Love me Louder.

To honestly love someone who lives with mental illness, especially when symptoms flair up, can be incredibly challenging.

Have you ever fallen for someone? When you met them, they seemed so perfect, funny, smart, talented and other qualities. Then as the days flip by, things start changing? Perhaps slowly or all at once? Eventually they tell you they suffer from *insert mental illness here* or they tell you right up front but you think it’s nothing.

Perhaps you live with mental illness yourself, or a friend or family member? So you have an idea of what it’s like. But have you fallen in romantic love or attracted to someone?

I should know, I live with mental illness and I’ve loved someone with it.

I’ve watched people get frustrated and leave, or try to make me better, even have me involuntarily locked up in an inpatient treatment center. Instead of asking me how they can help, they leave or blame everything on something I can’t control.

So let me give you some advice that I feel like you need to know if you want to try for a relationship.

• If you really want it, commit to it. Through the good and bad. Be willing to be completely open with your partner.

• Don’t lie to them. They've probably experienced this too much. One lies about having to work late only to go to a friend’s house to avoid a fight that’s been brewing. They say everything’s okay when it’s not.

• Remember mental illness is a legit illness. Containing symptoms that flair up and cause problems in their life. Don’t make them feel bad about it when it happens.

• Create an action plan together. Once your partner is emotionally stable, come together to talk about how you can help them during flair ups.. How to handle certain things. What helps and what makes it worse. Relationships are honesty from both parties.

• Stop trying to fix them. You’re not a doctor, there are plenty of those. Understand that they’re most likely under the care of a doctor. If not, suggest it, but don’t push it. Also remember if they don’t have insurance, unless you can find free resources to provide, or help them find healthy coping mechanisms.

• Don't become frustrated. Some of the things they do may not make any sense to you. But they make sense to them, understand that. They don’t want to suffer with negative thoughts, lack of sleep or too much, the fear of being in public when it’s too busy, suicidal thoughts or self-harm.

• Don’t lecture or insult them. Self-harm may happen while you're together. It doesn’t mean they’re suicidal, it means they’re most likely trying to find control in their life. Unless they threaten to kill themselves, and they mean it, don’t call an ambulance.

• Most people who suffer pretend their okay around you. They act like everything is okay because they don’t want to burden people they love.

• Out of nowhere, they may try to push you away or convince you to leave. They’re good at it too. If you want to be with them, realize they are doing this because they fear you’ll leave them regardless. Sometimes it requires you to put in more effort to make sure they understand you’re there for them and you don’t plan on leaving them.

• Accept they will have doubts about you. They may seek constantly seek out reassurance, so many people have left them that they assume you will too.

• Respect their choices, even if they change rapidly. Realize mental illness can affect sex drive. Increase or decrease the drive. Respect them even if your sex life changes and not in a way you like.

• Allow them to lean on you. They may feel like giving up, don’t give up on them too.

• Understanding behavior. You may see them reaching out to help others, either by making them laugh, talking them through rough times, whatever they need but not doing the same for themselves. When you know how depressing and hard it is to live with this hanging off your back, you want to help others, but it’s harder to help yourself.

• Be their active support system. Support them however they need on their journey to “get better” which really means to get their life and symptoms under control to promote productivity and live a better life. Everyone, especially those with mental illness that can flair up at any time, need a support system. Make sure you want to be part of that.

• Go the extra mile. If they’re down or having a hard time, show them you care. Call and talk, video chat, stop by, surprise them with something they love, even if it’s as simple as a candy bar, or even just hugging them a little longer.

• Never manipulate or try to control them. They’re not a puppet to control, they are a person with a problem within the brain. They didn’t ask for it.

• Effective communication: If the relationship has problems, talk about them. Conflict will always arise but do not blame the illness on the problems. Communicate effectively about what is bothering you and allow them to speak. It could be heated and they could be irrational, so don’t take things to heart said in the heat of the moment. Most need time to calm down and process what’s happening, and then they’re approach you again.

• Arm yourself with information. It helps if you can understand their diagnosis including the symptoms and triggers so you can realize when things are acting up, because it’s possible they don’t realize when they are.

And most importantly:

• Make sure that both people are COMPLETELY OPEN AND HONEST with each other. Allow for open dialogue. They may have things they want to say but are unable too, so find a way to communicate in other ways. Perhaps a notebook you can write back and forth too. But be together when reading it in case you have to question things since you can’t always tell inflection through words.

Lastly:

• Are you ready? They will love you fiercely. Their heartbeat, the blood traveling through their body, every muscle fiber or cell in their body works for you. It’s a love you can’t begin to comprehend and it means the world to them.

So when you meet someone you really care about, who happens to have mental illness, remember that they didn’t have a choice. If you want to be in a relationship with them, it will be work, it’s not always easy, and both people are able to hurt each other. But if you really want to be with them, acknowledge and accept them for who they are at all times.

Open communication is key, understanding is required but what can come from this is an amazing understanding into a complex but intelligent, unique person who will be faithful and loyal.

Vibe Higher,

Lobeless