MENTAL ILLNESS AND HIGH I.Q.

Mental Illness and High I.Q.

I find that it is always a difficult problem for people who have mental illness and a high I.Q. to merge those two aspects of oneself in social relationships, professional relationships, and as a client/patient of a mental health professional. 

These are some of the issues I have had in no particular order:

• I worry I am smarter than them.
• I get exasperated explaining how smart I am and trying to make sure they believe me.
• I get frustrated describing my medical and mental health care issues, and telling them why thus and such has not worked for me in the past and do not see any reason to do it again. 
• Counselors who cannot spell. 
• Knowing more about most subjects than they do. 
• Doing more research on my condition or medication than they do. 
• Having figured out my diagnosis before going into see my doctor only to have to go anyway, spend the time and money to do so, and have them tell me what I already know. 
• Being so smart and still be unable to cure my "mental defect" of depression and anxiety.
• Feeling guilty and defective when I make things go wrong in my relationships when I feel like I cannot control what I do.
• Unable to tell a mental health professional everything I really want tell them because I am afraid of losing my freedom or my civil rights. (Suicidal people have less rights than do criminals). 
• Being afraid of being carted away to the psych unit when I tell the truth. 
• Having to keep secrets from almost everybody I know because of prejudice, how they will react and fear of losing my freedom, and my friends. 
• Having difficulty deciding whether or not it is rational and intelligent to want to kill yourself when you really feel your life is not worth living. 
• Not being able to make suicidal ideation go away even when I am happy and satisfied with my life.
• Being so intelligent and still not being able to find gainful employment despite having an education that is higher than most people in the world, due to mental and physical disabilities. I have to be so much more than everyone else just to compensate. 
• Not being able to work just because I need to stay poor to get the healthcare I need, even if the mental health coverage is inadequate and abusive to me. 
• Knowing that even IF I feel like killing myself, it's my life and it's my right and I might still feel better being at home than the hospital, where my intelligence means NOTHING.
• When I am suicidal, I may be irrational, or I may be rational. If I am rational, what if ending my life is the right thing for me? 

That's enough for now, don't you think? Next time, another review of a less than stellar mental health care provider. I bet you can't wait.