Update

in a previous blog i wrote about a situation with someone that struggles with some mental/emotional challenges. i was very aware of my lack of patience but also of how difficult it is to hold up boundaries...especially when you know that healthy boundaries can cause pain to a boundary-less person.

well, in the time since that blog it's been quite interesting. some positives for sure, but i've been having to practice patience...not an easy thing for me. i'm assuming that the maintenance of good boundaries will be tested, which will be a difficult thing. however, when i think about it, the pain of having to bump into a boundary is momentary compared to the pain that's allowed to oppress a sad soul. in reality, having no boundaries only adds to that deeper pain, and i'm not ok with standing by while that happens. so i have to keep chosing to be the "bad guy of boundaries" rather than a co-dependent contributor to more illness.

the major obstacle???...which is not unique to a mental illness...how much someone needs a lie to be true. the degree to which we need that lie to be true is reflected in how much we are willing to take any and all situations and interpret them in a way that validates that lie. in other words, we'll take any situation and make it somehow say that our lie is true. once we decide that someone has validated our lie, we feel incredible permission to hate, gossip, throw fits...it can go on and on and on...

example: if i need to believe the lie that 'i'm worth rejecting', i'll take even a glance from a complete stranger as proof that "yep! they are rejecting me". i will then spiral into whatever behaviors and thoughts work to comfort myself.

the bummer is...no one can trump that lie until the individual is willing to consider that it might NOT be true... it's our disagreement with it that begins our journey to freedom...and that's a terribly difficult thing to do. misery at least feels familiar...and familiar feels safe sometimes. i definitely know this to be true in my own life.

compound that lie business, though, with the affliction of chemical imbalances or anything else contributing to a mental illness and it becomes almost impossible to rise up in someone's life and say "that lie is NOT true!!".

frustrating...enter my patience problem. hehe.

so...all that to say...my major role has to be one of prayer. i'll continue the boundaries, which may end the interaction entirely because they may want to keep on validating their own lies, but i'll keep praying a good counsellor or doctor will enter the scene regardless to help clear some of the fog that makes things worse...