Mental illness is a malady that unfortunately places the ill apart from the rest of society. The mentally ill has to be confined and separated from family and friends, indefinitely. The mentally ill is given appropriate, adequate and competent medical care, but those are no guarantee that he will be cured at a certain or definite time. Mental illness is unlike common colds, surgical cases and other medical ailments where patients respond to treatment rapidly and hospital confinement is not prolonged.
Mental patients are generally isolated prior, during or after hospital or medical facility confinement, from the rest of the world, including family and friends. With mental illness, however, the afflicted is cut off not only from society but the saddest part yet is they are even detached from themselves. They do not have a sense of reality. They are in their own space, practically living in their own world with no one else not even their own true self. They seem to lead their own life, unattached to nobody else’s.
Much as loved ones want to reach out and re-connect with the mentally ill kin, it is in some cases impossible. Mental illness varies in degrees of affliction. They range from the slightly to moderately to severely ill. Some manifest mild derangement, while others can be violent and dangerous. There are those who mumble incessantly, there are those who make incoherent discourses, and there are those who sulk and are ‘deafeningly’ quiet most of the time. Mentally ill persons are called many names like, “whacko’ or “cuckoo” proving that even if they have been cured of the affliction, which can be rare, the stigma remains.
They have a hard time integrating into mainstream society as society is wary of his mental state all the time. With regards to mental illness being a spiritual problem, it is to be taken in the context of the totality of man’s being. Ordinarily, a human being is his physical, mental and spiritual self. The mental faculties of a mentally ill are impaired. Physically he may be strong but his actions are no longer directed by a right and proper mind. Two of his faculties are impaired and the third is not able to connect with the other two, because of the estrangement or gap of each one from the other two.
Taken on a much higher plane, the spiritual or the soul is the center or the core. The soul is a person’s window of opportunities. It looks into growth and development within that can be harnessed and which should be used to benefit others. There are also the strong emotions, like sadness, alienation, and hurt. These feelings lead a person to separate from reality and from one’s self. A person loses a center or a core of his life. The lost is also a disruption of his life.
It is the same soul that would reconnect with the center of self, to heal and to continue life from where it left off. Mental illness, therefore, is as much a mental, physical and spiritual problem.
References: Redstone, Julie. (January 25, 2007). A Spiritual View of Mental Illness. Retrieved February 6, 2007 from http://ezionearticles. com/? A-Spiritual-View-of-Mental-Illness&id+43092 Understanding Mental Illness. Canadian Mental Health Association. Retrieved February 6, 2007 from http://www. cmha. ca/bins/content_page. asp? cid=3.