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Has anyone had a mental illness or a disability in a past life?

Looking Backwards

Senior Registered
I looked, and there didn't seem to be a thread for this. Does anyone remember being disabled or mentally ill, and do you think it's carried over at all?


I do sometimes wonder, based on some memories I've had. Or I should say, fragmented ones. It could just be me not remembering clearly, but for example, I wrote about a memory where I woke up from what might have been a seizure, but I couldn't really make out anyone around me, except I knew someone - whose name I now think was Sarah - was there. She was very upset and said I should stay down, I didn't want to see how bad I looked. but I couldn't see her - not like I was blind, more like I just wasn't clear. I also had a dream where I woke up in a city and didn't know where I was, and I've had other attempts at PL regressions where I was half-aware of my surroundings. (Although I wonder if in my case, drugs weren't involved, but it could have been seizures or spells. It's also possible it was both - often people with mental illnesses and disabilities get into drugs, and drugs can also cause those things.)


Also, this wasn't mine, but I remember reading about a PL - I don't think it was here, might've been Beyond Religion - where someone remembered being a mentally disabled young man, and wished he could tell his mother how much he loved her. Very sad. (Was that one of you? I read it many years ago. I'm pretty sure it wasn't here, but I could be wrong. There WAS a post about someone with some disabilities who died in the first world war, but that wasn't the same person.)
 
I have / had ADD (the hyper focus type) in my life and my two past lives. The signs are quite obvious to me and my most recent past life was described as just generally suffering a mental illness, despite the fact that she was completely functioning. I have no explanation why or how it's carried over.
 
I’d like to share a story that doesn’t directly respond to the topic but relates to it. For a couple of years I’ve been sorting through what came to me in a dream as a previous life. I’m female in this life, but in that dream I experienced myself as male, and I was aware of very specific things about him. I was able to identify this person and then locate a great deal of information about him. The multitude of unusual links between him and myself have led me to accept the reality of past lives.


This man married a lovely woman who developed schizophrenia so severe that she had to be institutionalized, and she remained so for the balance of her life. Her husband continued to support her and pay for her care. But, deeply involved in his work and unable to interact with her in this condition, he never saw her again. They died apart, wretchedly and fairly young, he first and she some months later.


When I was about seventeen years old I was introduced to a young man who’d had a psychotic break as a teenager and had been diagnosed with schizophrenia. At the time he was as a patient in a mental hospital. While not able to return to society, he was sometimes released for a weekend for a visit with his former school friends and their families. He understood his condition, and there were times one could tell he was struggling with his thoughts. Otherwise, he was a quiet, very serious person given to much pondering, not exactly the sort a girl anxious to have fun would have been drawn to. But I was. There was a sort of familiarity about him, and I felt totally comfortable and at home in his presence.


I began to visit him at his hospital on a regular basis, and we would just share our thoughts about ourselves and life and, especially, about music, one of the special things we had in common. It was a friendship rather than a romance, and, except for those few times when I sensed he was trying to keep a grip on this thoughts, I was focused on everything about him except his illness. Sometimes he would spend a weekend with my family, who, in contrast to me, felt they were walking on eggshells in his presence. One afternoon when I was visiting with him at the hospital he told me he’d made something special for me in his occupational therapy workshop. He produced a silver ring and, before I could say anything, he slid it onto the third finger of my left hand, where one would normally wear a wedding band. I don’t know how he managed to do that, because once on my finger the ring wouldn’t budge past the knuckle. There it stayed for about 18 years, and it always seemed appropriate to be wearing it, though we weren't married. Looking back on that friendship I can see it was the first time in my young life that I felt impelled to be kind and caring toward another person, to seek to know another for his own sake. This young man drew me out as well and showed me great kindness and understanding in turn throughout the several years that we were in touch. On one occasion, without my asking, he got leave from the hospital and, holding himself together, traveled hundreds of miles to help me through a very difficult situation. This was many years ago when medical treatment for schizophrenia was scant and consisted of electric or insulin shock, so I’ sure this wasn’t easy for him. I feel he was my first real friend and, from the emotional standpoint, sufficient for a lifetime. He’s still dear to me.


My friend and I eventually drifed apart. Somehow he was able to marry and even have a family. I went on to graduate school and work in another area. In time I had a sudden, frightening breakdown of my own. I never sought a diagnosis or help for it -- in fact, I couldn’t, because I was unable to perceive where reality lay. And so I struggled with it quite alone, like the schizophrenic wife in the previous life. I had a friend who realized what I was going through. She never probed me about it or showed any pity, though she frequently invited me to share a meal. Only once she said to me, “You’re never far from who you really are.” It helped release me from fear and self-absorption. I began to observe her more than myself and recognized her non-judgmental acceptance of me as well as her consistent cheerfulness. One day I thought perhaps I, too, could be cheerful again. That opened the door to recovery for me, which came by itself within a few days. Considering it now, years later, I see that this friend helped me in much the same way that I had helped my schizophrenic friend when he was hospitalized. I also see that the man whose life I think I once lived should have done something similar for his ailing wife but didn’t or couldn’t.


My schizophrenic friend died fairly young. We weren't in contact then, and I don’t know the circumstances, but it was around the time that I decided I should have his ring cut off my finger.


Back to the present, I have photographs of my old friend as well as some of the schizophrenic wife of the man whose life, it seems, I once lived. Recently it occurred to me that these two are one and the same. I scanned pictures of them that were taken from the same angle and superimposed one over the other in Photoshop in alternating transparencies. I saw the same face shape, the same nose and mouth, the same arch of the same eyebrow, one feminine, the other masculine. I’ve also learned that the woman died the same year that my friend was born. To be honest, I can’t persuade myself of a shared identity without knowing with certainty that the woman died before my friend was born. That’s something I may not be able to find out, as her death occurred in another country during war time. Still, it seems to me that they are the same. And if they are, it tells me, among other things, that we reincarnate with others we knew previously. We also carry unfinished business – incomplete growth in some area – from one life to another and are given the opportunity to overcome what we once thought was an obstacle. In my personal experience mental illness was more the courier of a message, rather than the message itself.
 
That's a beautiful thought, Tepi, that you were able to be there for him this time around in a way you couldn't manage the first time.
 
In many prior lives, I have been disabled, like missing limbs Its one of my biggest fears in this life to be disabled. I have a lot of sympathy for those who are disabled.
 
Tepi, I just find it sad that this man had to battle schitzophrenia from life time to lifetime just to teach those around him compassion. Its sad that mental illness went across lifetimes for him.
 
Tepi, that's an amazing story and you told it so wonderfully. I know it would be difficult or impossible for you to get definite proof of her date of death, but with all the detail you have already it certainly seems that your friend was indeed the woman/wife from the previous life, and you were able to be there for him (her) in this CL.
 
I was born half deaf in this life.my ear was not formed properly when I was born.I was curious about this question too.
 
In my point of view and my experience, the most important is our repeated pattern/ message/ perception of our past life and present life , in stead of the aspect happened in lives. When we can find this certain pattern/ perception, our work is to transform it. say, I am afraid of water and found I when I was drowned in my past life, I said " I will never go to water" when I was dead, then I have to transform this decision to " I can enjoy water but not going to where is dangerous.


You can take a look into this link,


http://originsassociates.com/articles/past_life_wounds.htm


""They are connected by the same theme yet each may reflect a different facet or aspect. For example, a man may find himself a slave in a past life, where the theme or personal imprint is one of hopelessness. If we are exploring the personal theme of hopelessness, several past life stories may arise that carry different aspects of how this was imprinted. The circumstances may change through lifetimes in which hopelessness became a part of each life. In one life it may be because of slavery, in another life it may be because of feeling trapped in an arranged, loveless marriage where he feels like a slave; or in another instance he may be a hardworking farmer and sole provider of a large family or community and blight comes that kills the crops. In the slave scenario, he may die with the idea that "there's no way out," and quite literally this may be true, in the marriage he may simply feel trapped and may commit suicide out of depression. The farmer may come to the end of that life feeling that "no matter what I do, the odds are against me, it's hopeless." All these different lives will be connected and recalled by an exploration of what is called the core theme. These core themes are present in our current life and are noticed by examining recurring patterns of behavior. This is one way that karmic imprints and samskaras reveal themselves in our current lives.


A few simple questions will open the door to streams of past life imprints.. Just finish the sentence "I always..." or "I never..." One could answer "I always have to do it all alone" or "I never have enough money." Sometimes we even make casual comments when describing our feelings that are loaded with past life imagery, such as, "I feel like a slave"; "My hands are tied"; "I've been stabbed in the back"; "There's no way out." These repetitive themes, that we take as actual truth and that shape our reality, are most likely core themes that past life characters are still unresolved with. They are changeable, but they are also so darn familiar, that one can't even conceive that it might be possible.""


For my Age & PL Regressions done, I have this experience,


I remember for any regression done either for my childhood or past life, every time I cried seriously and say " No one cares for me! ". Also, when my mom talks about her experience in giving birth to me, she is extremely angry about nurses and my grandma and says " No one cares for me!!!" .... Days ago, my SE therapist worked on this repeated pattern in my lives and my family.


I emailed Carol, she says "We carry trauma from past lives into this life, which set up patterns that are repeated through our births (messages from our mothers during birth, as you stated), and throughout our childhoods and into our adult lives. Past life therapy can be really helpful in releasing the patterns on all levels, since the trauma has origins before this life."


You are also welcome to read my PLR experience


http://www.carolbowman.com/past-life-regression/find-past-life-regression-therapist/


God bless.
 
I have ocd, had depression and when i was born my lungs were undeveloped so i remain with respiratory problems. I dont remember having any dificulty or disability in a past life, bt i do seem to have been a very compulsive person who was after every detail and was really demanding aswell. So i might have had ocd in that past life..
 
Very interesting question. For myself, aside from having reduced lung function due to a lung-wound, which is just shortness of breath, pain and not being able to sustain exertion, i.e. nothing terribly interesting, no. However I know of two other people who do. One friend recalls being colour-blind in a past life, which she isn't in her current one, and recalls how there was no distinct red and green, just sort of yellow/brown earth-tones. Another friend, who recalls many past lives of being as intelligent as he is in this one (very), has one in which a kick in the face from a horse or mule early in life apparently left him somewhat brain-damaged. He has described remembering it: "a lot of stuff has kind of a dull edge and I knew I wasn’t as smart as say, my older brother... things worked more slowly... I was like a computer with s***ty RAM." Interestingly, he recalls this as his happiest life. Perhaps ignorance truly is bliss...
 
I have a light mental disability in this life. I'm not sure what the lesson is i have to learn though.
 
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