It's no big secret facet of human nature that your expectations and perspectives and reactions and pretty much every other way you view the world and your experiences will differ within your lifetime--often it differs from one setting to another all at once. It all depends on a number of different variables: age, mental health, physical health, culture, location, religious beliefs, education... I could go on but I won't. The point is, you see things differently depending on where you're standing, metaphorically speaking. Sometimes it's wildly variant. Things that shouldn't be well-received or supported can become acceptable, and otherwise harmless behaviours can be taboo or inappropriate.
Even when you know something shouldn't be okay, you can still see it in a different light owing to all those variables as well as your own personal beliefs and personality.
I have an Australian friend who has mental illnesses and substance abuse problems similar to my own--similar, but significantly more intense. He stopped pill-popping for the most part but does other drugs occasionally. He's also a great deal more emotionally volatile than I am and his mood swings make mine look comparatively mild. This is a guy who has problems.
He has a crush on another friend of ours but, because the friend isn't gay and is attracted to women, the feelings are obviously not reciprocated and rejection like that hit Aussie really hard. He made a suicide attempt not too long ago over it. He was institutionalized for a few weeks and is currently getting help.
Because he knows I don't judge, at least not as far as mental health goes, he shared with me a recent development that literally in any other person on the face of the planet would make me kick into High Panic Mode and do anything in my power to get them medication and therapy. Because not only is this a not normal thing, it's a downright dangerous thing. When shit like this happens, something somewhere has gone extraordinarily wrong. It's one of the single most alarming developments possible in psychiatric health. It is really fucking bad.
He's started hallucinating.
He's got a full-blown visual and auditory hallucination of our mutual friend that he fancies.
Aussie doesn't want the hallucination to go away.
And I'm not worried.
My perception of this event is so completely askew it goes 180-degrees.
I'm really not very worried. Obviously seeing and hearing things is incredibly bad, but Aussie likes the company. He has trouble relating to other people like normal people do and so hasn't got very many friends, even though he desperately wants to be sociable. The hallucination is friendly and nice, completely benign, and nice to look at. It's someone to talk to and hang out with and because of this he isn't feeling the immense crushing loneliness he normally does--a feeling that can occasionally trigger a complete psychological breakdown and a relapse.
I understand why Aussie wants to keep him. And as far as I'm concerned, as long as the hallucination remains friendly, it certainly won't do a great deal more harm to just let it stay there. He knows it isn't real, so it's not like he's hallucinating and delusional. Granted it's still really fucking bad that it's happening at all, but for him it really is a legitimate case of being the lesser of two evils. If a hallucination keeps his depression from defeating him and helps him cope, then maybe it isn't such a bad thing. Drugs are a horrible thing, too, but I use them because they keep my problems from defeating me and make coping easier.
I did make him promise me that if the hallucination stopped being friendly and started being belligerent or mean or abusive in some way or ordering him to do shit, that he'd report it to his doctor and work to get rid of it. Because at that point it would no longer be an asset and will just aggravate the problems considerably more. He was reluctant and hasn't technically promised me anything, since he's stated he really really doesn't want it to go away. But at least he agreed that a mean hallucination would definitely be a huge leap backward.
All I can do is be there and try to help. He isn't a person with a lot of really effective coping mechanisms, so it doesn't seem quite right to deny him something he finds comforting. Something that makes life a little more bearable.
Even if it means letting him see and hear things that aren't actually there.
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