to think that PND is an explanation but not an excuse.

[Northernlurker]

Ths is not a thread about a thread but it is inspired by something that I have read on here again and again and heard in RL as well.
Basically PND is mentioned as the excuse for whatever undesirable behaviour the poster has engaged in. AIBU to be pissed off about this because:

1. Fundamentally PND - or any mental illness - is not a 'Get Out of Jail Free' card. It may explain why you have acted as you did but bad behaviour is still bad and has consequences which you must bear.

2)Effectively saying PND 'made' me do this damages the reputation of all sufferers and increases discrimination against mental illness.

By all means mention it - but be clear it is as a part of an explanation. It is not the whole story and it's not the end of the conversation!

AIBU?

not post natal I might add.

OP, i don't think you have defined what you constitute as your impression of PND?
What is in your list that is ok to be used as an excuse?
Every case is individual and you probably won't know the true extent of how severe the MH issue is unless you were that person ( and sometimes not even then!) or a trained professional who has treated the person for an extended period of time.
I think you will have to just realise that PND is just as damaging as other MH problems and that since you are talking about someone who is in that moment unstable in their thinking process, it is best to just ignore statements from them if you find them nasty or hurtful because you won't gain anything from pointing that out to them.
They are not acting/thinking rationally and don't need someone telling them that they are nasty as a person, their perceptions have been altered because of an ILLNESS, they are probably a very nice person who needs support not judgements cast at them.

When I am well I am lovely, when I am ill I am aggressive, violent and irrational. I know I am behaving terribly and try to stop myself but I just can't. It is so hard seeing my family's hurt and now I am well I feel regret and shame. PND was the reason I pushed, hit, screamed, ranted, wept - it is my family's choice to 'excuse' me or punish me. TBH missing out on most of DD's first year, wrecking my marriage, losing friends, hurting everyone I loved and nearly losing my job seem punishment enough. I am bearing the consequences- hope that makes you happy northern

I had PND. I did some things that people would have thought were weird. I thought some things that people would have been worried about but whether they were an excuse or not? No, just a fact of having PND.

it does when stereotypes are perpetuated on here. so so often, over the years i've been here, any and all types of behaviour are excused, not just explained, by depression.

What is it people want to happen if it is not excused?

I second LittleBlueBoat

I had some strange thoughts that at the time thought they were normal, and only after do I realise how odd I was.

So for me PND is not an excuse its THE reason.

I'm not a psychologist, but from my experience there's varying degrees of control that you can exert depending on how ill you are at the time. There's times in depression when you can change your behaviour (if not your desire to behave in a certain way).

It's a really complicated issue though. My father was pretty badly ill, and pretty awful to me at times. Now he is medicated better, he is much better towards me. I've just about absolved him of his bad behaviour because I know that it was his brain chemistry causes most of it. But it makes it quite difficult to respond well to his better behaviour - it's just his improved brain chemistry causing this...?

I want to be clear that I am not challenging any one particular person's illness or personal story. It does seem to me that some posters are taking this very personally and understandably so - it is an emotive issue. Nevertheless nothing I have posted is intended to cast doubt on any diagnosis or underestimate the difficulty of anyone's situation.
Similarly I'm not disclosing anything about my personal medical history because this thread isn't about that either.

Expat's statement 'so often, over the years i've been here, any and all types of behaviour are excused, not just explained, by depression' is what I was driving at.

That's an interesting question though that some of you have asked - what do I want to happen? I'm not actually lacking in compassion (honest!). I have no agenda for punishment' of those suffering mental illness but if things go wrong in your life, if you do things that hurt people and^ you have the capacity to understand that it is hurtful even if you feel unable to act otherwise - well you have to accept that you have caused that hurt. Most people do don't we? That's what I mean about using it as an explanation. Where I disagree is when it is used as an excuse - and implicitly as a denial that hurt has taken place. Fwiw nobody on this thread has done that - and shouldn't take my op as a reflection upon themselves. The fact remains though that I have seen that line touted and I don't agree with it.

Animula - not huffy at all - I wouldn't have posted if I didn't want people's views.

Yabu. I will explain why.

A year ago when my dd was born I developed PND, it was treated by ad's for about 2 months and then I stopped taking them, everything spiralled out of control untill january this year when I was sectioned under the mental health act due to having a nervous breakdown.

I hadn't slept properly for more than maybe 2 hours a night for around 6 months, all I longed for was to be dead and nowhere near my dd or dp.

In this time my behaviour and attitude were totally despicable towards anyone and everyone who looked or talked at me. I was rude, I would scream and shout and was a genuine class a arsehole. Now anyone that knows me will say that person was not me the total opposite. I tore my family apart and my dp hated to be around me as the way I treated him was awful.

Now I have just been discharged from the crisis team, taking ad's and sleeping pills and getting some counselling to help close the big can of worms that swirls around in my head. I am a different person, I am me again.

Do I think PND/depression explains and excuses my behaviour. Yes I do because that behaviour was linked to my illness and was something out of my control.

Hi Northern. I think it all depends really. Depending on the severity of PND I would say the YANBU to an extent.

If a woman is aware she is being deliberately nasty/hurtful, then she can't really use PND as an excuse for her actions IYSWIM. It may go towards explaining, but definitely doesn't excuse her actions.

The consequences of a behaviour are not altered by the fact that PND or other MH issue was responsible for them- but I would say that it certainly does 'excuse' the behaviour IYSWIM.

I think the problem is that 'excuse' is such an emotive word, and the implication is that to excuse a behaviour is to diminish the seriousness of the consequences- and really, it isn't. The consequences remain relatively unchanged.

To excuse is just to not punish the person who carried out the behaviour as severely as if it been carried out by somebody with no MH problems. Psychologists and our legal system have decreed that MH issues do excuse behaviour. I would tend to agree.

I dont know about PND but I have a long term biological mental illness. This involves pychosis and depression to the point where my mind has changed so much I become catatonic sometimes for hours even days. My entire outlook on life changes and I am like a completly different person . When I am normal I would never hurt anyone but when I am ill I hurt everyone . I have to live with this, the things I have done my family and pychiatrist say it is not my fault they are actual symptoms of my illness but that doesnt mean I dont feel guilty that I dont wish I could cut the part of my brain out that hurts people I have attempted suicide because living with the guilt of what I have done kills me and it doesnt matter if others dont blame me I always wil.l I will always try to think of a way I could of not hurt people. So I guess I dont know if it is a excuse or not for me it doesnt feel like one it still feels like my fault and if people got angry it would hurt less. All I can do is everything in my power to remain well.

mental illness affects judgement,mood,behaviour but isnt intself an excuse as such.but explanation of impact of an illness

but there needs to be an acknowledgement that behaviours,and mood can be altered by a mental illness.and these behaviour may be out of character

This is coming from someone who had severe PND (didn't see a GP and was never treated to this day), was drinking myself into oblivion, and being downright nasty and rude to everyone around me. Still, I KNEW what I was doing and REFUSED to take a few seconds to think of the consequences of my actions. That's all it takes, just a few seconds and it could be the difference between your DP's/DH's/family/friends finally telling you to take your behaviour and stuff off or change.

You can understand behaviour, but you don't necessarily have to tolerate it.

"You can understand behaviour, but you don't necessarily have to tolerate it."

I think that's a much better description than explain/excuse, Cymar.

Yes I like Cymar's description too. 'Excuse' in particular is pretty ambiguous really isn't it?

i don't really understand here what everybody else understands as 'an excuse' vs and explanation?

i mean, if you haven't done your homework cause your dog ate it - well, that's an explanation.. is it an excuse? or does the teacher give you detention anyway?
you don't attend school because you are ill.. well that's more than an explanation, that is excused, and you are not sent to the truant officer...

in terms of criminal activity, being insane is not exactly an 'excuse', it's an explanation and the criminally insane while 'not guilty' ARE still locked up.

in terms of hurting other people, surely only the person hurt can decide whether to 'excuse' the other person.. or 'forgive'..

seems over-simplistic to me, Cymar. It's not easy when you are affected to look at things from anyone elses point of view, and it certainly isn't that easy to just change

It's like when a kids bites or hits another child when tired. We know that the tiredness explains the behaviour, but as parents, we need to drum it into the stroppy child that their behaviour will not be tolerated IYSWIM. Although the child may not understand fully (considering they need to be taught), if we adults/parents understand that our behaviour will hurt someone then we should take a few seconds out to decided whether we want to face the consequences, feel guilty afterwards. If we don't want to suffer the consequences then, we shouldn't be horrible to people.

I understand that it's not easy to change Winter, but it can be done. Ask yourself how you'd feel being on the receiving end of a friend with PND and a persistant nasty streak? Would you keep taking that persons wrath time after time or would you eventually tell them to cool it and stop being so horrid?

It can't for many though, thats why its a mental illness. I remember well my mouth shooting off and hearing it like I was a bystander. I couldn't stop it, not if my life depended on it. I knew it was wrong, and I knew it was hurtful, what I didn't know was how to stop it. Not until I started to get better.

And I don't think its helpful to compare adult women to small children, either, nor accurate. Basically your point seems to be that they should just pull themselves together and just stop it. If it was that simple, nobody wou ld have a problem, would they?

cymar your post is wrong on every level,and simplistic

this isnt essentially about be nice or or suffer suffer the consequences.that whole notion is missing point and pretty much a round about way of saying just snap out of it

point being mental illness,affects judgement,volition,mood,behaviours,speech.an involuntary response not always under conscious control.but because mental illness is a spectrum it affects and impacts upon everyone differently.this is what people mean when they say it robs them of themselves,they become different people.this isnt an excuse its a statement of fact.

as illness progresses,certainly with medication,tlc,good nutrition things can improve,and people can find more of themselves again

behaviours are judged against societal and cultural norms,so no mental illness isn't an excuse,as in ach well then. it is however a reason as in biological/psychological/cognitive/social aspects of mental illness impact

there are statutory and non statutory pathways for addressing behaviours, criminality and mental illness.

Yabu and you know it. Your comments imply that you think that pnd isn't as bad as "normal" depression. As you clearly haven't had pnd, you don't really have the experience to comment knowledgably.

I've done the reasonable argument, can I tell you to fuck off now?

Having not had PND it can be difficult to empathize. I do have a mental disorder called dyslexia. I found it very frustrating that people would accuse me of using that as an excuse when I struggled with something. I had a hard time organizing myself when I first started working and told my boss I was dyslexic and this sort of thing isn't unusual. I was fired a couple of weeks later. I now don't tell employers about my dyslexia at all but if someone working for me told me they had a problem I would def work with them. Just don't tell me you have this problem after I have given you an E rating as it just sounds like an excuse.

Mental illness is difficult for others who don't suffer from it to understand. It is wrong for people who are having a bad day to try and explain their bad behaviour away as being PND/depression/other mental illness. It isn't fair to those who really do have PND and need some leeway, help and understanding.