Yes. It really is “all in my head.” Since I’ve had the responsibility of dealing at close range with “dementia meets bipolar disorder” for the past few years, I’ve thought more and more about how our brains work...or don’t. So, while I readily admit I have no more expertise in neurology than the next person, I think a lot about how we historically (and presently) have misconstrued and misunderstood so many things related to our brains. For example, phrases like "you're just imagining things," or "you're just hearing things" as explanations for hallucinations have long been a dismissive approach to what can be very real and serious mental disorders. The key word being "just." Going back in time, yet still not totally absent in the present, there is the idea that supernatural forces or demonic entities were causes of behavior we now know to be related to neurological disorders and chemical imbalances in the brain. I think part of humanity’s struggle with accepting physiological and neurological explanations for "abnormal" thoughts, feelings, and behaviors is that it makes us feel much more vulnerable and out of control. That three pounds of ugly grey matter could control everything we think and do, show us things that aren't real, speak to us when no one's around, cause us to say and do things that are outside our understanding of normal behavior; it's frightening. It's much easier to dismiss it as "just" something that happens, or attribute it to some malevolent force that seeks to control us.
We attribute, metaphorically, our feelings and emotions to the heart, yet they are in fact a product of our brains. Love, hate, joy, happiness, peace, melancholy, depression, mania, euphoria, sadness, grief....they all are a product of our brains. Physical pain and pleasure, while filtered through the senses, are processed, interpreted, and ultimately experienced by the brain. What we know, what we remember, our capacity to learn and understand, our ability to create, our physical motion and coordination, are all sourced in the brain. Whether we are living or dead is ultimately determined by the presence or absence of brain activity.
Our brains are us. They are who we are, whether we like it or not. When you're caring for a loved one who has a mental disorder and they behave badly, people are quick to tell you "that's not her...it's not who she is...it's just the disease." While I appreciate and understand the sentiment, in my own mind I say to myself "it may not be who she was, or who she would have wanted to be, but at this moment it is who she is." It's hard to deal with that sometimes, but I've never been one to find solace in living outside the reality of the moment.
So, what is my point here? Well, I hope as research on the brain advances and we understand ourselves better, we can become more sensitive to and more empathetic towards people whose brains don't work like we wish they would. Even without a formal diagnosis, I think none of us are what we'd like to think of as "normal;" at least not consistently. We're all just one shrunken blood vessel, or a misrouted neuron, or a drop or two of serotonin or dopamine away from being the person everybody calls "crazy."
We attribute, metaphorically, our feelings and emotions to the heart, yet they are in fact a product of our brains. Love, hate, joy, happiness, peace, melancholy, depression, mania, euphoria, sadness, grief....they all are a product of our brains. Physical pain and pleasure, while filtered through the senses, are processed, interpreted, and ultimately experienced by the brain. What we know, what we remember, our capacity to learn and understand, our ability to create, our physical motion and coordination, are all sourced in the brain. Whether we are living or dead is ultimately determined by the presence or absence of brain activity.
Our brains are us. They are who we are, whether we like it or not. When you're caring for a loved one who has a mental disorder and they behave badly, people are quick to tell you "that's not her...it's not who she is...it's just the disease." While I appreciate and understand the sentiment, in my own mind I say to myself "it may not be who she was, or who she would have wanted to be, but at this moment it is who she is." It's hard to deal with that sometimes, but I've never been one to find solace in living outside the reality of the moment.
So, what is my point here? Well, I hope as research on the brain advances and we understand ourselves better, we can become more sensitive to and more empathetic towards people whose brains don't work like we wish they would. Even without a formal diagnosis, I think none of us are what we'd like to think of as "normal;" at least not consistently. We're all just one shrunken blood vessel, or a misrouted neuron, or a drop or two of serotonin or dopamine away from being the person everybody calls "crazy."
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