Coping

Coping skills are, in my opinion, the key to beating mental illness. The best way to learn coping skills is by talking to a qualified therapist who knows your condition. I have not always been an advocate for therapy, but after spending time with a few good ones, I now realize their importance in recovery and maybe, a significant reduction of your symptoms.

Coping means that you use your own conscious effort to handle the situation in front of you. For instance, if you have a problem with anxiety, controlling your breathing might be a conscious way to handle your condition. If you’re at home and are suddenly feeling anxious, I have found that a finger pulse-ox is a great way to physically and visually control breathing and lowering your tension levels. When you see your oxygen saturation is high, you can see visually you are getting enough oxygen even when you feel like you can’t breathe. The pulse reading might initially be high because you are stressed, but slowing down your breathing, maybe listening to calming music or just sitting quietly and changing your thought pattern will bring your pulse down and you can visually see your progress, which encourages you to continue until you tension recedes. Finding your own healthy coping method is the key. Find something that works for you. Healthy coping skills are what is important, with a strong emphasis on healthy!

Certain conditions require counseling because a purely medicinal regime simply won’t solve the problem and learning how to cope with symptoms on your own is essential. One condition is the negative symptoms of schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorders. These symptoms cover a wide range, but one thing they have in common is they require someone to talk to and teach you how to cope with them. Medication can stop or at least help mute the symptoms of paranoia or voices; I can attest to this. I take antipsychotics most days (I’m not the best medicine taker), and I can manage to suppress the voices to an acceptable level and remind myself there really isn’t someone following me or reading my thoughts. One area I continually have trouble with is delusions.

Delusions and paranoia are linked in many ways. A delusion is a belief in something that is not true, but you have convinced yourself, without any real evidence that it is. We’ll use my problem with paranoia as an example. My coping skills in the early periods of the diagnosis were simply nonexistent. I had an intense fear people were breaking into my house to kill me. I would stay awake at night vigilant for the would-be intruders and be exhausted the next day, and after a few days of this I would collapse, giving the would-be attackers easy prey and making my paranoia even worse. I had convinced myself that some outside force was at work against me. Soon, I began to think people knew they could not break into my house because I was waiting for them and instead they began to follow me. When I left the house, which became increasingly less common, I was looking over my shoulder and waiting for someone to attack me. Someone was always watching me; I could feel their eyes, and I just knew people were surveilling me.

Coping with these feelings came with the help of first and foremost from my psychiatrist, but no less importantly, a (very) small network of friends who would listen to me when I was scared or worried, even late at night when they should have been sleeping, and what is that keyword I’ve mentioned previously? Therapy. A therapist isn’t a miracle cure but is there to listen and offer some advice on how to redirect your thinking, and by talking you begin to realize what you’re saying doesn’t sound very plausible, and you realize there is another way to think about this issue. It takes time, sometimes lots of time.

I have learned a lot over the years about coping and the longer you spend learning ways to redirect negative thoughts the better you get at it. I still sometimes see random people I logically know aren’t there, but logic falls away for a moment before I catch myself and come back to “now” and move on. Being in the moment is a phrase I use a lot with people. If you’re in THIS moment, a lot of the external things won’t affect you. Once again, it’s not foolproof, because as it pertains to mental illness, your mind is not giving you the right signals. It’s very hard, and sometimes impossible to distinguish “fantasy” from reality. But, if you’re able to be in this moment, maybe you can find some small reference points that you can look to when you’re feeling uneasy and aren’t sure if something is real or not. I know this is not the greatest help, but it’s a start, and as you gain skill and confidence you can find better and better ways to adjust to your mind trying to play tricks on you.

I can’t speak for everyone; these are just a few methods I use to stay in the here and now and they help me stay grounded often enough to be here still. There are times to when I relapse a bit and get carried away with paranoia and withdraw from people around me because I am stuck in my mind, and sometimes that’s all I can do to keep my sanity long enough to get help. Hopefully, they are kind, observant and knowledgeable enough about me and my condition to realize I am having a hard time and help me through it. It’s amazing what a little touch or some calming words from someone close can do to relieve you of fear and panic and the paranoia that caused it .

If you feel you are suffering unduly from paranoia, delusions, hallucinations, etc., I urge you to seek help from a mental health professional. They will have the educational background to sort through your various symptoms and sometimes find an amazingly simple solution. Mental illness is exceeding difficult to handle on your own. I (try) live by the motto one day at a time. If I can do it today, there is a good chance I can do it tomorrow, and the cycle continues.