Here's Carrie Fisher in her fantastic one-woman show Wishful Drinking, which Judy and I saw together on a snowy day in Manhattan. Judy has an article in our new Compass, out shortly, called "Hi, I'm Judy and I'm a Grateful Recovering Addict."Carrie Fisher is a celebrity so she can get away with the disclosures that she has both bipolar disorder and has had various drug addictions. Over the years, she's created art from these afflictions - her B'way play and books. Clever lady, once married to Paul Simon.
Ordinary people cannot disclose. When my kids were little, I told almost no one about my illness, even though I ran the group when my kids were about 10 and 8. No way did I want my kids' friends or their parents to know I had bouts of psychosis. "Crazy woman" was a term I dreaded to hear.
Realize this. Stigma is a constant undercurrent in our American society. We are a minority just as are people of color, people of the wrong religion, wrong sexual orientation. All this in the so-called greatest democracy on earth.
After our well-attended meeting last nite, a newcomer came up to me. "Ryan" was aghast when he saw our ND website. Ryan, there are lots of things to be mortified by but one of them is not our website.
As an aside, read this and tear out your hair. Blogpost of Bob Whitaker.
Ryan objected to my using names of real people in our group.
I got their permission, I said to Ryan as I began packing up to leave.
He was very concerned about confidentiality.
I assured him his name would not appear on our website and that everything we said in the meeting was confidential.
Such is his tremendous fear he will be found out - or, worse, outed!
How will people ever respect us if we can't acknowledge we've got an illness? This illness does not define us. It is simply part of the whole constellation of things that make up our persona.
Ryan, do you hate the part of you that has bipolar? Let's get in touch with these feelings and talk about them with a therapist or with your group members. We must live in harmony with our illness and realize how well we can do in life. My goodness! We have a cavalade of successful people who attended last nite's group: teachers, company owners, attorneys.
The brave people who allowed their names to be used stand as a bulwark against shame, stigma, mockery, and stereotyping. You support all of us by allowing your names to be used. That is true courage and compassion.
They understand.
"Realize this. Stigma is a constant undercurrent in our American society. We are a minority just as are people of color, people of the wrong religion, wrong sexual orientation. All this in the so-called greatest democracy on earth."
ReplyDeleteYou sum it all up in the above. I wish that everyone could be accepting about themselves and the uniqueness that makes them who they are, but we are not all at the same place in our evolutionary process. I understand where "Ryan" is coming from and hope that if he cannot grow into a place where he trusts, loves, accepts himself, he can still be helped by attending the group.