Fellow blogger John McManamy has started another blog called “Knowledge Is Necessary.” I took a peak this morning and loved his recent post “Making Peace With Our Loved Ones.” John writes:

At least half of the correspondence I get from readers comes from loved ones, including family members and sweethearts. Without exception, they are at a loss and their stories are heart-breaking. They are the innocent bystanders of our illness. 

I’ve also had ample opportunity to listen to loved ones at various mental health venues, plus I am forever engaging them (or, rather, they are engaging me) in conversations in coffee shops, on public transport, everywhere. More recently, by virtue of a broken marriage to a woman with bipolar, I’ve have had an opportunity to sit in with a DBSA-run friends and family support group.

Believe me, our loved ones see our illness far differently than we do. We may complain that they don’t understand us, but far too many of us fail to recognize the horrible abuse we have put them through.

Believe me, to live with a person with a mental illness is to live in an abusive relationship. Until we own up to this hard cold truth, we will never make peace with ourselves and our loved ones. We will always be stuck in our recovery, perpetual victims, always finding fault in the people who love us, always blaming our outrageous behavior – illness-related or not – on our illness.

To continue reading John’s post, click here.

To read more Beyond Blue, go to http://blog.beliefnet.com/beyondblue, and to get to Group Beyond Blue, a support group at Beliefnet Community, click here.

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