Greg Denniston
This is a book about mental illness. This is a book about faith. Taken together, this book is about the psychospiritual unity of human being that finds expression in human being’s primary character as a maker of meaning. As such, this book can be read as one consumer’s attempt to come to terms with his experience of severe mental illness. It can also be read as a small contribution to the emerging perspectives that construct theology from the locale of disability. In this case, theology is rendered from the vantage of the disabling realities of neurochemical disease.
Although this book can be regarded somewhat as an essay in pastoral or practical theology influenced by process thought, my hope is that this little piece can benefit several audiences. It is written in hope that students of religion, seminarians, theologians and pastoral care givers will find it to be a personal and professional resource. It is written in hope that students of behavioral health care and mental health professionals can learn form it and use it as a clinical resource. It is written in hope that family members who have loved ones with mental illness can come to understand better some of the psychospiritual dilemmas faced by consumers. In all these ways, it is written in hope that consumers will find greater empowerment and hope in our experiences of recovery.
In 1985, I had successfully completed my first year of studies towards a Master‘s degree in religion, on a full-tuition scholarship at the Iliff School of Theology in Denver, Colorado. At that time I was snatched away from reality by the onset of severe mental illness. “Snatched” is probably not severe enough a term to describe the traumas of the onset of mental illness, but it will suffice. I was 23 years old; and fortunately, the onset of my illness was a bit later in life than for many persons who share my diagnosis of schizoaffective disorder. This meant I had accumulated some successes in life and had accomplished some important developmental tasks that would aid in my recovery. However, many persons with severe mental illnesses get snatched away from reality in their late teens and accordingly lose out on a lot of major developmental experiences that consequently make their recovery harder.
Prior to being snatched from reality, I had a life. All my life I had been successful at academics and athletics--throughout grade school, junior high school and high school. High school included several successes. I was class president my junior year. My senior year I was vice-president of my class. I was a starting member of a top-ten rated basketball team in the state of Indiana. I was a Rotary Club Sportsmanship Award winner.
I was charter president of the Mayor’s City Youth Commission in my hometown. I graduated from high school with a 3.5 GPA and was voted Outstanding Senior Male by our graduating class. It should be of no surprise that I was pretty cocky. That was 1980.
By 1984, I had graduated from Anderson College, a liberal arts school in my
home town. I graduated cum laude with a 3.84 GPA with majors in Philosophy and Religion. I had managed to work an average of 25-30 hours per week as I put myself through college. I got married after the first semester of my senior year. My professional goal was to become a process theologian. Vanderbilt, Claremont and Iliff accepted me to graduate school; and I was still pretty cocky. But the party ended in 1985.
Five years later, I awoke to find myself snatched away by the throes of mental illness. I awoke one morning vomiting severely in bed on a locked psych ward at St. John’s Hospital in Anderson, Indiana. It would be nice to say that after I had put on my “Holy Spirit Decoder Ring” the Holy Spirit snatched me away from Denver to awaken pleasantly in Anderson. Also, it would have been nice if “Scotty” had beamed me up for a five-year vacation to explore the galaxy aboard the Mother Ship. But that’s not what happened either.
No, when I woke up on the psych ward in 1990, I had just lived through the hells of five years of mostly untreated major mental illness, with symptoms of psychosis, mood and anxiety disorders. During those five years I lost everything I had once cherished. I lost my first wife. I lost my mind. I lost my friends. I lost the ability to read and write. I lost interest in performing even the most basic and menial tasks of self-care. I could not work and could not support myself. All I was capable of was being psychotic, and being ripped by complicating symptoms of mood and anxiety disorders. I had been snatched away from reality so far that I had lost my self. Somewhere along the way God was snatched away from me, too.
But with medication, individual counseling and group therapy, my mind started to return. The paranoid, grandiose, mood-distorted world I inhabited began to fade away. The delusional walls in which I lived started falling. Bit by bit I started to recover some sense of confidence and ambition.
