World Bipolar day

This morning, I posted the following on my Facebook:

"In honor of World Bipolar day, I would like to share a bit of what's been on my heart lately.
Mental illness of any kind is a very real thing. It is not a joke, something to taunt or to be afraid of. Putting labels on it, such as those "crazy people", that "drunk" or clumping it with other people groups, like certain political parties, is just not ok. Unless you or someone you know suffers from one of many mental illnesses, you will never fully understand the struggles and challenges they face on a daily basis.
Some of the kindest and most intelligent people I know and have worked with as a nurse have and had some sort of mental illness. In my world, if you treat the person and not the disease, you will win 100% of the time!!"

Currently, as of 3:50 PM, it has 21 likes, 4 comments and 2 shares. But that doesn't mean anything to me. None of that matters; that's just stuff. In my years in this line of work, the amount of bravery, strength, courage and hardships these sufferers have gone through...my "problems" in my day to day life don't even compare. I've seen marriages, families, children and the sufferers themselves be ripped apart. I've seen patients whose employers have called telling them they've lost their job. I've seen patients whose spouses say they've had enough and want a divorce. I've had CPS come and tell a patient they're taking their children away. Bipolar, Depression, Schizophrenia, BPD, Alcoholism, Addiction; they're not labels, they're diseases. 100% treatable diseases, and THEY. ARE. REAL. As long as I am alive and on this earth, I am making it my mission to raise awareness via my social media to those who read my stuff and follow me.

Mental illness is something, I have to admit, I used to be afraid of. I have a cousin with bipolar disorder. My family told me about it, but I never saw firsthand what that was really like. In 2011, in my 3rd semester of nursing school prior to starting psych clinicals, our instructor asked us to share our hangups, fears, concerns and whatnot about going into this rotation. My answer was simple; I didn't want to get hurt. I didn't want "those people" to hurt me (those were my exact words). I remember my first day on the unit in the same place and unit I now work at, looking at what was going on around me and seeing how....normal everything looked. How normal everyone looked. And I remember talking to some of the patients and I was just like "oh my gosh, they're just people. They're not going to hurt me." I just felt like having a conversation with....well, anyone really. I didn't feel uncomfortable, nervous or anything like that; in fact, it was the most at ease I felt talking to a patient. In hospitals prior to psych, I had no trouble talking to those I cared for, but there was equipment, stuff, IV pumps and other staff going in and out of the room and so many other distractions. But there....there was nothing in between me, those I was talking to and my peers.

And now...almost 3 years later employed at the same place I sat almost 5 years ago, and sometimes I forget my patients are my patients. What I mean by that is that it sometimes doesn't feel like work. I'm not punching in and taking care of a bunch of sick people. They are sick; just in a different way. But what happened was that I educated myself and felt a divine calling to go into this field. And let me tell you, there have been hard days and there will be many more hard days. But every time I go into work, I feel like I'm a part of something, and lives are being changed. It's really a great feeling!