Giving Up When You Have A Mental Illness

Here's what's happening on the HealthyPlace site this week:

• Giving Up When You Have A Mental Illness
• Most Popular HealthyPlace Articles Shared by Facebook Fans
• From the HealthyPlace Mental Health Blogs

Giving Up When You Have A Mental Illness

Let's face it. When you are living with a serious mental illness such as major depression, bipolar disorder, an anxiety disorder, eating disorders, or schizophrenia, you're frequently in a battle to either maintain your sanity or keep from losing it. Living with a mental illness is tiring and that's why many people give up trying to recover.

I came across an interesting study on people recovering from recurrent mental health problems. People were essentially divided into two categories; giving up and fighting to get better. Those who gave up traced it back to the first time they were told by a doctor that they had to have mental health treatment, including psychiatric medications, for the rest of their lives. Those classified as fighters "started with finding one’s own motivation for recovery, and learning new ways of coping with the negative emotions. It was an on-going, day-to-day process which required a lot of energy and effort. Participants felt that it was crucial to have something or somebody in life to fight for."

"Not to give up, to fight, I mean every day you have to fight, you’re fighting one thing or another but if you lose the battle, depression can take over your life. It can totally ruin you, if you let it, but find something in your life that you want to fight for, and it helps a great deal. I fought for my children, my grandchildren really." ~ Study Participant

Fighting for your life takes substantial effort. As the study stated, starting such a fight requires strong self-sustained motivation. Have you thought about your motivation for saving your mental health and life?

Related Stories

• Do You Want to Give Up?
• Importance of Motivation in Addiction Recovery
• Value of Support Groups for Mental Illness
• What Recovery From Bipolar Disorder and Depression Means to Us
• Parenting and Schizophrenia: A Degree in “MRG”

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Most Popular HealthyPlace Articles Shared by Facebook Fans

Here are the top 3 mental health articles HealthyPlace Facebook fans are recommending you read:

1. Things Verbal Abusers Say and Do
2. Can You Cure Anxiety Attacks?
3. Depression and Weight Gain, Depression and Weight Loss

If you're not already, I hope you'll join us/like us on Facebook too. There are a lot of wonderful, supportive people there.

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From the HealthyPlace Mental Health Blogs

The Dissociative Living blog, focusing on Dissociative Identity Disorder and other issues involving dissociation and the people affected by it, is back. A year ago, writer Holly Gray said goodbye to the blog. She was just plain stressed out. Today, we welcome her back to the Dissociative Living blog, a blog she built into one of the most trusted blogs on the topic of dissociation.

• Goodbye Chronic Stress, Hello Dissociative Living

Your comments and observations are welcomed.

• How to Make A Confident First Impression (Building Self-Esteem Blog)
• Don’t Miss The Fireworks! (Anxiety-Schmanxiety Blog)
• GlaxoSmithKline to Pay $3 Billion in Fines – So What? (Breaking Bipolar Blog)
• My Name is Chris and I’m a Person (Surviving Mental Health Stigma Blog)
• Recovering From Mental Illness and Addiction (Recovering From Mental Illness Blog)
• NAMI National Convention: Love is a Recurring Theme (Mental Illness in the Family Blog)
• Sleepless Schizoaffective Disorder (Creative Schizophrenia Blog)
• Side Effects of Abuse Trick You Into Staying (Verbal Abuse and Relationships Blog)
• Anatomy of an Anorexia Relapse (Surviving ED Blog)
• Borderline Personality Disorder and the Masochism Myth (More Than Borderline Blog)
• Almost Alcoholic: A Review (Debunking Addiction Blog)
• Work and Life Balance with Adult ADHD (Living with Adult ADHD Blog)
• Retirement is Depressing (Coping with Depression Blog)

Feel free to share your thoughts and comments at the bottom of any blog post. And visit the mental health blogs homepage for the latest posts.

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Thank you,
Deborah

Community Partner Team
HealthyPlace.com - America's Mental Health Channel
"When you're at HealthyPlace.com, you're never alone."
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