Resilience: A Key Recovery Skill

In response to your "Resilience" posting.

Those are all wonderful things to have and adopt if we are at that point.   Assuming that we are in a nearly perfect stage of recovery, and we can, for example , accept advice from others.

For many years I was the opposite of these things untreatable, and violently resistant to treatment by doctors, family, and my own awareness of my sz was zero.   At that time I was very rigid, not wanting anything except things that would feed my delusions and hallucinations.  

When help came , it did not offer me a choice.      I did not develop the resilience you speak of until much later in my recovery.    Everything has been in black and white, it did not give me a chance to bend as you describe.

Regards

Don Fraser

Some of the things you describe, Christina, take a lot of courage.  It wasn't until I began to feel better and began to recover that I realized I had that courage.  I had made it through the worst part, and I was willing to start from there on the uphill climb.  Now that I feel I am almost to the top of the hill, I am elated.  I can look and see more hills ahead to conquer -- independent living, life without Mother, new creative pursuits, etc.  But that does not daunt me.  If I could get this far, those other hills don't even compare.  And I have proven I have the courage to overcome.

Carolyn

I am the mother of an adult son with sz who has little to no insight, and times usually seem tough to me.   These tenents for living described in this article are wonderful for anyone, and especially for caregivers who are there daily trying to make an ill family members' life meaningful and enjoyable.  With so much focus on them, sometimes we forget ourselves and need to be reminded to care about ourselves too.   We can only continue as long as we stay healthy and balanced.  I have experienced being overwhelmed and stressed to the limit, and it's a horrible place to be, for it changes us and limits our abilities to function in any part of our lives effectively. 

Thank you for this article that brings us back to center and self knowledge which makes us better caregivers and human beings.