by Jerome Espinosa Baladad

Created on: October 12, 2010

The experience of being diagnosed as being in a “mental health case” is similar to being judged “guilty” before a competent court. You may not actually be the one diagnosed, but if you happened to have a relative, or a family member who has been diagnosed with a mental illness, you start questioning if the rest or others in your family have inherited the same illness. You start questioning, too, if any of your forebears might have “contaminated” your genes, such that you continue asking why you have to undergo this predicament, among other forms of unwanted sufferings in life.

This writer’s family counts among its members at least two who have been diagnosed as having mental illnesses, the types of which most people would rather not learn more about. Most would feign curious interest to know more details, but they are actually behaving like “being thankful” such maladies linked with a stigma are not found with their own families. You’re even advised by ill-informed personal coaches, such that you seldom admit to these illnesses to people you’ve recently known, or you’ll soon expect a certain change in their behavior towards you.

One of this writer’s younger brothers is schizophrenic, whose diagnosis was recognized late, which was triggered by the death of their maternal grandmother. He was mumbling a lot of inconsistencies during the wake, which some members thought were just temporary, and which could have been due to depression over the death of the beloved matriarch. He has since then been taking medications, and undergoes psychotherapy. But he could not anymore get employment, as results on the mental health diagnosis will be made known, and recruiters would tend to refuse outright to even consider him as a serious candidate for their requirements.

There’s even another older relative, the half brother of this writer’s late father, who has remained undiagnosed whether he actually has one some form of mental health illness or not. He’s remained unmarried, wears a lost-look on his face, and would just keep to himself most times, mostly “talking to himself.” This writer repeatedly asked what happened to him, but most relatives won’t clearly say whatever they recall about events when this half-uncle was younger. Unable to join other members of his family abroad where most of them have relocated, he remains in the Philippines, and has been confined

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