At the present moment the psychiatric profession treats schizophrenia in two ways. The bedrock of treatment is medication of course. We need medication to get the positive and negative symptoms under control. Once the medication takes hold and gets the symptoms under control then consumers receive psycho-social treatments which are based on the concepts of psychology.
What about the rest of the person? I personally believe that mankind has a spiritual side to them. When people talk about the medication and the psychological side to treatment everything is just fine. Once you start talking about treating the spiritual side everyone gets up in arms. Especially if one starts talking about religion. Particularly Christianity. Why is that? For me personally if it wasn't for my religious beliefs I would not be able to recover from my two mental illness's, addiction, and alcoholism. I just cannot recover just from medication and psycho-social treatments. I need the spiritual element in my treatment and recovery.
Sad to say one cannot receive the spiritual part of treatment from the mental health profession. One has to figure out that part of their treatment on their own. For many consumers that is a very difficult thing to do. Consumers need guidance for their psycho-social treatments. We all need human guides in life. What about spiritual guides. We need someone that would be able to guide us in the spiritual part of our treatment.
Unfortunately I don't have a spiritual guide. The church that I was involved in viewed my mental illness as demon possession. I was full of evil spirits. As a result of this I have not gone back to that church. I have never found someone to be my spiritual guide in life. I am left on my own to try to figure out the spiritual aspect to my recovery. I am thankful that I have been able to figure out what to believe and how to utilize those beliefs and apply them to the spiritual part of my recovery.
The purpose of my writing is to share my experience, strength, and hope with others to help them with their recovery. I personally feel that I cannot share the spiritual side of recovery on this blog for the reason being that my spiritual beliefs are fundamentalist in nature. If I started sharing my fundamentalist Christian beliefs it would offend a lot of people and people would stop reading my blog. People would think what does that have to do with recovery. Much every way. My religious beliefs are a major part of my recovery. If I am to recover I need to treat my whole person not just part of me. The spiritual part of me needs to be fulfilled if I am to enjoy a full and complete recovery. Up to this point I have been trying desperately to avoid the spiritual aspect to my recovery. I have touched on it briefly on a couple of my entries. I didn't go into much detail though.
I do mention my religious beliefs on other blogs but I haven't done so on this one. I have been trying to confine it to just the medical and psychological aspects of treatment. By doing this I have not been sharing my whole recovery with others. Like I said before the spiritual aspect is a major part of my recovery. I have been only telling half my story. Their is a lot more to my experience, strength, and hope concerning my recovery.
I am in a strait betwix two. I am between a rock and a hard place. I don't know what to do about this issue I have been discussing. Deep within my heart, mind, and soul I want to share my whole recovery with my fellow man. If I am to be honest with my readers I am too afraid and a coward to share my religious beliefs with others on this blog. I am afraid of stepping on people's toes and offending them. I am afraid that people will stop reading this blog.
Yet I am being dishonest with my readers by not sharing my whole and complete recovery. I have only been sharing half of my recovery. Not all of it. I just wanted to share these things with my readers. I just felt a need to share this with my faithful readers who read my blog.
Good luck in your own personal recovery.
What about the rest of the person? I personally believe that mankind has a spiritual side to them. When people talk about the medication and the psychological side to treatment everything is just fine. Once you start talking about treating the spiritual side everyone gets up in arms. Especially if one starts talking about religion. Particularly Christianity. Why is that? For me personally if it wasn't for my religious beliefs I would not be able to recover from my two mental illness's, addiction, and alcoholism. I just cannot recover just from medication and psycho-social treatments. I need the spiritual element in my treatment and recovery.
Sad to say one cannot receive the spiritual part of treatment from the mental health profession. One has to figure out that part of their treatment on their own. For many consumers that is a very difficult thing to do. Consumers need guidance for their psycho-social treatments. We all need human guides in life. What about spiritual guides. We need someone that would be able to guide us in the spiritual part of our treatment.
Unfortunately I don't have a spiritual guide. The church that I was involved in viewed my mental illness as demon possession. I was full of evil spirits. As a result of this I have not gone back to that church. I have never found someone to be my spiritual guide in life. I am left on my own to try to figure out the spiritual aspect to my recovery. I am thankful that I have been able to figure out what to believe and how to utilize those beliefs and apply them to the spiritual part of my recovery.
The purpose of my writing is to share my experience, strength, and hope with others to help them with their recovery. I personally feel that I cannot share the spiritual side of recovery on this blog for the reason being that my spiritual beliefs are fundamentalist in nature. If I started sharing my fundamentalist Christian beliefs it would offend a lot of people and people would stop reading my blog. People would think what does that have to do with recovery. Much every way. My religious beliefs are a major part of my recovery. If I am to recover I need to treat my whole person not just part of me. The spiritual part of me needs to be fulfilled if I am to enjoy a full and complete recovery. Up to this point I have been trying desperately to avoid the spiritual aspect to my recovery. I have touched on it briefly on a couple of my entries. I didn't go into much detail though.
I do mention my religious beliefs on other blogs but I haven't done so on this one. I have been trying to confine it to just the medical and psychological aspects of treatment. By doing this I have not been sharing my whole recovery with others. Like I said before the spiritual aspect is a major part of my recovery. I have been only telling half my story. Their is a lot more to my experience, strength, and hope concerning my recovery.
I am in a strait betwix two. I am between a rock and a hard place. I don't know what to do about this issue I have been discussing. Deep within my heart, mind, and soul I want to share my whole recovery with my fellow man. If I am to be honest with my readers I am too afraid and a coward to share my religious beliefs with others on this blog. I am afraid of stepping on people's toes and offending them. I am afraid that people will stop reading this blog.
Yet I am being dishonest with my readers by not sharing my whole and complete recovery. I have only been sharing half of my recovery. Not all of it. I just wanted to share these things with my readers. I just felt a need to share this with my faithful readers who read my blog.
Good luck in your own personal recovery.
No comments:
Post a Comment