My journey with mental health has not been an easy one. I was diagnosed with anxiety and depression in 2011. I was constantly having panic attacks at bight time which prevented me from sleeping. I finally decided that it was time to get the help I very much so needed. I did, and every since then I can better manage my mental health with the tools that my therapist has given me. There is light and hope even after the darkest of storms. Keep fighting ❤️

Last year the definition of depression to me was “someone who is sad and needs to get over it.” This year my definition of depression has completely changed. On May 2015 I started experiencing panic attacks. They began in the night. One per night. As the days went by these panic attacks started getting stronger and it wasn’t one per night it was more and suddenly it started taking over my life. I couldn’t sleep, eat or even take a shower.

One day I had panic attacks for almost the entire day.. I ended up going to the ER and was diagnosed with anxiety and depression (I believe I also had panic disorder). I was prescribed medication and it really helped me. I also started going to therapy. When I went to my doctor to get a refill he prescribed me with another medication that instead of helping me, actually made me feel worse and created more problems than the ones I already had so I decided to stop the medication and just continue with the therapy. After a month I started to feel better. I was still feeling nervous the entire day, my head was full of all these thoughts that were senseless and silly.

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Hello my name is Alan and i have been struggling with my mental health for about a year and a half now and I’m just now recognizing that i have mental health issues such as depression, anxiety, and panic attacks. I have started attending therapy and group therapy sessions and they have honestly helped me to see that i am not the only person in the world that feels that they may be going through something and that there are other beautiful souls feeling lost out there. Please seek out help, i know it can be hard with the stigma on mental health being taboo in society but understand that there are people and programs willing to help you.

Hello, I have always thought that sharing my story with the mental health community is important to bring hope to others that are just like me.

I’m a 37 year old divorced mother of two boys. I have been in therapy of some kind or another since I was 7 years old. Mental illness runs in my family as well as substance abuse addiction. I believe I was born with my many disorders that progressed and worsened as I got older, abused illegal drugs, prescribed medication and had my children. In my early childhood I showed all the many signs of OCD. I also grew up in an extremely chaotic family where my mother suffered terribly with her own mental illness that was never acknowledged or treated and an emotionally absent father. My two older siblings coped with this by using and abusing drugs and my older sister was put into rehab when I was seven. My older brother simply moved away and is still an addict today covering up his own mental health issues. My younger sister was extremely emotionally disturbed and would act out violently towards my parents but especially towards me. She would later become a drug addict for many years and thankfully entered recovery 4 ½ years ago.

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October is mental health awareness month and anyone who has been touched by mental illness has an important story that needs to be shared. There are people that need to understand that these issues are okay to talk about and feel all the feels.

I feel compelled to share this story about my anxiety and depression because mental illness took the voice of a friend of mine and countless others when it doesn’t have to. It’s a journey, but there is hope.

            “I have a chemical imbalance in my brain. I did not ask for it, nor did a diabetic ask for their illness. Yet, you stigmatize me for mine and call me crazy yet you give compassion for the other.”

That chemical imbalance for me, according to a psychiatrist, is generalized anxiety disorder and depression. Before the diagnosis, let’s go back to December 9, 2016 at around 3:30 in the morning when I was literally catapulted from my bed and my journey began… I jumped up as if someone was stabbing me in the heart. I thought for sure, this is it, I’m dying. Not realizing that I was walking around and pacing in order to decide what I should do next. Needless to say I wasn’t dying… I decided after calling my primary care doctor that I should go to the ER. They pulled me into the room right before the ER pretty quickly after getting there as they often do with unexplained chest pain. They took an EKG of my chest and sent me back to the waiting room. After they took me back to the ER they went through chest x-rays, physical exams, multiple doctors and nurses, and then they said you’re not having a heart attack. We only treat you for what you came in with so we’re sending you home and just follow up with your primary care doctor. What?! That’s it?! Do you people not realize I am actually going to die? Spoiler alert- I’m still here.

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Sometimes the trauma we experience is not definable in terms of scientific research or assessments. Sometimes depression, anxiety, and other mental health issues are never actually diagnosed but somehow those of us who experience these issues deal with them on a daily basis and find inspiration and hope in our communities and inside ourselves.  

I, like many others, have experienced multiple traumas in my life including rape, abandonment, intimate partner violence, a diagnosis of a “terminal” disease, homelessness, and drug addiction.  Yet, somehow, I have made it through these experiences and found help along the way.  Not from the system of care (as many of us know, the system of care is not really designed to “care”), I found help in the support and love from others who have also experienced similar things.  It is their courage and compassion that gave me the strength to keep moving forward.  It is their determination and insight that helped me work through the pain and fear.  

I am forever grateful for those who guided me along the way.  Your support will never be forgotten.  Your support helped me to not only find a new way to live but to follow my passion and help others.  Even though I have been dragged through the mud, I know my worth and value has not changed.  Today, I am working on a PhD. and hope that the work I do, the community bridges from research and academia to the real world I build, can help inspire others.  May you find love and peace in your hearts

I try to volunteer every year, not only to help others, but because I, myself, have a mental illness. I probably will have it a long time so I try to stay positive. I can’t always do that, but I have faith and the National Alliance of Mental Illness (NAMI) gives me power not to give up.

 I was once a normal girl. I was once not controlled by anxiety, panic attacks, depression and manic episodes.  I was once carefree and my mind was my friend. Now it is an enemy I can’t escape.

I was once a normal girl. Before I was forced to be an adult at the age of 13. Before I was forced to raise my brothers and sister.  Before my mother became distant. Before my life became abnormal.

I was once a normal girl. Before I got addicted to pills. Before I was a cutter. Before I made my multiple suicide attempts. Before they hospitalized me. Before the first time the doctor told me I wasn’t normal at all.

Now I am not normal. I fight an internal battle every day of my life with anxiety, depression, and my bipolar disorder.  My mind is an emotional roller coaster. One minute we are up and I am on top of the world and the next I am so low I don’t feel worthy of living.  

Now I am not normal. Though I do not take pills that aren’t prescribed to me anymore and I don’t cut I do sometimes think about it. I have panic attacks all of the time over nothing. My relationship is struggling because he doesn’t want to believe that I am not normal.

I was once normal but now I am not. I have issues I deal with every day. Though some people don’t see how it’s an accomplishment that I let myself live another day to deal with those issues. I may not be normal but I am stronger. I am a fighter. I am a survivor.

Hello, my name Daniel and I struggle with Schizophrenia. It really all started with me being to scared to get near under my bed, in which I would jump to my bed from as far from my bed as I could, occasionally making me hit my arm or knee of the bed frame. Next, I’d look up to a figure staring at me or going to another room and someone is staring at something. Finally, the delusions were the worst part. I’d think if the full moon was full, I would be unsafe, I thought my limbs were turning purple or that someone was after me. My friends would tell me nobody is where I’m saying one of my hallucinations would be or would say that the moon or something would hurt me. I didn’t believe I had Schizophrenia or any other mental illness but finally, I believed my friends after the first psychotic episode. I was stressed over school and decided to go on a walk and sit down for a while. I constantly got worried someone was behind me and would look behind me often. Finally, i looked behind me and a figure was staring at me and started walking towards me. I kept saying, ”Please leave me alone,” or “Please dont hurt me.”

Anyway, now I’m with friends that help me through it and understand.