As a fellow blogger wrote, “If only it were so simple…”
Depending on the kind of mental illness and its severity, it might be like the cartoon below: feel the storm coming and hunker down. But there are other possibilities:
— Feeling the storm coming, and work frantically to batten down the hatches with the meds at hand before chaos…
— No warning, just the storm arrives, and there is nothing in the larder, no time to cancel, just SPLAT and then aftermath for a while…
— Or the storm arrives and passes…. and you wake up with your life in disarray, the house in need of Crime Scene Cleaners, your bank account empty and half your friends furious for mysterious reasons.
I know folks for whom each of those scenarios has happened. So if you have a friend with mental illness, be kind. If you are one of us, know that you aren’t alone, even if it feels like it. (And thanks, comic artist, for a great cartoon!)
Thank you for this, Rabbi Adar; it’s so helpful. Im a great fan if graphic novels/cartoons….they have a way if showing something in a way which sometimes words can’t (Alison Bechdel – aside from her other books, the two on her parents are so readable. And there’s another wonderful one you likely know, too – the Rabbi’s Cat….)
Still trying to consider if it’s appropriate to post on Shabbat: *I* do, but I know lots of Jews don’t, and I don’t want to be disrespectful to anyone in that way, so please accept advance apologies
Shalom from Scotland
Alex