Mental health patients turn to each other

Mental health patients turn to each other
Mental health patients turn to each other for strength, advice

By John Keilman

Chicago Tribune

CHICAGO — Jim Bina was feeling good. And that made him nervous.

The Naperville, Ill., man had struggled with depression for decades, and he had learned to distrust happiness as an illusion that masked an approaching crisis.

It might sound like an unusual problem, but when he mentioned it one recent night in a hospital conference room, most of those listening nodded in recognition.

Bina, 54, had come to a support group for people with mental illness, run by people with mental illness. It offered them a chance to discuss and maybe get help for problems that, all too often, their friends, families and even therapists didn't seem to understand.

How do you feel comfortable at social gatherings when everyone there knows you tried to kill yourself? Should you abandon your religious faith if you're prone to thinking that you're God? How do you handle your illness when your child has it, too?

"A doctor can read about it but he doesn't know it firsthand," Bina said later. "Here, they get it. You're preaching to the choir. They know exactly what you're talking about."
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