I want to talk about mental health diagnoses. In my book Christians for a Free Palestine, I talk about how treatment is a colonial concept because it is administered from a position of power and designed to maintain control of a situation. I didn’t realize the extent to which I was still under the power of the “treatment” model for the management of my condition until today.
The “treatment” model–about which I write in my Palestine book–is impacting me and my self-concept. If I believed that treatment was a colonial concept, and if I’m truly against labels, why would I frequently describe myself as having schizoaffective disorder?
Why would I do this?
I experience symptoms, but they are manageable, and they are clinically negligible. But, at a deeper level, what I’m getting at here is this: what is the point of the label?
I need the medicine still. The label may still be helpful for my doctor because I am being prescribed medicine based on this diagnosis. The medicine is the right medicine. But because my symptoms are being treated, and because I’ve found the right vitamins that go with the genetic mutation that was contributing to my psychosis, I’m not diagnosable with this illness.
I should stop considering myself through this lens.
Vitamins will be a crucial aspect of my life for as long as I live. I am committed, furthermore, to the medication I take, though I take much less than initially. I take a mood stabilizer, an antidepressant, and an antipsychotic and am dedicated to staying the course.
My naturopath has confirmed that I need to stay on my medicine based on the blood panel that she ran: I have a genetic disorder.
Many say getting the diagnosis was life-changing and helped them get the right treatment. But it is a two-edged sword. In a way, I’m just rediscovering what I wrote in one of the blog posts I placed in the appendix of my first book Emergent Grace: Christian Hope for Serious Mental Illness.
Is Mental Illness Permanent?
So is mental illness permanent? Doctors say, and I agree, that every case is unique. This is why we seek professional opinions. Mental health diagnoses are composite images of many people who manifest the same symptom cluster. We need to challenge some of this, for example, in the case of psychosis.
Psychosis can result in instances of vitamin deficiencies (which I have), trauma, schizophrenia, and more. Psychiatry acknowledges this without letting this change their approach (which is criminal). However, this doesn’t mean the medications it prescribes aren’t frequently necessary.
Finally, however, I was put on metformin, which causes B-12 deficiency, to combat the weight gain from my antipsychotics. However, the psychosis that the antipsychotics was treating was caused by a B-12 deficiency. Had I not accidentally taken a health shake for two weeks that was loaded with B vitamins and experienced an immediate positive effect, I would have continued to take antipsychotics and then a secondary medication that would have only made me have to take more antipsychotics later.
When I was first diagnosed with schizoaffective disorder, the psychiatrist told me that I could do whatever I wanted in terms of schooling or anything else, and that I would just need to go up on my medicine every year! I could write five books critiquing this lens, though I say that without intending to discount readers who may have agreed. I’m actually on less medicine and am doing well.
