I Want People To Know How Serious Mental Illness Is

Keeping someone alive is hard, physically & mentally. My mum has had a really hard life and sadly she’s now at a stage where she doesn’t want to be here.

She had a difficult childhood, her sister was hit by a car and killed. My mum turned to alcohol and social services put her into a B&B with a bar. She was raped and told that it was her fault for drinking too much. She had a physically and emotionally abusive marriage, she has spent time in psychiatric hospitals and wasn’t always safe in them. Especially the time that she was on suicide watch but managed to walk out unnoticed. She took an overdose and threw herself into moving traffic. She did that because she has schizophrenia, it traumatised her she saw me being tortured, believed that everyone was conspiring with the devil & she was told that she needed to sacrifice her life to save her me. I was 2 years old and nearly lost my mummy.

Being hit by a car left her with brain damage as well as partial sight and hearing and epilepsy. She stopped drinking years ago but the damage was done, she now has liver cirrhosis.

A few years later I was taken from her. She has severe clinical depression, lung disease and many more disabilities and illnesses. Her life is a daily struggle and it only got worse when her husband committed suicide last year. She has no friends and sits alone at home every day, on good days she will go to town where people have knocked her to the ground despite her carrying a blind stick. She’ll go to the doctors and cry and she’ll be sent away, her physical health deteriorates and the doctors surgery always leave her without medication. She can’t concentrate on a book or TV because of her brain damage, she doesn’t feel anything when she listens to music. All she does is sit alone.

My mum is in hospital at the moment, she hates it there. I’m hoping that this post will open up peoples eyes, there are sadly still some people out there who don’t realise a little kindness goes a long way.

Remember that the way you treat people will affect their lives. I want people to know how serious mental illness is, it takes lives just like any other illness and it has so much stigma, please love and look after those around you. Mental illness could hit anyone at any time, even you.

My mum has given me permission to post this, she’s also happy for it to be shared by anyone wanting to 💗

Credit https://www.facebook.com/starandcolby/