Hi,
There is no right way to announce your "condition" to your family. You could, of course, just wait for your behaviour to reveal it without having to talk about it. Maybe they’ll hear you howl in your room in the middle of the night, or figure out from your sudden aversion to fish curry that "something’s off"? Maybe you’ll be rude to them without reason, scowl permanently, and emit a grunt every time they ask you to take a bath? Maybe you’ll emerge from your room once a day to refill your water bottle at a different time every day and swat them aside when they block your path? Or maybe all that warfare is too much work, and you’ll simply tell them to bugger off.
Maybe they will lose interest on their own? Oh forget it. No one gets bored of us "crazies".
For years, I presented my major depressive disorder and chronic anxiety as a case of "stress and vitamin deficiency" to my parents. It was a risky stunt, because my mother was a nurse for thirty years. Her skills were much revered in the hospital where she worked. She was called half-daktaar (doctor) for her talent for accurately identifying ailments and predicting lines of treatment. Since retiring, she has been centring all her energies on tracking my blood tests (I am hypochondriac too, so I am particular about getting elaborate blood work done every six months). She has a surgical ability to tear apart my ruses by asking very specific questions about my medication that are impossible to answer with lies. Her knowledge of the human body is a great inconvenience for me.
Thankfully, it was also my mother’s fealty to the world of disease and cure that helped me devise a strategy to break the news of my illness to her. One day I spread out all the pills – some six – that I was taking at the time on my palms, took a picture, and WhatsApped it to my parents, with an explanation of what each of the maroon, blue, white, yellow, and green things was for. And just like that, I had come out. Now I could tell my parents to leave me alone without worrying that my uncalled for bad manners would hurt them. It was empowering and liberating.
Framing my condition medically was an inspired decision in hindsight also because my parents wouldn’t have been able to deal with my truth bombs about how society damages people like me. Telling them that I was suffering from the psychiatric equivalent of a stomach bug helped me ease them into accepting my condition, and thus ensnared, they were far more receptive of my eventual disclosures about familial oppression.
What strategies have you heard of from your friends, or employed yourself, to break news about their illness to their families? How was the news received? Let’s all build a DIY manual for future depressives looking to come out to their families with minimal disruption.
A reader’s letter from São Paulo, Brazil
Gabriela wrote to me in response to last week’s newsletter, where I had talked about Indian miracle workers claiming to cure all kinds of mental and physical maladies. With her permission, I am reproducing her email in full. It is an entertaining and illuminating read about similar claims made by "religious" groups in Brazil:
"In Brazil these types of pamphlets are also common. A very popular one is the one that says ‘Stop suffering!’, distributed by an evangelical church, IURD (‘Universal Church from God’s Reign’). It was easy finding an image online:
Translation:
“Stop suffering!
There is a solution for your problem.
Join one of our praying groups.
Monday - Financial prayer chain
Tuesday - Unload section - Protection against envy
Wednesday - God’s sons meeting
Thursday - Sacred family chain
Friday - Chain for complete freedom
Saturday - Love Therapy
Sunday - Faith and Miracles”
As you see, they promise a cure for all causes of suffering. As this religious group owns also a TV channel, this type of message is also common on television. They frequently picture someone telling how the church has helped them in a case of depression or anxiety – both very common problems among Latin American people.
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