Those of us in mental health recovery are often faced with the hardships our symptoms can cause us. It can be easy to get discouraged, to look at our progress in recovery and tell ourselves, “I’m never going to overcome this mental illness.”

This week my life closely resembles one of those old country and western songs. You know the ones. Basically everything that could go wrong has, and even the dog doesn’t want to get close to me. I’m sitting alone in my four bedroom home, contemplating the condition of my life and wondering just where this is taking me. I’m very fortunate that I have people in my life, specifically my wife and kids, who truly love me. They love me enough to tell me I need help and they want me to get it. Until I do, they’ve decided that for their own well being, they think living apart from me is the best thing for them right now.

Communication is challenging for many of us from time to time. For those with a mental health diagnosis and his or her support team, good communication is imperative.

Grief is a curious thing; especially when the mourner has a mental illness.  My mother died a month ago today from a combination of COPD, heart failure, diabetes, brain and bone cancer.  Her breast cancer had metastasized to every organ in her body.  I found out via my aunt 5 days after her death.  I wish that I could say that I was surprised, but my mother had chosen a hard life for years.  The surprise was how quickly she died after the brain cancer diagnosis.  She was diagnosed in May and given a year to live; she was dead in less than 3 months.   My mother and I had what could best be described as an awkward relationship:  abandonment as an infant, a lengthy court battle before my grandparents got guardianship and very limited contact throughout my life.

I feel like I am doing a lot of apologizing lately. I am sick of saying: "I am sorry", "Sorry, I did not mean it", "Please forgive me" or this one is creative: "Please, let me steam clean your carpets because I am oh so sorry I called you a choice word when we were fighting...Did you need to borrow any money? Like my new leather boots? Take them. Because, dammit, I am so sorry!"

When I think of mental illness--my journey sprinting through life alongside it-- I think of the image below. The famous Two Masks. I painted a picture of it, framed it, and gave it to my mother a couple of years ago. The irony was not lost on her. It hangs in the hallway; laughing at me. The masks represent bipolar disorder to me. They represent emotion on a whole--the entire spectrum. Like many people living with chronic mental illness, it's hard to find the parts that define the middle; the sort of happy bits that made us smile but were fleeting.

Acting on impulse, mental illness or not, rarely turns out well. So, this is, unfortunately, a post about my situation, formed by acting on impulse. I focus on myself not out of some form of narcissism (I might enjoy writing this blog if that were the case) nor because I feel particularly obligated. I write about it because I have become a damn good example of acting on impulse when life gets dark. Right. Here we go.

I'm pretty sure I have never written on this topic before. In nearly one-and-a-half years, I have never written exclusively about mental illness and anger. That sort of makes me a bit angry at myself. Just a touch! I think, and perhaps you agree, that the journey we make from the diagnosis of mental illness to recovery is full of anger.