Posted by Reader on May 24, 2004 at 16:40:45
In Reply to: Brain Disease, Mental Health & Choices_Consequences posted by Carol on May 24, 2004 at 12:12:45:
Thank you for this explanations. I am eager to know more about "brain diseases". Mor ein point, I have a friend who though not a Christian, he behaves most Christian-like than many other people I know. He is by no means intellectually challenged. His wife is also a very nice person but until fairly recently I had not spent much time around her. While she is very good at superficial social interactions, she seems to have many "secrets" or topics she never goes deep into. They are not areas like "your high school years" or "music we like". They are more specific events related to things she do and people she is with. My friend told me that at first he had suspected that she was cheating on him but that was not the case (he even got a detective a couple of times when they were newly weds). He explains that she has a hard time allowing herself to be pinpointed in time and place. He thinks that it is related to something that may have happened to her mother, who died when she was about 6 years old.
What I noticed is that while she makes friends easily, and some of them are her confidants, there is not much depth in their friendship. It is normally one-sided. Also, she is never demanding, almost fearful to show that there is something she needs. She commits herself but can change her mind and never be bothered by that nor inform others until after the fact.
Since the husban is my friend, he asked me if I could helpher understand what to do just recently. My personal inclinations is not to get involved but I know he is concerned that she might be at the verge of a breakdown but can figure out what it is.
As an example of her secrecy, she never told him that she was supposed to take care of her sister who suffers cerebral pulsy, until 3 years ago (after 30 years of marriage). They bought a new house with an extra room for her. He told me this incident to explain how she goes about some things. She is not sure she loves him as much as she loves the situation she has with him. He doesn't care, because he loves her, but she is afraid that she has some mental problem that needs to be treated. She is very anxiety-prone and a little on the obsesive-compulsive side that she has to do some things in the spur of the moment. Shehas refused to even hear about the possibility of any mental health problems but it seems there are some indications of it on the mother side (who died of pancreatic cancer). I am not sure what exactly were they talking about but some members of that side of the family had criminal histories. Their oldest son has some problem and is in jail now for threatening their younger daughter with a knife to her throat.
The husband says that she may be ashamed but she has freely talked to me about several of these things so I doubt it. I have refrained from making any comments but this guy is really taken by the woman, and after all these years together and their history, I don't think they will separate or anything along those lines. But I wouldn't be surprised.
I am not qualified to make any judgments but I told him that I would look into it with some of my friends. He knows about my COG past and suggested that maybe something like that happened to her. The truth isthat she does behaves a lot like one. Could you give an opinion on the "mental diseases" part? Thanks. Sorry for the length.