When a family member has been diagnosed with a mental illness
When a family member gets diagnosed with a mental illness, a wide variety of different emotions can be experienced. You may experience devastation, embarrassment, shame, anger, grief, sadness, confusion, feeling overwhelmed or even feelings of relief to finally have answers. Whatever you may be feeling, it’s probably likely that you’ve been through many appointments, crises, and emotional ups and downs before you arrived at a specific diagnosis with a medical professional. Know that whatever feelings you have are okay. There’s no “right” way to feel in this situation. If your loved one is a child, it can be especially difficult to accept that there may be things about your child that are atypical. It’s understandable to have a mixture of feelings. Give yourself time and space to process the news. Seek out good quality information about the diagnosis your loved on received-Dr. Google is not necessarily your friend in this situation. It can greatly exacerbate worries and the quality and integrity of information varies widely across websites. NAMI may be a good place to start to learn about a diagnosis and treatment options.
Something to begin to think about is how you will protect your mental health as your support your loved on. You are not expected to give up your life and your own dreams because of your loved one’s diagnosis. There is no doubt a family member with mental illness may need more care and support, but it all does not have to come from one person. A piece of this journey that may be difficult is learning to set boundaries to be able to preserve your own mental and physical health. You will likely need to gather others up to support your loved one with mental health issues but also yourself. You are not expected to be a martyr and sacrifice your entire life or self for your loved one. If your loved one is a child and you have additional children, it will be very important to give the child who does not have the mental illness intentional attention, love and support. A diagnosis of one member of the family affects the whole family. So many times in families, the “sick” relative takes up the focus of the entire family, often leaving the other “well” people feeling left out and unimportant.
If you have a family member who has been diagnosed with a mental illness and they are resistant to treatment, that presents its own set of issues. Even people with mental illness have a right to “self-determination”. Meaning, they have a right to decide if they want treatment or not and what kind of treatment they want. The exception to that is if they are an imminent danger to themselves or others or are so gravely disorganized in their behavior or thinking that they can’t take care of themselves, you may have options for involuntary treatment. The legal system does not take removing someone’s rights lightly. You will have to prove that your family member is an IMMINENT danger, meaning without treatment the likelihood they will hurt themselves or someone else is HIGH. You will have to go through your local circuit or mental health court to get a judge to order them into treatment. I will warn you ahead of time: this process is usually not simple or easy. The United States has a critical shortage of psychiatric beds. Your loved one could end up spending days in the emergency room or even in some areas, spend time in jail waiting on a psychiatric bed to open for treatment.
If your loved one has financial resources such as SSI or SSD, you might consider becoming or requesting a fiduciary for them so they can have financial stability. Depending on the severity of your loved one’s illness, you may need to become their guardian or power of attorney. If that is the case, you will need to go through an attorney or your local Legal Aid program for assistance. Seek out local organizations that can offer day treatment, respite, case management and possible housing resources as your loved one ages, and their needs may change.
The most important thing you can do for yourself if you have a loved on diagnosed with a mental health issue is seek support and self-care for yourself. It’s not an easy journey, you will need to shore up your personal resources and strength as much as possible.
