What It Means to Be More Than a Diagnosis
- Brainz Magazine
- Oct 13
- 7 min read
Written by Justin H. Briggs, Writer
Justin H. Briggs is the author of "Insanity Comes To Mind: A Memoir on Mental Health," which was published on May 1st, 2020. He is a good writer working at being great.
Am I more than my diagnosis? Lately, I have to admit that the number one topic of conversation in my life is my mental health. Am I simply a summation of a series of symptoms? A ledger of failure and cost? Well, I’m alive. And what I live with is disabling in terms of my mental health, so truly in this moment, I at most feel like my diagnosis.
The diagnosis
Schizoaffective Disorder, Bipolar Type, is a rather specific mental health diagnosis with which I have officially been labeled since 2018. This mental illness manifests in symptoms ranging from visual and auditory hallucinations to strong emotional fluctuations and mood swings. For someone such as myself, a diagnosis of this type often presents in an individual’s early adulthood, and often after a history of mental health episodes which give only clues as to what a person is really struggling with in their reality to outside observers.
Schizoaffective Disorder, Bipolar Type, is a condition which I earned over almost a decade of mental health diagnoses and treatments, as well as hospitalizations ranging from emergency room visits to several months in state mental hospitals. I have the official designation of “disabled” according to the United States Social Security Administration.
Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder is another nice label. It means I have been through some shit and survived. Only my shit was mostly self-inflicted by my brain’s irrational perception of reality. Yes, people have done me wrong. No, I do not feel good about that reality. But I can take reality and turn it surreal, at least in my own head, real damn quick. And then it’s me against the world. Not good odds.
Reading signs
While I know for certain there were signs in my earlier years that something was amiss with regard to my mental health, I write today as an adult who can admit he cannot read signs for shit and, even though I was raised to handle myself, no one really taught me how to read, other than me. So I’m a poor reader and a writer perniciously. At least, all anyone wants to read from me is writings on mental illness, according to my book sales.
I was not so much afraid in my youth of having mental illness as much as I was of showing emotions, or talking about feelings, or explaining my thoughts. So, of course, by the time I graduated from college, I had a fully-formed worldview that did not include me having any real problems, like a mental illness that qualifies me as disabled. Sure, I was paranoid, depressed, anxious, and ill at ease, but that’s normal, right?
Rough life
In explaining what this diagnosis means to myself, I would like to explain a bit about my opinion of myself, if I were not harder on myself than the world, then the world would have buried me by now. This is something I have been telling myself and others for so long now that it is clearly true! What I told myself to get here, the negative self-talk and criticism of my performance, surely justifies the hand I am dealt, right? I was built for this!
I am afraid I was not. As a friend once put it, “500 years ago you would have died in combat by now or be the village wizard.” I like this rationalization. I should not be able to sit here and write these words on a laptop for publication in a major international media firm. But here we are, or here I am rather, writing words I hope someone can relate to on their end of the World Wide Web, living a life which I as a human being could not have been afforded merely last century.
I am on the cutting edge! The advancements in mental health from when I was born to today have allowed me to sit here and admit that things could be worse. I could have been lobotomized just a few decades ago. I could be strung out on heavy prescription medications like lithium. I could be dead in a ditch by my own hand, even. The will to change your life is a powerful thing. But there is no guarantee in the struggle.
Current headspace
Concerning my current state of mind, my psychiatrist recently stated, “The progress you have made in terms of your mental health, based upon what you have been through, is so statistically improbable that we may as well call it miraculous.” You hear that, world? I am a miracle worker, yeah, right! It feels miraculous, yes, that I feel at a stable place at this moment. But stability is not the norm.
I know I am more than lucky to be alive, I know I am more than fortunate to be in a stable place in life relative to any time in my past 40 years, and I know I am more than blessed to have found a personal reality which would afford a psychiatrist the opportunity to say what was written above. However, there is solid evidence to suggest that I may have only so much time with my current mental health “success”.
In the heat of a summer day, or the communication breakdown of an important conversation, or the wrong sign from the wrong part of the universe, I know regression is essentially guaranteed. Either I will regress or someone’s opinion of my mental health will regress, or both. By the end of the year, I could lose all progress for myself or in anyone else’s opinion and, potentially, regress to a state even more irredeemable than I have yet found. It could always get worse, that’s my only guarantee.
I am not hopeless. There is real benefit to not being in a mental institution, to have failed at every suicide attempt whether intentional or instinctual, and there is a real value to me to be able to write about this experience for anyone willing to read about my mental health issues. But do I really want to be special for being mentally ill to the point of disability? Affirmatively negative on that.
What more can be done?
And so the struggle to be more than my condition, stronger than my symptoms, more capable than merely taking medications and keeping medical appointments. For years, I had an innate ability to forget my meds, or miss my appointments, or just say no to treatment of any kind. These choices are soon followed by a return trip to a mental facility. So here I am, medicated, in talk therapy, writing about how bad it has been and how much worse it could have been and could still become.
If this is progress, ok. We can start from here, but there is a reality of mental illness, which is difficult to admit, grief. It was recently brought to my attention that, in addition to the litany of symptoms my disability offers, I am also actually grieving the life I thought I was supposed to live. I have an inability to accept my lot as disabled.
Where are the fruits of so much perceived potential? Not in my bank account, not in my social life, and not in my self-respect. If I am more than my diagnosis, it has been a while since I got that impression from the outside world. So I’m the problem, right? I have to fix my condition? No. I have to manage my reality. The idea that I can succeed beyond survival must be put to bed by me and everyone else.
Imagine that! I want something better for myself than a mental illness. Yes, my best-selling title to date is a memoir on mental health. Yes, I was motivated to write out of a necessity for survival. Yes, choosing the path of a writer has brought upon myself motivation to be more than any diagnosis. But I'd better be damn-well aware of the diagnosis in all it has to offer. I dare not shoot for any more highs without acknowledging the risk of yet further lows than I have yet been afforded.
Risk vs. Reward
As implied previously, I can regress before I finish writing this article. This regression could be self-inflicted by improperly medicating myself, or merely occur in the event that my chemical imbalance becomes even further less balanced. And of course, there is the rush of chaos, the inner demon telling you to live life free of hesitation. If you were swimming against a riptide for 15 years, and you finally made it back to shore, how long could you lie around on the beach before you paddle back out to catch the next overwhelming current?
As I sit here typing these words at daybreak, I ask myself, “Is that all there is?” Man, I hope not. I choose to believe in myself, at least in terms of my condition. I believe the label affords me insight beyond the experience of the condition, labeling a problem allows for comprehension, treatment, and growth. I can take meds, I can talk to therapists, and I can live a life more self-aware than most I have encountered along the way. The cost? I have to live with myself. If I want to be harder on myself than the world, why not just be my own worst enemy?
Read more from Justin H. Briggs
Justin H. Briggs, Writer
Justin H. Briggs is a writer located in Manhattan, Kansas, USA. He is more than his diagnosis and less than his potential for success, in his opinion, but he is working on that. His diagnosis of schizoaffective bipolar disorder manifests symptoms of depression, mania, delusions, paranoia, and hallucinations. He is in no way medically certified beyond the occasional CPR certification, but he has been there and done that, so to speak.
