Christina Sell Yoga

View Original

May is Mental Health Awareness Month- #notalone

Christina Sell

Trigger Warning- The following post speaks candidly about  mental health, addictions, and suicide. 

***

Both of my paternal grandparents took their own lives. My grandfather suffered from an untreated mental illness. My grandmother fell into depression after a stroke disabled much of her capacity for speech. Both chose violent means by which to end their lives. 

One look into the matrilineal side of my family reveals depression, workaholism, food addiction, and tragic losses which robbed my ancestors of the  capacity to experience the joys of daily life, relationships, and work. 

Depression came calling for me at sixteen, taking me into dark places of compulsive eating, over-exercising, and bulimia along with self-destructive patterns with  sex, alcohol, and drugs. No aspect of my life was unaffected and, as my relationships fell apart, my education suffered, my self-esteem plummeted, and I thought frequently about suicide.  

Lucky for me, I got help.

When I was eighteen, I spent 16-months in a residential emotional growth program, exploring the basics of how to get my body, mind, and emotions to work together. I learned how to liberate the pain and distrust that was lodged inside of me and began the process of growing into myself.  To this day,  I know that this radical experience— although not neat, tidy, or easy— set me on the path of spiritual awakening. 

***

Recently, when discussing a family member’s upsetting health condition, my physician advised me, “Well, the only thing you can do to help is to safeguard your own mental health.”

He was right— no doubt about it—since  the number one ingredient for change is the painful and personal recognition that things are not working as they are. No one can do the work for anyone else and no one can  make that recognition come one moment sooner that it does for another.

Truth be told, the term “mental health” doesn’t quite capture the essence of what I have come to experience as recovery or health. In fact, while I am telling the truth, I might also add that the term “mental health” gets my hackles up a bit, triggering a sense that I am somehow flawed or mentally deficient for struggling to live authentically in a world that rewards falsity, for needing help to manage pain in a world that values numbing out, and for not being able to “think myself into a new perspective.”

Anyone who deals with anxiety, depression, addiction, or any challenging pattern of behavior, thought, or feeling knows that if you could think your way out of it, you would. Even in the throes of my eating disorder, I began most days with a very insightful pep talk about my situation and yet, every day I was unable to stop the compulsive reenactment of my self-destructive ritual.  From my experience, mental health is not just mental.

***

I am taking this stark walk down memory lane today because my friends at PURE Yoga in Austin, TX have invited me to teach an asana class (If you come to class, you will see me riffing on the 26/2 sequence with some creative embellishments.) and to give a talk about mental health for Mental Health Awareness Month.. The title of my talk is Mental Health is Not Just Mental. I plan to talk about the dynamic interplay of body, mind, emotions, and spirit that constitutes health. 

I am not a clinician, although I have some training and experience as a counselor. And, to be clear,  I do know the importance of correct diagnosis and treatment for psychiatric disorders.  I also suspect that for many people, being able to label something  a mental health issue is important, so the fact that my hackles go up when I hear the term “mental health” is personal testimony, not an attempt to thwart any movement towards lessening stigma or the process of acceptance that healing requires.

I know that regarding my eating disorder as a “disease” was crucial for my recovery and yet, I once had an argument with a psychiatrist who said there is no disease in bulimia save the psychology of hunger. (Seriously, this conversation was during a  therapy workshop, but I digress.) Luckily, I was far enough along in my healing that I could simply say, “Well, that may be true, but I am pretty certain I would still have my head in a toilet if I hadn’t seen bulimia as a disease.” 

***

We are both simple and complex beings. We are both fragile and resilient. We are an ever-shifting mix of cultural conditioning, family history, relational influences, biochemistry, and temperament. None of us are exactly the same, experience our world the same, face the same obstacles, have access to the same help, or share the same coping strategies. And yet, we all suffer. I believe the recognition of shared suffering— not the content of said suffering—can be a place from which to experience unity. Recognition of our shared human condition can be an access point for learning and reminding one another that, for all of our differences, we are not alone. 

For the record, I am a huge fan of the Yoga of Psychotherapy with a trained, licensed psychotherapist over a long period of time. I also believe that being established in the regular practice of asana, meditation, mantra, and other consciousness practices can aid the therapeutic process tremendously. And, while a steady diet of Twinkies is not going to help anyone’s mood over the long-haul, there is not enough green juice on the planet to rectify certain chemical imbalances or to make sense of the trauma that unfolds in the lives of so many of us. 

More could be said, because 1000 words is never enough to unpack the many layers of personal and collective experience that falls under the heading of mental health. My hope is that speaking frankly of my struggles encourages others to do the same— to seek help, to reach out from corners of isolated darkness to risk discovering that on the other side of shame, confusion, and despair there is a life worth living and that, for all of life’s unfair circumstances, also holds joy. 

More soon.

And now, for the commercials—