By: Cameron Sprinkle

A little over two years ago I crashed and burned out of ministry, nearly losing everything I held dear in the process. It was a startling and earth-rocking wake-up call that forced me to re-examine everything about myself, including my mental health. I’m at a point now where I’m ready to share my findings and my story in hopes that other people would find the same revelations and freedom. It’s ugly, but it’s real. 

This post isn’t meant to be a stand-alone thesis or recovery guide for mental health. There are so many facets and complexities that are all worth their own posts, so we’ll be writing more on this in the future. This post is kind of just to get the conversation started and share about my own experience.

Before we get into it, I want to clarify what I mean when I talk about mental illness. When we think of mental illness we usually think of things like depression, anxiety, and bi-polar disorder, because those are the most obvious ones to spot and treat. But I’m going to talk more about the subtleties of mental illness, the underlying thought patterns that go unrecognized for years. I’ll use the phrases “mental illness” and “dysfunction” interchangeably, because being mentally healthy means your mind is seeing things accurately and functioning properly; having mental illness, therefore, means your mind is not seeing things accurately or functioning properly. It’s not a shameful issue, it’s just something we need to be able to talk about!

Here’s what I’m going to cover in this post:

1. Share what mental illness feels like
2. Explain what subtle dysfunction looks like
3. Identify causes of mental illness and dysfunction
4. Dispel the over-spiritualization of mental health 
5. Give encouragement and hope to those who are struggling

What Mental Illness Feels Like

In the movie Shutter Island (spoiler alert), Leonardo DiCaprio is introduced to us as a police detective visiting a small island that houses an insane asylum, and he’s been tasked with unraveling the mysterious disappearance of a missing inmate. The mystery grows as we go with him on a harrowing journey throughout the asylum and its inhabitants. The incoherence of the mounting clues grows the tension exponentially as we, along with Leo, become more and more suspicious as we realize that something isn’t adding up. Leo grows more and more paranoid as his findings lead him to believe that there is a malicious conspiracy being carried out by staff and warden of the asylum, a conspiracy to cover up the disappearance of the missing inmate. The questions swell in our pounding hearts: What don’t they want us to know? I thought they seemed like nice people at first, so why would they do this? Our compassionate and logical conclusion is that Leo needs to get out of there before something happens to him, too! 

In the climactic last chapter of the movie, we are stunned by the great reveal: Leo is the missing inmate. 

We find out that the staff has tried numerous ways to help him come to terms with his own condition and this was their last-ditch effort, to let him examine everything himself in hopes that he would finally understand and come to his own conclusion. But it didn’t work, because he was incapable of believing that he himself was the one with mental health issues. 

A little over two years ago when my life crashed and I bottomed out, I found out that I was the missing inmate. 

For so long I secretly carried suspicions that the world was against me. Life had been so hard for me mentally and emotionally, and no one seemed to be able to understand. I felt like a burden to everyone, even the people who seemed so nice at first. And as my quest to unravel the truth of who I was and how the world worked carried on, the tension kept mounting, my heart became more and more cynical and suspicious, and I felt more and more hopeless and alone.

I had so many clues that pointed, I thought, to the fact that the world was inadequately equipped to handle me. My pain and struggles felt invalidated at every turn, and I was so incredibly sensitive. My feelings would be hurt every day by things that should not have bothered me, and all those little pains would stay with me. And I felt stupid for it, weak. But I couldn’t help it. And while I didn’t realize it at the time, the deepest driving force in my life was this endless, burning desire to prove to everyone that I had value, that I was legitimate. If people couldn’t see my value, then I was going to make it inescapable.

I was incredibly defensive, always expecting to be doubted, undermined, or confronted. So when normal conflict would happen, I’d see what I expected to see: this person is doubting my credibility, and therefore attempting to reduce my value. I would fight every single tiny battle to defend my own honor. And with each encounter I became increasingly convinced of this one simple, destructive lie: no one else sees things as clearly as I do. No one else gets it. 

It finally got to the point where I was convinced that even my bride—truly my best friend, and the most empathetic, kind person I knew—was also not to be trusted. Why else would she withhold her admiration, affection, and adoration? I felt like the lights had gone out on our romance and the only conclusion was that she just couldn’t understand me or see me how I thought she should. She just didn’t get it. 

Turns out it was me. I was the one who didn’t get it. 

What Subtle Dysfunction Looks Like

As I began to see myself in this new light, I was able to identify some common characteristics of dysfunction which may be a sign of mental illness. All of these applied to me:

– Inability or unwillingness to recognize one’s own repetitive dysfunctional decisions or thought patterns

– Inability or unwillingness to receive and apply simple, practical advice even from trusted sources

– Stuck in a draining lifestyle but unable to make positive changes

situation

– Consistently consumed by one’s own emotions and the idea that no one else “gets it” or understands them (and they believe, therefore, that no one can really help them) 

– Easily triggered into negative emotions or outbursts

– Cynical outlook on life (often manifested in sarcasm, sad jokes)

– Physically unhealthy

– Self hatred, low self-value

Before I go on, please know that with everything I share I am writing with deep compassion! Nothing I say is meant to be a dagger but rather a diagnosis in the hope of helping either you or someone you know who may be unaware that they are struggling. For most people it feels like a personal attack to have someone suggest that they may be mentally/emotionally dysfunctional in some way, but when someone sees character flaws as an assault on their identity or value, that’s actually just another indication that something isn’t working properly. 

God separates our flaws from our value, so we should, too. It is not a reduction of value to suggest that something about us needs to change. 

We can’t get help until we realize that we are the missing inmate. Most people don’t realize this until it’s too late. That’s my story, and I don’t want that for you or anyone you care about. And before you take offense to the word “inmate”, think about how perfect of a word that is to use here: someone with mental illness is in bondage, stuck behind the bars of their own mind. You can’t be free until you acknowledge that you’re an inmate.

When this devastating, massive inversion of truth was revealed to me after my life bottomed out, everything about how the world had interacted with me suddenly added all the way up. The way that the masses liked me, but people in my inner circle seemed disappointed in me and would avoid connecting with me or celebrating me. I was using so much of my energy protecting and proving myself that I had not been truly loving, and they didn’t trust me anymore. Everyone else wasn’t misguided—I was misguided. My fear and paranoia had twisted me into a prideful, combative, easily-offended, angry, bitter person, and a person like that will bring out the worst in everyone they encounter. Imagine a cornered animal that is crouched back in an attack position…no one wants to hug that guy. 

Most people in my life would be surprised to hear that I was like this. But if anyone who was close to me throughout daily/weekly life in that season were to read that last paragraph, they would likely have to fight resentment and pain in their hearts as they nod in agreement with that assessment of who I was. 

So the question is why was I like that? If it all stemmed fear and paranoia, where did that fear and paranoia come from? Why did that animal feel cornered by people who meant him no harm?

Causes of Mental Illness and Dysfunction

The fundamental element of mental illness is a mind that does not process information accurately and appropriately, and therefore has significant misperceptions about themselves and those around them. 

Imagine your brain as a FedEx shipping warehouse. When all the workers are healthy and well-trained, and the machinery is working properly, parcels are brought in and quickly escorted to where they’re supposed to go. But what if the workers are poorly trained? What if the machinery isn’t working properly, or at half-speed? Most likely things are going to start going to the wrong places or not even get delivered at all.

People who have mental illness are unknowingly seeing every experience through their single warped lens. This inaccurate perception makes their responses to their world inappropriate, and sets off a chain of social and relational consequences. This sequence results in a world that disappoints, which is then fed into the lens as the loop starts over again. 

Here are four things that I’ve discovered that contribute to the mind being unable to process information correctly: 

1. Trauma – Negative experiences that make the brain’s mental constructs shift dramatically in an attempt to protect itself or make sense of what happened. Trauma is anything that happens to us that God didn’t design our brains to be able to process.

I believe that trauma is perhaps the most tragically under-represented and misunderstood concept that there is. Dr. Marcus Warner says that there is “A” trauma and “B” trauma; most people think of “B” trauma when they hear the word, which is “bad things that happened”. But there’s also “A” trauma, which is “the absence of things you need”. Being beaten and berated by a drunken parent can obviously be extremely damaging, but what’s massively underrated is the impact of a parent that does not nurture, comfort, or affirm their child. In both cases the child is getting the same message: “I don’t have value. If the people closest to me, who I look up to the most, don’t love me then no one will.” 

Unfortunately, living in a broken world, we encounter a lot of things that God didn’t intend for us to encounter. Every child is born to two flawed people who make mistakes, and in most cases, the parents themselves have unresolved issues of their own. It really is broken people raising broken people. If you’re a parent, there shouldn’t be any shame in acknowledging that you said or did some damaging things to your child—and it would actually be a deeply healing thing for them if you did. There’s also no shame in acknowledging that someone said or did damaging things to you.

There’s much more I could say on trauma, but I’ll save that for another post.

2. Generational Dysfunction – This is when inaccurate or improper world views are either intentionally or unintentionally passed down through the generations of a family. 

3. Physical Health – The brain is a physical organ, and when the body doesn’t receive nourishment, healthy activity, and rest, the brain doesn’t function properly.

4. Brain Chemistry – Our brains require a tender balance of chemicals to function properly, and just as our bodies need supplemental help like glasses, hearing aids, or vitamins, many people’s brains need to be chemically re-balanced with medicine.

I was one of those people who felt like needing medicinal help was weak. But when I finally got on an anti-depressant (Wellbutrin) it seriously changed my life. In the words of my doctor, “It doesn’t make you do the right things, but it makes the right things easier to do.” I suddenly felt that I had the capacity to handle life and finally be the man I always wanted to be. Bear in mind, this was not an isolated solution—I was about six months into counseling, trauma work, and changing my lifestyle with better spiritual, physical, and mental daily habits. So this was like a Mario Kart rainbow strip, boosting me in the direction I was already going. Medicine won’t singularly turn your life around. But when combined with other healthy recovery efforts, it can have a massive impact. And it’s nothing to be ashamed of. 

The Over-Spiritualization of Mental Health

Despite what we now know about mental health most pastors and churches don’t talk about those factors, choosing instead to singularly address the spiritual component by asserting that God makes all things new.  

Most of my life I sat under various pastors and sermons that said thing like, “God heals your depression by giving you purpose!” “God heals your insecurity by accepting you as you are. He chose you!” “God wants to heal your addiction!” And over the years I grew more and more bitter and confused, because if the answer was just to give your life over to Jesus and accept his love……..I wouldn’t still be depressed, insecure, anxious, or addicted. So there has to be more to it than that. And if there’s not, then there’s no hope for me because accepting Jesus just flat out didn’t do the trick. 

The good news: there’s more to it than accepting Jesus! And it’s available to you or anyone you care about. 

You wouldn’t tell someone the Bible has all the truth they need for their life if they wanted information on how to treat flu-like symptoms. If the church has over-spiritualized or dismissed your pain, I am so sorry. That’s really painful, frustrating, and damaging, both emotionally and spiritually. But I believe the problem is just that they don’t know any better, not that they’re withholding or intentionally misguiding. So we need to have grace for them, because they may be doing the best they can.

Healing mental illness is a multi-faceted approach of unwiring and re-wiring the circuits in your brain that form your view of yourself and the way the world works. Unwiring is therapy, counseling, weekend or week-long intensives, all designed to get to the root of your false beliefs and where they came from. This part is incredibly painful. And expensive. And the best thing you’ll ever do for yourself. Re-wiring is intentionally forming new healthy habits, inputing new truths, and developing intentional, honest relationships.

Encouragement and Hope For the Struggling

If you’re reading this and you have someone in your life who fits the descriptions I’ve shared, I would plead with you to have compassion on them. They may be hurtful, destructive, frustrating, draining or difficult, but I can assure you that aware of themselves or not, it is miserable to live this way. There is a good chance that there is a wounded child deep inside them that is terrified to be fully known. Grace is what changed me, not force. 

Maybe you’re reading this and you have resonated with the struggles I’ve shared. One of the biggest problems with mental health issues is that they are by nature, virtually impossible to self-diagnose. Put simply, you are the worst person to assess your own mental health. Remember, if you do struggle with mental illness or dysfunction then it means you’re looking through a warped lens that lies to you. So if you want to know if it’s you, a bold but potentially life-changing move would be to take the characteristics I listed earlier in the post and ask someone close to you, who you really trust, “Do any of these things describe me?” The truth may be very hard to hear. But it also might be the beginning of a break-through that you’ve been waiting years to have. 

Maybe, if you’re honest with yourself, in the back of your mind you’re putting the pieces together that perhaps you might be the missing inmate. With tears in my eyes I write these words with deep compassion for you, the words I wanted to hear so desperately when I was in pain: I am so sorry that life has been so hard for you. I’m so sorry that you’ve felt misunderstood for so long. I’m sorry that people have hurt you. You didn’t deserve what happened to you. You are not what you do, and you’re not what you’ve done. The trembling, terrified whispers of your heart matter to God. You are precious. Your heart is precious. God made you the way you are on purpose—he put that heart and soul in you by hand. You are going to have to own your healing and recovery, because you have to show yourself that your own soul is worth fighting for. God has provided healers in our world because he cares deeply for broken hearts like yours.

Finding safe people like this can be tough, and on top of that our culture tells us to hide our wounds or else we’ll look weak and vulnerable. Even in little league baseball coaches teach young boys “Don’t let him know it hurt you” when they get hit by a pitch, urging them to make a defiant, unemotional trot to first base.

I want you to imagine Jesus’ tender, gentle voice as he whispers to you, “You don’t have to keep up your defiant, unemotional trot anymore. Show me where they hurt you, and I’ll show you healing.”

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There is much more that God has laid on our hearts for Karissa and I to share, because the healing Jesus wants for the hurting requires more than just trying harder to accept his love. God heals through doctors, therapists, counselors, and friends, and we want to show you how that happened for us.

You may have noticed numerous ambiguous references to me bottoming out two years ago…it’s not going to be ambiguous for much longer. I’m excited to share the nuts and bolts of my recovery discoveries and exactly what resources God used to help me find healing, and most of all I am excited to share the greatest mistakes I’ve ever made so that you can see how wondrously God rescued me from myself.