NAMI

I can imagine that there might be some of you reading this who have children or a family member with mental illness.  I knew nothing about mental illness before all of this.  Quite frankly it scared me.  The one experience I had was a family friend whose brother with schizophrenia killed his parents.  I'm going to be honest with you.  I grieved this diagnosis and I grieved it hard.  I was mentally and physically beaten and battered down after the events of last summer so I was already in a state of crisis and distress.  Still, I told myself that we would get this fixed, it was OK, it was temporary, etc.  It was then that we got the bipolar diagnosis.  Suddenly it wasn't OK and it sure wasn't temporary.  I was angry and I was scared.  The words "I didn't ask for this" came out of my mouth a lot....a whole lot. 

Now back up a bit.  When all of this first started to escalate Larry and I were taking classes to become adoptive parents through the state.  One of the trainers had a daughter with mental illness.  We talked to her about Oksana and she suggested looking into NAMI.  I find it interesting that through this whole journey she is the only one who ever said anything to us about NAMI.  I called someone from our local NAMI chapter and she said that NAMI Basics is a 6 week class designed for parents of children with mental illness and would be perfect for us.  I registered for that class twice and both times it was cancelled due to low enrollment.  Finally, they offered it again and had enough people to move forward. 

I've been in this class for 3 weeks now and I don't want it to ever end.  I look so forward to every single Thursday evening.  I don't know what I like more.....the incredible information that I get each week, or being in a room with people who "get it".  I walked out of the first class feeling like everything I had experienced and felt in the last 9 months had been normalized.  That was an incredible feeling.  Through the 6 weeks they will talk about the biology of mental illness, medications, doctors, schools, and more.  After all of the books I've read and experiences I've had I though this might be old news.  It's not.  Some of the information they are giving are things I've never heard anywhere else.

They have other classes and support groups offered so please look for your local NAMI chapter if you are affected in any way by mental illness.  It is now my mission to make sure that doctors know about this and tell their patients.  I already told my primary care physician and she had no idea.  How many people do you think she comes in contact with that could benefit from what NAMI has to offer? 

I had done a lot of healing recently, but this class has helped me understand and feel better equipped to parent a child with mental illness than anything before it.  Mental illness doesn't scare me anymore.  That doesn't mean I won't still have times of crisis and grief as we walk this road, and it doesn't mean I won't sometimes be scared of the future or of making hard decisions.....but I'm not scared of mental illness.  I didn't ask for this but I have it.  It's time to accept it for what it is and move forward for Oksana and for the rest of our family.