Tuesday, February 25, 2014

Post Ill Guardian Health

As a male, who once suffered from mental ill health in the form of eating disorders for fifteen years from youth to adulthood, I must say that indeed this is a pressing issue in our society.

Not only the predominance of the illness in culture, but how we as a society perceive those who are ill, before, during and after treatment. It is this social stigma that drives the ill from getting help or telling others, even themselves at times, that something is indeed wrong.

One perception is that doctors and family will accept the mentally ill person again, as normal and healthy, only when they are sufficient weight. Now, the above view may not be real at all, but I will say that as an adult with a mental illness, eating disorder, I experienced language in conversation with family that indicated my acceptance and health was tied only to my physical appearance. Which I may add, is the key contributor to having a false self image, leading to an eating disorder, in the first place.

Moreover there is a very dangerous subculture online that follows this illness, creating a vapid plague of content that only procures a deeper rift between the ill and those who perceive them, even if the rift only grows deeper in the minds of either party.

How can we say we love someone, if we do not accept them?
How can we say we accept someone, if we do not understand them?
How can we lay claim to understanding someone, if we spend no quality time with them...?

Help those who are ill understand themselves in the mirror, through accepting them without stigma, either it is within you or not, do not even imply it, lest you make the wound more grievous.

The following are two poems written about my illness and times of struggle.

Dapper Devil

Strapping young lad
Handsome moral heathen
Reprobate hiding a secret
Dreading a porcelain witness
Bloodshot eye disgusted scene
Mother's appalling judgement
Eldest twenty something son
Shackled inside contortions
Mental illness perception
Now everyone looks...
Down on the 'it'
That was him

Unisolated purge incident 
Bulimic acceptance lesson
Holocaust mirror reflection
Starvation self test dummy
Emotion architect upheaval
Anorexic search for...
The elusive demon
Acceptance

Dapper anorexic devil
Moral fibre student advocate
Degenerate perception enslaved 
Trapped inbetween corrupt worlds
Mirror's half convincing truths
Reflections worth devalued
Imperfect scale weight
Daily traumatic issue
Acceptance misery

Unisolated purge incident 
Bulimic acceptance lesson
Holocaust mirror reflection
Starvation self test dummy
Emotion architect upheaval
Anorexic search for...
The elusive demon
Acceptance

Strapping disorderly lad
Conduct loneliness hid well
Solemn scale wish adjustment
Acceptance endorsed by weight
Hospital admittance too late
Behaviour social stigma 
Labels burn the ears 
Trapped in fear
Of discovery

Unisolated purge incident 
Bulimic self inflicted test
Skeletal mirror reflection
Laxative self test dummy
Anorexic warning signs
A near death discovery
The elusive succubus 
Anyone's acceptance
Ghostly white hero

A near death bed scene 
Diagnosis administers regret
Walled in by prescriptions
Social stigma incriminate
Judgements on all sides
Wished into relapse
Hide in the secret
Behind the mirror
Confined in lies

Whelp Prodigy

Whelp prodigy
Golum in the mirror
Dual audio dialogue box
Personality swap paranoia
Schizophrenic shallow breath
Anticipating the incarnation
Of player versus player
Self monologue
In the mirror
Undone

Black oath son
Sheperdless vow child
Intoxicated plot unfolding
Causality of heart reminiscence
Murmuring through violence
Under a bully lord's throne
Father's game unplayed
A Chess surrender
Match of size
Never wit
Loss

Whelp prodigy
Holocaust skeleton
Sideways view hologram
Incapacitated half life illness
Mental anorexic measurements
Decapitated epidermis layer
Daily pound shed or else
Wishing for acceptance
Scale reflected mirror
Tragedy of tomorrow
Suicide time loss
Shoulder weight
Of the world
Alone...            

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