have a diagnosis. You can bet in it.

  I do believe we need to quit telling everyone that every time something doesn't go the way you think it should it is someone else's fault. We need to quit telling people they have mental health issues whenever they aren't happy. If they aren't satisfied with their lives, their jobs or their personal relationships that doesn't mean they have a mental health problem. All of that falls under the category of life. It is what it is! If my father had never let go of the bicycle, I would never have learned to ride it. I needed to experience that fear, fall down and get back up to learn. I didn't need counseling to overcome my fear of falling down, I needed to fall down. When little Johnny got that coveted gold star on his school paper, and I didn't, it wasn't unjust, unfair or discriminatory. I just didn't earn that star, simple as that, I learned to get over it. Yes, we should be teaching our children to deal with disappointment, with failure, and with the expectations of society. We need to return to the time when we were taught to respect authority. Oh, I was taught I could question that authority, that was my absolute right, but only after I had complied with the law. I have the right to redress. That is written in the first amendment to the constitution. What is redress? To remedy or set right. Before you can do that, the wrong has to be committed. 

  All I'm saying here is that we need to knock it off. It's an old adage and one that holds a great deal of truth. You can please some of the people some of the time, you can please all of the people some of the time, but you can't please all of the people all of the time. I'd add this; you aren't going to be happy all of the time, get over it. Only one person can really ensure your happiness. That person is you! Therapy isn't going to do it, medications aren't going to do it, you have to do it. Do not look for happiness outside of yourself. You have to regulate your emotions. That's on you. When you allow your emotions to get out of control you get crazy! It's that simple. Just because you feel a certain way that doesn't make it right. Calm down, think rationally. I was born a man, assigned that at birth. How I feel about that makes no difference, the fact remains. It is what it is. Yeah, let's start teaching that once again. Attempting to normalize what isn't normal isn't progressive, it's regressive. And guess what; regression leads to mental illness. Even I know that, and I haven't been to college, gotten a degree or a PhD. I learned that somewhere around the fifth grade.