A Career in Mental Illness I am a sixty-year-old grandfather. For most of my adult life, I have suffered from bipolar affective disorder. This condition causes me to experience exhaustion and mental dysfunction, which can lead to depression or elation, to a debilitating degree. I initially became ill in high school as I became increasingly isolated socially. This social withdrawal acted as both a cause and an effect of my illness. It was to become so pronounced in university that I was almost completely unable to speak. Except on paper. I high school, a wonderful English teacher discovered I had a talent for writing and he encouraged me to foster it saying, “I prophesy you will be unable to give up creative writing. If you do it will be a tragic loss!� As I moved through university, this talent kept me whole, but in the end, under the weight of the increased study I was assigning myself in order to become the best writer I could be, my health broke. In my third year at Dal I had a compete break with reality. The next year I returned home to recuperate. On Oct. 19, 1969, my father was tragically killed by his own car when it ran over him in a freak accident, killing him instantly. Two years later, my mother died, I believe, of grief.
For a number of years I was “in and out” of hospitals where I met many wonderful people and experienced many varied things. I remember my first night at the Nova Scotia Hospital, when, out on the beautiful grounds on a pass, it was all I could do to bring myself back into those buildings again after experiencing all that beauty around me. Fortune began to shine on me a few years later, when I applied my ever-growing interest in Zen Buddhism to the management of my illness. This practice allowed me to gain, as my therapist remarked; a “breakthrough in (my) illness which I have not seen in my other clients,” so much so that in 1973, I met and married a wonderful girl who has supported me and given me a family to love and care for the past 36 years. This is my greatest blessing. Through the ensuing years, there have been many tragedies other than my illness. One in particular, the violent death of much loved family member. Because I was not directly involved, I was able to take a supportive role in my family, strengthening all those involved. I want to say here, that, far from being a figment of one’s imagination; a weakness of character, or a lack of ambition; mental illness is one of the most horrendous forms of suffering we humans have to endure It destroys families as well as minds and careers. One may suffer unspeakably all ones life and suicide may seem like the only rational solution. It can transform ones inner environment into an cavity of torment and despair, which seemingly may never end. To cause us to suffer further by stigmatizing us adds insult to injury.
As the years passed, my health improved, and New Hope was given me by the wonderful rehabilitation center New Hope here in Pictou County. This facility allows clients to regain their social skills and to retrain the damaged circuitry of the brain. I have practiced my writing and my Buddhism all my life, having considerable success in publishing; and just this last year, I formally became a Zen Buddhist. Today, my wife and I enjoy our wonderful granddaughter; and I pursue my interests in music reading and photography. Oh yes, I am in complete remission. ~ Thank you for your interest. David Young