Video Transcript: How can you support someone with a mental illness?

Welcome back to mental health integration, the short, I am Brandon Appelhans  for the final time, because this is the final segment, this is segment nine, you're  almost done. I'm gonna throw a plug in right here for the main course, again, I  know you're sick of these plugs. But seriously, there's a lot of cool stuff in there.  If you are interested in serving, if you serve in clergy in any way, shape or form,  there is a section of that course, on how to implement mental health ministry in  your own church. And what the church can do a mental mental health that's  missing here completely. It's a really cool, go see it. If you want to know about  suicide prevention, this is that's not in here. It's in there. So go see it. If you want more depth on all of these topics, I go into so much more depth on all of these  things. It's there. Go see it. With that, we're gonna talk about the last section,  which is how to support someone that you care about who has a mental illness? Let's go ahead and jump in. So how do you support someone you love? You  want them to get better. You want them to get help. But what do you do? I can't  tell you the number of people that I've had express interest in this. Because they have a love for someone. They care for someone and then they don't know what to do. They have the right answers. They've sometimes done research. They  want to see their loved one become the person that were again. But now, who  are they, they're, they're sitting under all of these mental health issues, all of the  struggle, and they can't seem to get better. So what do you as a supporter do, I  can tell you, the first step. It's to listen. Before you try and offer really great  solutions, and before you try to solve that person's problems, hear them. Now,  they might be ruminating around some of the pain from their mental illness, you  might have to go for a walk with them, you might have to distract them, you  might have to go do something fun with them. God forbid the people have fun  when they're actually depressed, or anything like that. I'm kidding. Go do those  things with them, go play. But listen, and hear them. They need to know that you care. They need to know that they're heard before anything else can come  about. There's a trite statement. That happens a lot in the church, but people  don't know how much you know, until they know how much you care. That's true in this space. You have a lot that you can offer. But the main thing that they need right away is they need you to listen. The next thing you can think about is that  listening gives dignity. They are still a person made the image of God who is  valuable and worthy. But right now, they probably don't believe in themselves.  They feel like the world is falling apart. They feel like their capacity is diminished. They don't know how they're going to pay their bills. They don't know how  they're going to take care of their family. They don't know if their world is going  to fall apart. They feel completely insecure about all of their roles and their own  being. And they don't know what to do. But they just have this mental illness  thing, and how's it going to get better. And they need a friend. If you were their  friend, or their pastor or anything else, just be that to start. They need you to  listen, they need you to be present. They need you to hear them. And they need 

you to know you understand. If you do that, that's half the battle. I remember a  study about survivors of rape. That said that survivor of rape is the first person  they told about it actually heard them and validated their experience. The rate of  the trauma was significantly lowered. This isn't rape. But I can tell you that  having someone hear my story and validate it and say I know it was horrid. I  don't know what your pain is. But I hear you and I believe you, that is so  valuable. And from a voice of experience when someone gives me the dignity of  sharing their story with me I know my reaction is, thank you. I know that was  hard. I've been there, not like you have our pain looks different. But I think I  know a little bit about what that feels like. And I'm sorry it happened to you. And I believe you and that recognition goes so far. everything else that you do from  there will be helpful in some way or another, as long as you start with love, and  without judgment. And as long as you keep that conversation, in love, and  without judgment. My next statement to you is if you care for somebody, I want  you to be a little selfish. But bring it in, I'm trying to take care of them. I know,  that's exactly why you need to be a little bit selfish. You need to take care of  yourself in ways that bring you life. You need to go play, you need to go see your other friends, you need to go and be listened to and heard and cared for. The  person with mental illness just had all of their abilities, shrunk, their capacity was greatly greatly diminished. You also as a supporter, did not ask for this extra  thing in your life. It diminishes your capacity too and so you need to take the  time to take care of yourself. Because you can't help somebody else, if you're in  the middle of falling apart, you might be able to help a little but definitely not your full capacity. So take care of yourself. Sleep, exercise, do all of the things that  we talked about a person with mental health issues doing. Even if you need to  get pills, get pills, whatever you need to do. For the record, get them from a  doctor who is board certified, not from a kid on the street, like not those pills, the good ones, from the doctor and the pharmacist. Go ahead and take care of  yourself. Play, enjoy. When you have a vibrancy of life about you, you're able to  carry a lot more of this stuff. And it won't weigh you down. Oftentimes, I see  supporters who are so burnt out and destroyed and distraught that they're not  helping at all anymore. They think they are, they're present, they're there. But  their presence isn't helpful. It's depressing, it's hard. And what it takes to actually serve this person is to be able to lift yourself up, which means you need to take  care of yourself and take that rest. Take that Sabbath, take that time. And then  you can help. If the person that you love needs resources, you cannot make  them use those resources. But you can find them. You can look up what  resources are available, and help them get appointments. If the person that you  love needs a workout buddy, or something like that, you can help with that. But  you can't outwork your buddy, whoever it is that your son or daughter mom, dad, brother, sister, wife, whatever, friend. Never outwork the person you're working  with. If you are willing to do 100% of what you've got in the tank, when you're full

to them, make sure they're willing to give 100% too. I've met a lot of people who  are willing to give 100% And it's amazing to see their support networks rally  around them and how it's healing experience. But I've also seen people who  were only willing to give 10% And it's amazing how much they drained their  entire network around them because their network was trying to give 100% got  frustrated because this person wasn't actually taking anything seriously. And  they started to actually like disdain the person who they were trying to help. And  in return the person who was trying, giving that 10 or 15% felt like the person  was trying to help trying to control them. And they returned that with disdain  themselves. You don't need to create a relationship where butting heads can  create room where we're actually improving each other. But that takes letting go  taking care of yourself. and not out working your loved one. If you have more  questions about this, there's still a three credit course that you should take. But  in the meantime, thank you for being here with me. It has been an absolute  pleasure to walk with you through this. Thank you for the opportunity and God  bless you