Facing Life - Heidi DiTonno I don't consider myself mentally ill, although my diagnoses would disagree with me. They are stigmas for my way of having to cope with situations that I somehow had to find a way to survive. And they worked for me, here I am! Burned and severely facially disfigured at 9 [...]
On the 8th December 2013, after a huge row which had escalated from the (fairly unremarkable) incident of me switching off the oven with my foot, I left home at 2am with no coat, no money and no hope. Later that night, I was found doubled over on the pavement, choking on my own tears, [...]
I was first asked to write for Stigma Fighters a few months ago, and to be quite honest with you I found the thought at the time, daunting. I reviewed the website and saw quite a eclectic mix of stories from individuals and mental health professionals. I honestly thought how could my story and writing [...]
I don’t see myself as a person with a mental disorder. I don’t buy into thrown-around labels and insults. Deep within my core, I believe we all have differences: Maybe your trauma was a car accident that threw your Civic off the highway, and every time you drive that stretch your knees buckle, reminding you [...]
When my son was first—and finally—diagnosed with Asperger's, my reaction was total and complete validation. I know...it sounds awful. My reaction was all about me. As a mother. A caregiver. A disciplinarian. I think it's like this for a lot of parents...the reaction we have to our children's diagnoses has, at least immediately, more to [...]
Until the stigma has been removed from mental illness, I do not want help with my mental sufferings. This may be wrong, propagating stigma, or symptom of paranoia, but in my mind it is honesty about reality. It was a choice I made over twenty years ago, and I don’t see it changing anytime soon. [...]
There is no single origin story for mental illness. There are genes and what passes through them; there are early onset signs that may be treated if they weren’t missed or ignored; there are traumas that bring forth something in the brain’s chemistry that wouldn’t have reared its ugly head otherwise; but there is not [...]
PPD and PPA. Two seemingly harmless 3 letter acronyms that are mentioned quickly in a one page article in the back of the most read pregnancy book on the market. Two acronyms that my (otherwise wonderful) OB doctor failed to mention to me at all during my 18 combined months of pregnancy. But Postpartum Depression [...]
The other week, I 'perved' on a teenage girl in a displacement camp. The sixteen or seventeen year-old from Nuba in South Sudan, now languishing uneasily in the nearby town of Kodok and being filmed by a team of BBC cameramen, was wearing a thread-bare, semi-transparent whisper white tobe (as is traditional in the region), [...]
When I was asked if I wanted to write for Stigma Fighters, I couldn't imagine what it was that I would say to the world about my experience. I have been through so many different experiences both personally and with other people. I fight a battle everyday because of one of these experiences. 6 months [...]
