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Friendship and Mental Illness

© Amy Hillgren Peterson

In my community, as in many others, we have a place called The Friendship House, which is a social club for people with mental illness. I have been there once and did not feel I fit in with the people there playing cards, gossiping and smoking. (cough cough) For some, it seemed to be a place Where Everybody Knows Your Name. Not for me. Maybe at some future time, it will be my hangout as well.

I can see the value of the Friendship House, though, as I see people stuggle and I have my own struggles with creating and maintaining friendships. My best friends know that I have bipolar disorder and while they don't really understand, they really, really try.

My best friend and I took her three children and my two children, ranging in age from 4 to 11, on a camping trip this weekend.

For me the camping trip was not just a camping trip, but a manifestation of all that was pure and simple and beautiful about my childhood. We camped at the same lake my parents and I, and the friends who were like family, camped most summer weekends for fifteen years as I was growing up. The lake is a large one, and the clean water is sparkling blue under a clear sky. We were all very excited.

I brought to the trip the expectation that I could recreate my childhood for my children.

But the wind blew and the thunderstorms raged.

"I don't control the wind; I don't control the wind" was the mantra I repeated in my tent the first night as my children huddled at my sides. I was filled with self loathing for not being able to make everything better.

And in the predawn darkness as the wind rippled the side of our tent, I had the most devastating realization that I had forgotten my medication.

The wind blew apart our tents and extinguished our cookout fires. We went to town to find something for the children to do.

My coping skills were spent. I was snotty and unkind.

When my friend confronted me about my attitude I snapped.

All of the expectations of reliving my magical childhood with my children, of hot dog roasts and campfire stories, of a dry, white beach and calm lake, and my grief for both of my parents who gave me all of this came to the surface.

Things were said that could be forgiven, because we are good friends, but not easily forgotten: we questioned each other's parenting skills and relationships with our children, we sniped about each other's inherent personalities and intelligence. Things that are forgiven, but can't be taken back.