A young wife and mom I know, a former student, spoke recently at a NAMI training for those who love and care for people with mental health challenges. This young woman–let’s call her Elizabeth–told the group about her childhood.  Elizabeth grew up with a mom with mental illness, a mom who loved her dearly but who, when things got beyond coping, would just go into her room and check out of life for a while.  She’d leave the kids a note that might say something like, “You kids are on your own. I’m tired of waiting on your ungrateful little selves.”

Elizabeth, who has a big personality, outspoken and strong, would go and stand at her mother’s bedroom door.

“You get OUT here!” she would yell. “You come and take care of your children!”

That never worked, but in a couple of days, the mom would re-emerge, rested and ready to cope again. Then life would be fine for a while, until the stress built up to the sticking point, and the next note appeared on the kitchen table.

“I always thought that was normal,” Elizabeth said. “I thought everybody’s mother had her disappearing days.”

Then Elizabeth grew up and got married. After the birth of her baby, she plunged into a depression that did not, for a year, dissipate. Instead, other troubling symptoms arrived, and Elizabeth finally came to realize that she, like her mom, was mentally ill. Her treacherous journey to recovery and independence leads her to advocate for others who haven’t yet completed the trek. It leads her to understand her mother, with whom she remains very closely tied.

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The reason I want to share my story is because I want to bring awareness to mental health and stop the stigmas. I want to promote positive outlooks for moms with mental illness. Not everyone is going to be the same just because they have the same diagnosis. And a diagnosis does not define someone.

I have been affected by mental health personally since my teenage years. I recently have been diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder. When I read about BPD I thought it sounded pretty accurate and it was nice to feel like I new one of the answers as to why I was struggling. The parts of BPD that hit home the most with me were the criteria of the diagnosis stating that those with BPD have a hard time regulating emotions and also that they can struggle with finding purpose.

As a mom it makes me sad to realize I worry so much about purpose or think so much about what my purpose is, what my meaning is. Why can’t I feel like being a mom is enough meaning? Why isn’t being a good wife is enough purpose? The ruminating obsession with questioning what I should be doing and why constantly flows through my head.

During my recent hospitalization followed by an outpatient program I was dealing with multiple areas of mental illness. I’m also diagnosed with generalized anxiety and major depressive disorder. I was 6 months postpartum, a stay at home mom with my baby and her sister, my other daughter, who is 2. At the time I started to experience postpartum depression as well.

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I Am a 61 yr old woman who has dealt with mental health issues all my life. Sometimes life just becomes too hard for me. I try to navigate the systems that are there to assist us but when I am in a downward spiral my brain does not think and cope as well as it should. I like many people with mental illness are alone. I also have had people close to me use my mental disability as a way to control or hurt me. It takes me a lot to ask for help out of fear that I will be locked up in a mental ward and forced to take medication that either does not work for me or is not good for my mind and body. What I don’t understand is why society thinks that doping a person up to become a slobbering, shuffling idiot with no feelings is better than working with that person first and foremost cognitively instead of numbing their minds and feelings. Ups and downs in life is a part of life but the stigma of being mentally disabled does not make me different than most yet the way society thinks that I need to be put away and medicated to the point of zombie gives me great fear to speak up and ask for help. I have been suicidal in the past since I was a young girl but that doesn’t mean that I still am or want to be yet society drama once u do something u will always do that. Well I don’t want to do that. Some people change and mature and others don’t want to Admit defeat and turn there like me ,yet I am threatened if I open my mouth and let others know how I feel, they will use this in ways of control and do more damage and make the situation worse. I fear if I openly admit I need help because of my mental disability society thinks they have the right to do things against my will that hurt matters instead of help.

Remember you are not define by your mental illness. Your hope becomes your recovery. Your strengths and positive coping strategies empower your destiny to recover.

Recovery is possible if you believe that you are not your diagnosis. The road to recovery is not easy. Hope, strength, support, determination, and education on mental illness can help an individual with a mental illness recover so that they can live a productive and gratifying life in their community. Some individuals with mental illness can work, attend and graduate from college, buy a home, and have families.

Hope equals maintaining a mentally, emotionally, and physically healthy lifestyle!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Mental health is a big deal here in Wichita Falls, TX. We have a state mental hospital and a host of various private practices, yet stigma is almost immediate. Being a functional person with mental illness causes so many to be skeptical of this disability because it can’t be seen. Everyone who suffers with disability be it that which is physically disabling , mentally disabling or both knows all to well the stigma. If we try and stand up for ourselves we are stigmatized even further as “bitter”, “angry”, “lazy”, “ungrateful”, and “entitled” because those who label us these things “pay taxes” so we can survive. We want to do more than merely survive. We want to thrive. We want to succeed. Greg Abbott is governor and he is disabled physically. Many innovators in many different fields and industries who pioneered if not fathered what we now benefit from and enjoy now in this post-modern era, often overcame the setbacks mental illness presented them. They moved with it instead of allowing all that mental illness has with it hold the back. They refused to first- stigmatize themselves. They rejected the stigmas others placed upon them. It was not uncommon that a parent or other influential person in their lives saw in them what others saw as ever incapable and always less than.

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Hello, my diagnosis is schizo-affective disorder, and even though I suffer from a severe mental illness, and struggle with some of the symptoms, I still see hope, everyone has been supportive and fully understanding, so if anyone who is living or coping with mental illness out there if you walking through hell right now, keep walking, it will get better I promise.

I was fired from my job. I feel that I was wrongfully fired. I told them that I was not well. I worked at a mental health agency and was hired as a peer support specialist.  So they knew about my mental illness.  I have been working there for 2yrs. They never had a problem with me. This new supervisor that I last had as a trigger to me. To make a long story short. The last time she snapped at me, I snapped back. I told her that she need to learn how to talk to people .  I ended up having a panic attack. I didn’t curse, I didn’t touch her, nor threw anything.  I had all of my doctors excuses so they couldn’t use that to get rid of me. However,  they said the way I acted they had to let me go.  That happened this February,  and my life hasn’t been the same.  My mental health has been at a low since.  No matter how I try to move on i just can’t.  There are so many things that that supervisor did that upsetted me. This woman called my therapist and my phyctrist. Like was lying. I have been thinking that I should of reported to the Director of the agency.  She was always nice to me and did tell me that I could talk to her. But I never did. 😒😒😒😢😢😢

Hi, my name is Janay Monique Matthews and I have so much to share to you about my own journey through mental illness and my other disabilities I was born with. When I was born, I had so many odds going against me. I was born with a neurological disorder, cerebral palsy, ADHD, a learning disability (dyslexia), and tremor in my left leg, seizures, and a hole in my heart but it closed up. With this, the doctors though that there was no hope and that I was not going to make it past age 12. I'm Black girl who grew up in poverty and abuse. My mother has the narcissistic personality disorder with bipolar and I was abused for many years and decades by her and many others. She favorites biracial people with their so called “good hair" and thus, I thought lowly of myself thinking that I was genetically inferior and wasn’t human or up to standard. I was also sexually abused for nearly 2 years from September 2004 to May 2006 by my godfather who died in cancer in December 2006. With all of this I was also bullied, teases, drowned, screamed, and yelled at harshly by kids and adults and some teachers didn’t have high expectations of me. Some doctors, psychologists, nurses and social workers thought very lowly of me too. With all the abuse that I endured at home, I ran away a few times and got caught to be sent to the hospital. I was first diagnosed with anxiety. After graduating college in May 2012, I was worried,

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Hello.  We all can live a great, purposeful life managing Bipolar Condition or any mental health situations. 

The social stigma of mental illness used to bother me to no end…and contribute to my problems!  I’m over that now, but I prefer to call it Bipolar Condition vs. “Disorder”.  I also prefer to discuss Mental Health vs. “Illness”.

My story in general: 

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This poem was  inspired by the struggle  with mental illness and the subsequent recovery of a young woman very dear to me.

I’ve always wanted to express my love and support for her and let her know that she’s been in my heart and  mind every step of the way.  This is a message of hope for her and for anyone struggling with mental illness.

Here is a song for you, my beautiful girl

A song for a rare, delicate pearl

You’ll always be Mom’s and Dad’s baby doll

So never fear a tall wall

Above the dark clouds, the sky is always blue

A beautiful rainbow will always come through

The moon is bright in shadowy nights and

Stars sparkle, like precious stones, far in the heights

If you close your eyes and stretch your hand

You’ll be able to catch one of them

Catch it and carry it with you, so you’ll never be blue

Let that light brighten your spirit

Let it be the key that will set you free

Free from worries, free from fears

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