Mental Illness Takes No Holiday

With all the merriment associated with the holidays having a family member who struggles to find merriment no matter what day of the year it is can be difficult.  Mental illness takes no holiday.  It is there 24 hours a day 7 days a week.  Often it intensifies during the time everyone else is at the height of merriment. 

As a caregiver for someone with mental illness it is not always easy to avoid being pulled into your loved one's depression.  Your work as a caregiver intensifies along with their anxiety.  I am still struggling to find a way to separate myself from my brother's illness.  Because it is an ongoing battle measured by phone calls, thoughts of suicide and delusional thinking I live as much with his schizophrenia at times as he does.  

At times I am acutely aware that I am in over my head but that doesn't seem to matter.  I'm here and that is where I will remain.  I'm in this until one of us has taken our last breath.