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Humanity needed in the world of humans

Soft sweet touches

An understanding ear to hear

Laughter bursting from the small bodies of children

Old hands carefully baking bread for a neighbor in need

Or crafting a blanket with yarn for a stranger in the hospital

A nurse’s reassurance to a frightened patient

Looking at them with the self confidence of the profession; but adding something personal in their glance

A worker willing to go outside the usual procedures  and protocol…in the name of  helping someone who is in danger of foreclosure on their family home

Too many medical bills and not enough time…

Time spent working to take care of loved ones has to be balanced against the need to just be with them

Sitting next to a stranger and matching their body language… their hopeless slouch on the bench…

just to let them know someone sees them…and they are not forgotten

…they are not invisible

Humanity enough to pay the extra 2 dollars for the pizza at the Mom and Pop shop; to drive the extra mile to get there

Rather than paying the “fast-food- dictators” their tithe;  the Mama Rosina Pizza places need to be there…on the Main Streets

What happens when no one cares anymore about the “little” people; will they truly become little people after all?

And the smallest gestures of holding doors for a mother carrying a child and helping the elderly woman cross the street safely…

What will becomevof these small acts of random kindness ? What shall we say to those …who call us foolish for wasting our time…

On people of no consequence?

Who has the right to determine who is more or less significant?

And what does this say about mankind…

If we are just too busy spending time making money…and nothing more?

Isn’t there something further? Isn’t there something more?

 

 

KIndness Boosts Self Esteem

When Someone with a Mental Illness Reaches Out to You / Do’s and Don’ts

I thought of this idea this morning. It is a way for people with mental illness to get real help from others. There are some people in your life that want to help but they just end up making things worse.

When that happens, you do not want to communicate with them about your pain.
You end up keeping all of your pain bottled up like a secret.

No one wants to reach out for help just to feel invalidated, misunderstood, judged, scolded, intruded upon, and pushed farther down.

The problem that I have experienced is that people “guess” at what will be helpful. They always guess WRONG because they do not understand.

They have not been inside of that pool of pain, feeling the water going farther and farther over their heads. They do not know what it feels like when we are basically being drowned by our own emotions.

It is not something we are allowing to happen or are causing. It is something that invades our minds like a virus. We have no control over the attack of our own brain on us.

Our brain begins to attack itself, our bodies and our hearts. Asking someone to just stop their mental suffering is like asking someone to stop a broken leg from hurting.

A broken bone hurts because our body senses injury. Then the nervous system tells the brain we are hurt, The brain then responds by sending horrific pain signals back through the nervous system to the injury.
So the cycle is : injury, nervous system, brain, nervous system, severe pain.

It is exactly the same cycle with mental illness. The brain and the nervous system coordinate together.

1.Something triggers an intrusive thought.

2. An intrusive thought hurts the brain by activating neurons that are wired to the person’s thought behaviors.

3.The brain reacts by sending a signal through the nervous system into the entire body.

4. The pain is felt throughout the body. It is a nervous system attack.

Neurological behavioral patterns in a person with mental illness are different than other people. It is a biological difference of how the neurons are attached.

The way our neurons are attached in the brain has a disfunction. We cannot do anything about it. It actually gets worse every time we have an episode.

*I will mention here that there is new holistic neurological research ongoing about the ability to rewire the neurons in our brains. I am studying this currently and will let you know when I have anything helpful to tell you. So there is hope. However for the time being , we are stuck with the faulty wiring.*

If people can understand that there is actual biology that is misbehaving with us, maybe they will understand better that our own brains actually attack us, against our will.

So, I am going to give individual scenarios with a do’s and don’t lists for people with mental illness to use as a tool, when reaching out for help. Please feel free to show them or quote the information I provided above , as a way for a greater understanding that most people do not have.

I have experienced myself, that people trying to “help” you, have some go-to words and actions that are both useless and hurtful to us. My next post is going to be Scenario 1.

Please leave me ideas for situations you have been in, so that I can include them. I will try to post a couple of them a week.

Namaste,
Annie