Having been seduced and subsequently beaten into a pulp by this variety of mental illnesses, I have been placed in this burning seat again. Poked and prodded, like a newly discovered extraterrestrial, this process is beginning to bore me to a slow death. God, just make this repetitive bullshit stop. A constant droning inside my [...]
My kid knows how to ground me. If you don’t know exactly what grounding is you are probably one of the lucky that don’t suffer from anxiety. I do suffer from anxiety quite badly. I frequently get panic attacks, sometimes out of nowhere it seems. But my seven-year-old, he knows how to ground me. He [...]
Today I am asking you to admit a mistake. My students know that the 2 most important things to me are kindness and mistakes. I create art that challenges traditional ideas of beauty and acceptable body types. My art explores bodies that are not commonly pictured dancing, doing yoga, and loving themselves. My message is [...]
My daughter, Samantha, was seven-years-old when she was diagnosed with an “unspecified mood disorder.” This is what doctors usually say when they don’t want to tell you a hard truth – in our case it was early-onset bipolar disorder (as opposed to major depressive disorder or seasonal affective disorder) and we were in for years [...]
I got my first babysitting job when I was 9 years old. I was paid with a chocolate bar. I got my first real job at 14 working in a small playdough factory. I was paid $7/hr and felt incredibly rich. Since then, I have never not had a job. In university, I had 3 [...]
My sister wouldn’t talk to me for almost five years. The original story from my perspective was she was mad at me for not working while I was getting multiple panic attacks a day while pregnant with my first son. At one point she even told me “Fuck your therapist and fuck your doctor, you [...]
I was born into a humble family. I was the last child. I am what people call ' born by mistake'. My birth was unplanned and there was an age difference of about six to seven years between my immediate elder brother and I. My father was a driver, traveling all over the country. He [...]
Paralyzed. Frozen. Numb. Paralyzed. When the depression hits sohard I can't move. Literally. A fire could break out, and I'm not sure it would matter. My eyes are either stuck wide open or impossible to open. Every limb on my body is heavy and feels like sandbags. To move them it would take someone physically [...]
When you think of PTSD, you may imagine gunshots. You may imagine a young silhouette in an ACU on the frontlines of war. You may imagine an old man in a rocking chair on the front porch with pursed lips and a rifle a la Grand Torino. You may imagine someone who hides under the [...]
People who struggle with mental illnesses are still plagued by stigma and discrimination. It is true that awareness of these diseases is starting to permeate society and seep into crevices once thought impenetrable. Yet we have much further to go; walls of ignorance to break down, deserts of misunderstanding to quench, and mountains of inequality [...]
