LIVING AND COPING WITH A SEVERE MENTAL ILLNESS

PACHEDU

MENS GROUP

9TH JULY

Zoom call 6.30 pm

LIVING AND COPING WITH A SEVERE MENTAL ILLNESS

Hello Everyone

It is lovely to be here tonight. My name is Graham Morgan and I work for the Mental Welfare Commission for Scotland. I will explain what that is in a moment but just to set the scene – I am here to talk about how I cope with a  severe mental illness and what the things are that help me have the life I am pleased to have.

I have been coming along to Pachedu since the lockdown in covid – we had various zoom calls with you about mental health and the mental health needs of diverse ethnic communities – these contributed to a report we published a few years ago and sent to the  Government and other people. Since then I have sometimes come to events that you have held which has been a great pleasure – I can be very shy so you may have seen me sitting on the wall watching the football or going pale with fear when asked to dance at one of your Rediscovering Africa events.

I have a diagnosis of Schizophrenia and depression and anxiety and I drink too much but I have  a life nowadays I once could not have dreamed of having – I am going to tell you about that in a moment and then hopefully we can have a discussion about that and how you manage your lives and maybe what you would need to keep mentally healthy.

But first the Mental Welfare Commission for Scotland. We are an independent organisation funded by the Government to make sure that people with a mental illness, learning disability, autism, dementia and so on and their carers are treated well and have their rights protected.

We do this in a number of ways but briefly we visit psychiatric hospital wards where we meet with patients, staff and relatives to find out how people feel about their stay there and how they are being treated. You can see reports of those visits on our website – we expect the hospitals concerned to follow up on the recommendations of those reports.

We also concentrate on particular issues different communities face, as I said we published our report called Racial Inequality and Mental Health in Scotland which gave the views of people  from diverse ethnic communities about how they are treated if they are patients in mental health services and how they are treated if they work in services as well as looking at statistics  on these subjects – you can find that report on our website too – but we have also looked at the issues people with addictions face if  they also have mental health problems or the issues  people  with mental illness face if they are homeless or in prison and many, many, other issues.

We have an advice line about peoples care and treatment which is free to phone and open Monday to Friday. We produce guidance to help both professionals and people with lived experience in their work and lives.

Sometimes things go terribly wrong for people, at such times we may carry out an investigation into how this happened and make recommendations to stop this happening again. We also influence policy and law and government and look at how people are experiencing something called guardianship.

I play a part in some of these activities but I also spend a lot of time meeting people such as you finding out the issues in your community so we can make sure that the work we do is based on the things you  tell us and I also give talks on all sorts of things.

Having said  that; I am now going to talk about my life for a bit.

I was first admitted to a psychiatric hospital when I was about twenty, over forty years ago, it wasn’t a  good experience as the hospitals in those days left a lot to be desired.

I have worked for most of my life and have been given some awards for the work I did and as part of that met the Queen a few times in recognition of that and also spoke to the United Nations about my compulsory treatment but at the same time life has been difficult on occasion.

I lived in a very toxic relationship for some years and only left it when it had become utterly awful. I have a son who I loved very much,  but fourteen years ago he decided he didn’t want to talk to me. I have only seen him twice in the last fourteen years and don’t have any way of contacting him except by face book, where he rarely  replies to my messages. When he was born I had promised him I would give him the sort of upbringing I would have wanted but it turns out I couldn’t do that – which is one of the biggest regrets of my life.

I used to work very, very, hard, I think it damaged my life and the life of those around me – I really needed to prove that I was good at what I did and really needed to show that I could be a success – it is only nowadays that I have started working part time when I still work hard but now realise that there is much, much, more to life than being rich or well regarded. I will tell you in a little bit about what I have learned since coming to live in Argyll.

For many, many, years I was very angry about my upbringing. We were a small family and moved all the time. No sooner had we, as children, made friends in one place than we moved and had to meet new people who were strangers to us – sometimes with all the moves, we just didn’t fit in at all to the communities we lived in – it was too frightening and too much effort to  dare to try to make friendships in some places. When I was nine I was sent hundreds of miles away from my family and friends to a boarding school. I think my parents wanted me to have the chance to get the education I wasn’t getting and the chance of success when I grew up. But those places were places devoid of love and community. They were places of abuse and bullying, of homophobia and racism and sexism. It was a lonely existence in those days. When I look at my partner’s children nowadays, I cannot understand how a family could send the children it loves very much away from their home and  family but nowadays, as I have reflected; I can see that maybe my parents had no choice.

I live with Wendy and her children and Dash the dog. It is a good life. I am very, very, quiet but our house can be noisy with the exuberance of Wendy and the children – I like that very much indeed; when I am cooking dinner and Wendy and Louie are giggling in the sitting room and James is screeching while gaming in his room upstairs I can feel that life is good indeed.

The children are very well behaved when they are outside the house and at school but when they get home, they have a chance to let go and be themselves which I think they need because school and the busy bus there can be difficult for them. That means that the house can be very loud and vibrant! Louie hates maths but is brilliant at Art and last year won a stamp out racism prize with posters she did as part of a racism in football competition. James hates art but is brilliant at maths. Louie is not convinced she likes school but has some lovely friends there, as does James.

I am not regarded as the children’s step dad – they have a lovely dad who they spend half their time with and love very much indeed. Instead I am called a bonus Dad by Louie. She tells me she loves me every day and snuggles in for cuddles when she gets home from school while James makes fun of my eccentricity when I am being a bit odd as I often am – I like that very much.

I mentioned I do not see my own son, that hurts me a huge amount –as I said, when he was born I promised him he would feel so loved he would never feel sad or alone – I promised him a different upbringing to the one I had. I cannot actually explain too clearly what happened. I got ill not long after he was born and spent a few months in hospital trying to kill myself and was off sick on and off for the next couple of years at which time I was diagnosed with Schizophrenia.

My main memory is the extreme tiredness of trying to help look after him, while working too and my anxiety about being a new father; trying to do a good job, trying to get everything right and feeling sad that somehow I seemed on the edge of our family as my wife was completely occupied by my son until finally I lived in a world that lost all its moorings and nothing much made sense at all and I ended up sectioned.

It is horrible being sectioned and kept against your will in hospital but it did keep me alive; without that help I would have died.

However this affected our young family, everyone was traumatised in some way and though I didn’t realise it, this was the start of a relationship that became more and more toxic over the years until twenty years after I had met her I left. I left because I no longer loved her, but also because our marriage had become deeply unhealthy for all of us.

I didn’t realise the separation and divorce would be so hard and didn’t for a moment think I would stop seeing my son who was 17 at the time I left. He was very angry with me but I have seen him twice in the last decade and half and at least I can message him even if he doesn’t reply and that feels sort of good. It is better than the no contact at all I used to have.

I have been in hospital a fair, few times now; always under a section. In that time I have had good and bad treatment from staff. I can remember some community psychiatric nurses who really helped me, especially when I left my marriage – I ended up needing taught almost how to live again and look after myself properly at that time and they were wonderful for that. They saw me as a person and treated me with respect and helped in so many ways.

I still see NHS staff for my health but I also go to Jeans Bothy in Helensburgh which is a wellbeing hub – I imagine it does for me what Pachedu probably does for some of you. I can be myself there and feel welcome and accepted and understood and that makes a hug difference. It is a place where we can eat together, laugh and talk and do things together – I don’t go there all the time but it helps.

I have also been to Argyll and Bute Rape Crisis for help with things that happened in my childhood and in my adult life – I had no idea such places would be willing to see men but they have made such a difference.

I have also just started going to Time to Talk which is a men’s group in Helensburgh. I was very suspicious of it to start with, I am not that good in the company of men but there I am learning that it is after all good to talk about life, our emotions and what is going on with us in our lives. I think I will continue to go there.

I have also recently been learning about the situation some of us men encounter. Sadly we tend to die younger than women, we are much more likely to die by suicide than them, much less likely to seek help for our health and less likely to have people we can confide in and talk about our emotions with. We are more likely to be victims of violence than anyone else although admittedly, mainly at the hands of other men. And although most people think domestic abuse is carried out mainly against women and children by men, a third of it is also carried out against men by women; something that is rarely talked about. We often have few friends outside of our family. We tend to be expected to be strong and capable and protective and so when we cannot manage that, it can be very hard indeed. Being vulnerable and emotional can be seen as unmanly and yet sometimes it is just what we need.

I must admit I am often like that too – often I don’t know I am upset until Wendy tells me and often it is her that guesses why I am. I know a fair few people but have few close friends outside of family and sometimes regret that.

And what is it that means I have the lovely life I mentioned at the beginning of this talk? I haven’t been in hospital for over a decade now and that makes a huge difference. I have work that I mainly enjoy. I do other work, some of it voluntary, which is very rewarding and which allows me to express myself. I write; for me writing is a great release.

I live in a loving family, that makes a huge difference to me. Not so long ago I didn’t think that would ever happen.

I have become closer to my brother and sister and their family and reconciliated with my parents and knowing I repaired the tension that existed between me and my Dad before he died was a wonderful thing. Talking on the phone to my Mother every day is also good and being able to help some of my nephews and nieces when they are struggling is also lovely. Once I hardly saw them at all.

Work has always been a problem for me – I get too passionate about it and its importance – very slowly I am beginning to realise there are more important things than changing the world and slowly I am taking my days off properly. This makes a huge difference but I still do not know how to switch off completely from it.

Every day I walk Dash the dog somewhere, often at Ardmore, with the birds and seals and flowers and trees – that sooths me, helps me think through issues, helps me sort of stay fit.

Because I have a severe mental illness, I get regular health checks which has been really helpful – as they picked up diabetes which prompted me to try to get more healthy.

And increasingly I am realising it is small things that make the difference, I will never be rich; I won’t be a success as people conventionally see success. But hopefully I will write more books, take Louie out to see the bats flying under the trees when dusk arrives, buy James the occasional treat. Make the children meals they will actually like and enjoy the sound of the radio when I wake up far too early which I always do.  

Well that is more than enough about me.

Discussion