My Mental Health Journey: Mirroring Success Through the Eyes of a Relationship

My Mental Health Journey: Mirroring Success Through the Eyes of a Relationship
A Column by J. Alfreda
Success is Obtained by Letting Go of the Toxic Pieces
Our relationship has been strained at best, a really rocky road. It’s a love/hate relationship that borders on psychosis. But, in the final analysis, I am the one who knows her best. She is the closest person to me. She is me.
There was a pouring of rain on our already strained relationship. You see, I have schizophrenia, bipolar type, which onset at age 20. Many voices and much pain have infiltrated my mind over the past 35 years. I have just arrived at a place of readiness to accept this illness as mine.
You might possibly think it’s strange that it took me so long, but I have always thought of my illness as another entity, an alter-ego, an arch nemesis. I refused to see myself as a whole person. My war had an enemy though I couldn’t see that the enemy was unintentionally me. Success would start with forging my “selves” and attaining as much peace as possible. 
Schizophrenia is a different realm of reality. You realize what you go through intermittently. But, when you are there, it is real. It is marked by delusions, extreme paranoia, suicidal thoughts, steep highs and lulls of depression in my case.
In the beginning, it was like having my life, mind and soul hollowed out and strewn across the four corners of the Earth in scraps, feeling like I had to travel to each site and retrieve them piece by piece in a zombie state. The disease alienates you from yourself.
Schizophrenia is a useless, evil being who can’t stand in a church for fear of bursting into flames. It is a pimp that bids actions contrary to your will, turning you inside-out. That is, until you fix it.
I walked around in this nightmarish, delusional state for 24 years before a medication was created that I would respond to and not put me in the conveyor-belt-shuffle-mode.
When I was 20, I was sure that by now I would have an engineering firm, a great home, kids, and the whole nine yards, but that hasn’t been in the plan for me. I have barely been able to take care of myself. I did manage to finish college, though on the revolving door plan; one quarter in school, the next in the hospital and so on. I changed my major from chemical engineering to journalism because after the first break, with the tranquilizers I was taking (that was all they had for schizophrenia back then), I found I could not comprehend my coursework anymore. I was in my junior year before the break.
You can imagine why I would rebel against this entity. It has undermined my every opportunity and effort to gain success, but it is a part of me and I have resolved to make myself whole.
After some soul-searching prompts, my first stop was in the gratitude market. You can’t ask the Universe for more without thanking It for what you already have. It just wouldn’t be polite. I bought a gratitude journal in which I write daily those things I am grateful for: past, present and future.
The little things that I appreciate and make me happy fascinate me the most. In my first entry I always thank God for “waking me up this morning clothed in my right mind,” a phrase my grandfather used to say in his prayers, which has taken on a new meaning for me. You can guess why.
I’ve also created a gratitude board somewhat akin to a vision board, visually celebrating all of the things that make me happy, appreciative and that I am thankful for. It has things as frivolous as vintage clothing and jewelry, as marvelous as a multi-hued sunset or a cobalt night sky, and as welcoming as family and all that it entails. It helps me to embrace the positives of my life.
Some would say I lost everything in the deal. It may seem that way from one perspective if viewing my past, but it is far from the truth. In picking up the pieces for the umpteenth time, I discovered me, the whole of myself. I am coming from a natural place, a place of gratitude and love─not someone else’s definition of who I am, or even who I think I am; it is a place of true character.
My true character has been revealed by letting go of the toxic pieces and embracing the positive aspects of my true self. This is how I define success.

Baltic Street Advocacy, Housing and Employment, Inc. celebrated its 20th anniversary

Baltic Street Advocacy, Housing and Employment, Inc. celebrated its 20th anniversary on October 25th, 2016 in Brooklyn. Since 1996, Baltic Street AEH has grown from a group of five peers serving 400 people a year to 100 peers serving 5,000 peers a year. Baltic Street AEH is now one of the largest peer-run organizations in the country and has programs in all five boroughs of New York City. Peer-to-peer service delivery is the backbone of the organization. Recovery for all is the guiding vision. City Voices: A Peer Journal for Mental Health is proud to be sponsored by Baltic Street AEH.

How Acceptance and Open-Mindedness Led to My Recovery

How Acceptance and Open-Mindedness Led to My Recovery
By Cecil Williams

Staying Clean One Day at a Time

The mental health system has done an amazing amount of work in improving the lives of former drug addicts and even practicing alcoholics. Although professionals spend countless hours to assess and assist substance users through their daily living activities, I have found that groups like Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) and Narcotics Anonymous (NA) offer users priceless opportunities to meet and talk about lifestyles from active using to recovery. The message presents as “now is the time to stop using and get our lives back together, where everyday living is returned to being manageable,” and “,” is something I can work with.

I had the affinity for any type of alcoholic beverage, and began drinking heavily, which started out for me as a social activity. Not realizing that alcohol was a deadly drug, nor that I had a genetic predisposition to using, I was unaware of the physical and emotional strain of drinking alcohol, which exacerbated my reckless behavior provoked by low self-esteem issues. It has been thirty years since AA got me to the point of recognizing I could utilize Bill W's book and the meetings to request help and stick with the simple effective program. The twelve steps helped me discover how tomorrow could be better. I would find myself not reaching for that bottle or can or glass of alcohol. I celebrate today because of those rooms where countless other addicts shared their stories and experiences to make amends. The AA/NA creed of confidentiality gave me the strength to struggle to be sober and clean and reflect what lay beyond the substance.

Nowadays when attending AA meetings, I perceive along with others the need to stay out of hospitals. As alcoholics, perseverance demands of us to stay sober and among the living. I now witness that some individuals have an enjoyable time drinking at parties or bars without the repercussions of being labeled alcoholic. The alcoholic has a double whammy confronting them. We can pinpoint the problems and try to resolve them by discontinuing the use of alcohol. Meetings have shown persons with clean time or even newcomers the necessity to sober up and admit that assistance is necessary.

Shortly after professionals targeted in and told me to get it together and go to Dual Recovery Meetings, which I was allowed to lead at times, I became interested in the journey of other members of the group who had gone another route with drugs such as heroin, marijuana, crack and ecstasy. That seemed alien to me at first. Primarily, I decided that I desired to be informed about street drugs and the pattern of moving on to accepting hardcore substances (NA considers alcohol to be a drug as well). My friends went to Narcotics Anonymous meetings, and their true colors shone through. I became willing to talk about and accept that the use of any substance is bad for us. My comprehension increased and I recognized the seriousness of how lives that had been destroyed have to be pieced back together again before relationships, dancing and real enjoyment of life could be achieved.

As the mental health professionals perceive the need to deal with drug and alcohol use and assist victims who have had a history of such substances, we see the possibilities of a future with less reliance on substances and a diminishing of substance abuse. Physical health can be adversely affected by prolonged use, and medicines are required to attempt to restore the physical and emotional state to a healthy level. 

Learning to Embrace My Unique Learning Abilities

Learning to Embrace My Unique Learning Abilities
By Dillon Browne

Dealing With The Inflexible Nature of Public School

“He’s a bright boy, but he’s not living up to his potential.”

That phrase, or some variation of it, came to define my life. I was never a traditional student. In one way, I was more interested in the concept of learning than most young children, but in another I seemed incapable of completing daily tasks in class.

In second grade my teacher would drag me by the wrist back to my seat. I can’t quite recall what I was doing out of my seat in the first place, and I was no doubt wandering the classroom while I was supposed to be completing worksheets. What I remember clearly is the teacher’s angry impatient facial expression as she dragged me back to my desk and the feeling of her fingers clasping my wrist uncomfortably tight.

On one occasion this particular teacher caught me drawing with a crayon on the inside of my desk. I am sure I was aware this wasn’t allowed, however, during the dreadfully boring classes, there was little else I could do. Her justice was swift and involved shaming me in front of the class, as if I was too simple to understand where to use my crayon. Another instance had me “accidentally” rub my dirty paint brush against a wall in the bathroom where I was meant to clean it. Again, I was called out in front of a strongly disapproving class of my peers.

At some point, knowing my teacher viewed me as a troublemaker, and my classmates as an imbecile, really started to stress me out. I dreaded class, and decided to tell my parents what was happening, emphasizing the fact that the teacher often dragged me back to my chair. As a child I thought it was fair of her, because I was not following the rules. However, I knew my parents wouldn’t approve.

The truth was, I really wasn’t trying to cause trouble. Rather, I was so bored, so unstimulated by the material and my classmates that any possible stimulation was appealing. To be clear, I was not looking for the negative attention of the teacher, my mind simply wandered to fill the void and I often found myself doing things quite mindlessly. Running the paintbrush, still dirty with watercolor, across the blue tile was not meant as an act of defacement. Even my younger self knew how easily the watercolor would wash away. Rather, I wanted to witness for a moment what the paint would look like on the wall.

A variety of events transpired, eventually leading me to sit in front of a neurologist who diagnosed me with ADHD and elements of Autism. I was sent back to school with a letter for the teacher, and medication to keep me in my seat. The medication helped until high school, where I became aware of its detrimental effects on my personality.

Unmedicated, high school was difficult at times. I would enter classes with the full desire to pay attention, but I would find myself essentially dissociating within 15 minutes into class. When I say dissociate, I mean that at a certain point, I would simply become unaware of the passage of time until the class ended. Mindfulness techniques eventually made it possible to remain aware, however I truly could not maintain a decent level of attention over the course of a school day.

The rigid structure of high school caused me to chronically underperform, and I quickly became known as a student who was squandering greater potential. It was known I had an IEP (individualized education plan), a prerequisite to special considerations in a public school setting, and some teachers even knew my diagnosis, but most viewed it as an excuse. When I spoke to them, one on one, they heard an intelligent student who was capable of the work they were asking. On this count, they were correct. I was always able to complete the work. In a different context, I might have thrived learning the same material, however when forced to function in the specific modalities high school required, I inevitably struggled.

One example that comes to mind is in a particular history class where students were expected to keep a very specific binder. I simply don’t learn like most people, and even in high school carried a laptop with a single text document for each class' notes. I’m not an organized person, it’s not part of my nature, and my handwriting is simply terrible. To compensate for this, I learned to type at an early age, and keep notes together in digital form, making them hard to lose. This teacher felt his method was best, and I struggled to pass as I was never able to organize his handouts and notes in the manner he desired. All the while, I never scored lower than 90% on any test, paper or other class assignment.

College, and now Grad school have been revelations. In both instances the ability to mold my own schedule and the focus on results over process have allowed me to thrive. I spent most of my life blaming myself for my failure to live up to my potential. Looking back, I realize that the highly inflexible nature of primary education has not caught up to the demands placed upon it by students with cognitive differences. Teachers and administrators need to accept that often what they see can better be characterized as learning difference, not learning disability. If those with ADHD (and other so-called learning “disabilities”) were truly less able to learn, it would be astounding how many of us reach the graduate level, in reality many of us are quite gifted in one way or another, struggling only in a system that fails to allow us to capitalize on our unique skills and individual learning styles.

DOHMH Office of Consumer Affairs Annual Wellness Fair

DOHMH Office of Consumer Affairs Annual Wellness Fair

On September 11^th, 2015 the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene's (DOHMH) Office of Consumer Affairs ran a Wellness Fair from 10AM to 4PM in Harlem. Wellness is defined as “the state or condition of being in good physical and mental health.” In the spirit of that definition, the Wellness Fair hosted workshops on self-care, nutrition, relationships, a trip to the farmer's market with free health-bucks to purchase good food, HIV prevention and yoga. Lots of useful information was available to collect from the many and varied information tables, all wellness-related. At the fair, one could get a blood-sugar screening, blood pressure exam and weigh-in to determine body-mass index. A tasty and nutritious lunch was provided and a raffle was held at the end of the day for various expensive items of joy. You went home with a bag full of good things, useful information on wellness and an attractive tee-shirt. The hope is that you apply what you learned to enhance the wellness in your daily life. The fair is always on the Friday before SAMSHA wellness week or the third week in September. If you want to be alerted on events from the Office of Consumer Affairs then email oca@health.nyc.gov and ask to be put on their list serve.

Even for Those Who Suffer From Schizophrenia, Life is Precious

Even for Those Who Suffer From Schizophrenia, Life is Precious

By Rebecca Chamaa

I recently read an article titled “Mental illness haunts countless Americans” from the July 14, 2015 Camas-Washougal Post-Record, a state of Washington periodical, where the author said that schizophrenia was “a fate often worse than death.” It turns out the author’s son has schizophrenia. I was so offended by that one statement that commenting on it seemed senseless, but if that author really believes that, and other people really believe that, then I need to step up and write my truth.

Schizophrenia is hard. I win some of my battles with it and I lose some of my battles with it, but I keep on fighting. I want to keep on fighting. I want to keep on challenging myself to do the best I can with a severe mental illness. I have attempted suicide twice and twice my life was saved by complete strangers. I have no words for what those strangers did. The words grateful and thankful will never be enough.

I am happy to be alive. Yes, paranoia, psychosis, social anxiety and panic attacks are difficult to live with, but have you ever seen a sunset over the Pacific, or fallen asleep on your loved one’s chest, or had your spouse kiss you goodbye in the morning as you can smell the coffee they made for you still brewing?

I could write for days about the things in my life which are worth seeing, hearing, tasting, smelling, touching or experiencing. The scent of jasmine can transport me back to Cairo, Egypt and the time I spent there in school before I knew anything about schizophrenia.

It is true that being psychotic is one of the scariest things that has ever happened to me. It can only be described as living your most terrifying nightmares, and it has happened to me repeatedly, and it may happen again at any time. Even knowing that, I wouldn’t give up a minute of the joy, love, discovery, creativity, and life that is possible to take part in when symptoms of paranoid schizophrenia take a rest.

I have symptoms of my illness everyday, and some days are more than a little difficult, but hearing people say that they think living with schizophrenia is worse than death means that they believe there is no value to my life.

Tell my husband there is no value to my life. Tell my family there is no value to my life. Tell my friends and nieces and nephews there is no value to my life.

Just because the author of that article doesn’t want to walk the road I walk, doesn’t mean I don’t want to walk it. I do want to walk it. I want to walk it with everything inside of me. I want to walk it into old age. I want to walk it holding the hand of the man I love. I want to walk it with a passion for all life has to offer.

I have paranoid schizophrenia and I want to be alive as long as possible and experience that first sip of coffee along with the rising sun as many mornings as I am able. If you can’t understand that, then you don’t understand people who have the courage to take the good with the bad and keep moving in the direction of life. Life is worth living even with a severe mental illness. Trust me, I have one.

Pullout: “...hearing people say that they think living with schizophrenia is worse than death means that they believe there is no value to my life.”

Employment is the Best Medicine

Employment is the Best Medicine

By Danielle

Give me a chance and see what I can do for you. A chance is all I want and what I strive for.

I was stuck in the doldrums for countless years, working on how to get out of my own head. I was stuck. My mind was scattered, unfocused, yet yearning for a more positive life. Deeply depressed, suicidal, delusional and conflicted, I told myself, “Have a positive mental attitude and anything is attainable.” I reinforced my daily life with this positive ideal, placing it on each of my emails.

I have been hospitalized over a dozen times. During my last stint, I met people from the Lighthouse Clubhouse, a vocational rehabilitation center for people diagnosed with mental illness, and they gave me a service called Peer Support in Aftercare. It was a free service that helped me transition back into society. I lived in fear for many years, isolating myself at home, consumed by my delusions. My prescription to wellness was a friendly face, a cup of coffee and conversation that began my path to wellness, putting my symptoms into remission. I’d be remiss not to mention the visiting nurses that came five days a week to keep me in check.

Distracted by the work of the clubhouse that needed to be done, I made it my mission to help those who helped me. I joined the Lighthouse. I went to the clubhouse as if it were my job to do so, the first one there and the last to leave. I worked in each unit, diligently trying to better both myself and the units. Job opportunities presented themselves, upon which I pounced like a tiger. Yet fate would have it that I didn’t meet certain criteria or realized the job wasn’t for me, post-panic attack.

One Friday, I attended the group meeting to close the week joining most of the staff. The program director of the Lighthouse announced that a local scanner job was opening, a mere 14-minute commute from my house, and asked if anyone was interested. I eagerly signed up, thinking, “Please give me a chance and see what I can do for you.”

One interview later I was hired. I was going to be the best scanner ever. I must have asked my coworker, mentor and friend Chuck a million questions back then (I still do). By the end of the day, we went from one shred bin to two. The job was short lived, a mere six months. It dawned on me that I really loved working, and that the backlog of scanning was coming to an end.

Unexpectedly, I was offered a full-time position as an administrative assistant in operations. I was ecstatic. It was a hefty job description, but I was up for the challenge. I thought, “Thank you for giving me a chance to see what I can do for you.” Now, my job title reads “Operations Coordinator.” The perks? The company started a free weight-loss program. Within 43 weeks, I lost 97 pounds.

I can’t thank my work-family enough for all the support they have given me. They are my compass, pointing me true north, challenging me mentally and physically. Thank you for believing in me, noticing my talents and exploiting them, teaching me the business, and letting me shine. Can you tell that I love my job? The very best part, my symptoms have been in remission the entire three years I’ve worked.

Working has been the best prescription for me. I’ve tried all sorts of anti-psychotics, yet none of them helped me nearly as much as being a productive integral member of society. In fact, the meds made me more delusional than before. With goals and people standing behind me, I have become very successful and an integral part of the business. If given the opportunity, please give someone else a chance. It could make a world of a difference.

Pullout: “Working has been the best prescription for me. I’ve tried all sorts of anti-psychotics, yet none of them helped me nearly as much as being a productive integral member of society.”

Psychotic Without Knowing It

Psychotic Without Knowing It

By Jason

Surviving the Rollercoaster of Untreated Mental Illness

The last twenty years of my mental illness have been slowly progressive.

It all began while serving in the military in 1993. I started to have this feeling that I was being talked about and followed by others. After the military, in 1995, while living in Berlin, Germany, these feelings continued along with the sense that someone was spiking my food and drinks as a joke. At that time, I could only hold a job for a couple of months at a time.

In 2005, I went to London. There, I started experiencing an on and off sensation of fingers touching my body (known as tactile hallucinations). Soon I started believing I was a victim of witchcraft. In London, I began to think that someone was angel-dusting (putting PCP in) the places I would sit to cause these hallucinations as a prank. I thought it was a newly developed hallucinogenic that was being soaked through my skin. This was the beginning of my psychosis.

I started to have delusional thoughts, believing things that were unreal, but which I perceived to be real. It was while I was living in London that I first became an inpatient at a mental hospital. I started to believe that street signs were put up to remind me of the past (delusions of reference). This is when everything becomes a coincidence. I also started believing that I was a victim of a prank and I was being left out. I started to believe that behind my back I was famous (delusions of grandeur). I was paranoid but hid it well. When I would go into a grocery store, I would believe all the customers and employees there were waiting for me.

After London, while in Washington State, I started reading license plates and brand names on peoples’ clothing, and thinking that there must be some sort of hidden meaning. I started believing that the things said or seen on the television had secret meaning about me. In Washington State I tried to commit suicide a few times and was sent to the mental hospital. California has section 5150 which allows a qualified officer or clinician to involuntarily confine a person suspected to have a mental disorder that makes him or her a danger to self, a danger to others, and/or gravely disabled. In Washington there are no 5150s. The justice system in Washington will put a person in jail for having an episode and give misdemeanor charges. I went through a vicious cycle of mental hospitals, emergency rooms, ICUs, jails and courts in Washington State.

When I got to California I got real sick. I started to believe I was on camera 24/7 as a prank (which is The Truman Show delusion) and that my family members were switched by impostors and wealthy actors (which is Capgras syndrome, aka delusional misidentification syndrome). I then started to believe I was a POW and that I was still in Germany and WWIII was happening behind my back—because Anaheim is in California and Anaheim is a German name. Heim means home in the German language and Germany was also involved in WWI and WWII. Then I started to believe that the military was looking to rescue me from Germany and that enemy snipers were in the trees. So I started crawling around my condo in the dark to avoid being shot at by snipers through my window (as I had learned to do in boot camp while having live ammunition shot over my head).

Sometimes in my condo, I would hear machine guns firing and black hawk helicopters hovering right outside. I would also hear people speaking the German language outside my condo. So I got a baseball bat to sleep with to protect myself and destroyed my heater/air conditioner, cellphone and computer internet modem and turned all electricity off in my condo. I avoided human contact and believed any and every person I saw was an actor. I thought that if one person was on a cell phone walking by me, the person was talking about me.

Last summer I became gravely disabled. I thought that if a person was driving next to me, behind me, or in front of me, the drivers were following me. I thought it was all arranged with cell phone communication. I got diagnosed with psychotic disorder, then schizoaffective disorder, then bipolar, and schizophrenia. My current diagnosis has reverted back to psychotic disorder. However, it does not matter what I am diagnosed with at the moment because most of my symptoms are gone, thanks to the medication that I only need to take once a month.

Presently, I think like a normal man as I did when I was younger. I have very rare audio hallucinations and rare tactile hallucinations but I am not delusional or paranoid any longer. I also do not believe that everyone is an actor trying to fool me, like in “Rosemary's Baby.” After I moved to Citrus Heights from Washington State a year and a half ago I had three 5150s in a four-month period in the summer of 2013. Since October 2013, I have found a medication that works, an injection once a month. I can easily slip off of an oral medication, thinking: "Oh, I am better now, so why should I take the medication? There is nothing wrong with me.” Luckily, I have no side-effects from the medication and I do not even notice a medication in my system.

I now realize that alcohol had played a major role in my dramas during my vicious cycle of mental illness. Now I do not need to drink so much because most of my symptoms are gone. Since 1994 I have had a very slow progressive illness, so slow that I had a condition known in a neurological study as Anosognosia, a deficit of self-awareness, a condition in which a person who suffers a certain disability seems unaware of the existence of his or her disability (Wikipedia) and that means that a person is without knowledge of something being wrong and without knowledge of having a disability. Up until October, 2013 I was in complete denial that I had a mental illness. It was then that I began reaching out for help and got the help I needed. Talk therapy seems to have helped the most.

Texas’ Mental Health System

Texas’ Mental Health System

By Donald Wayne

A Mixed Bag

Years ago, I was a stringer photographer for the local newspaper in Huntsville, Texas, covering an execution. I was outside the “Walls” unit, and toward that fateful midnight, when the execution took place, I photographed protesters, and advocates, stood beside the TV news videographers pointing their lenses at the lit outside clock. I was at a remove, but it was one of the most brutal events I’ve ever been through.

While Texas seems to be a mecca of law and order, mental health services are often underfunded. While the nation spends per capita about $125, the state of Texas spends $39. In a Dallas Morning News essay online, Clayton McClesky, writing about mental illness and suicide, points out that when a few years ago the West Nile Virus killed seven people in Dallas, the authorities spent $3 million for aerial spraying of mosquitoes. It is a matter of emphasis. Nor is access so good. About 488,520 in the state have serious mental illness, while 156,880 are being served. That’s about 33 percent. I think that may be due to a shortage of mental healthcare workers, as is the case in Texas.

Yet paradoxically, I have had good results. The procedure is something like this: you call the Texas Mental Health number, and participate in a phone interview. If you qualify, you then get an in-person interview, and if qualified after that interview, are assigned mental health services. I was assigned a therapist, and have had three. My most recent, helping me for about five years. She was a godsend, and though it’s been difficult, I have nothing but respect for her. The mental health staff and professionals are caring, highly capable people.

A few years ago, my rural mental health center opened a Peer Support Center, and it is quite nice, with many donors and volunteers. It’s a place to relax. Sometimes we have big meals around the holidays, and there are computers, a television, and meeting rooms. I myself have been a Peer Center Board Advisor and have been on television and in the newspaper doing interviews about the Center. More recently, the Center serves veterans. There is a major military base in central Texas; therefore helping veterans in mental health is especially needed. Pointing veterans to resources have been important, and volunteer colleagues have done a good job in staffing the center for all consumers.

Some years ago, the Texas legislature passed a bill that makes claims on Medicaid beneficiaries, like me, if one is 55 or older. Once a recipient dies, the State makes a claim on the person's estate, unless there is less than $10,000, or a spouse is still living, to make up for repeated expense to the State. I know, I know, there is no free lunch, but as I have never married and as my home is about the only thing of value I own, and it was inherited, I wanted to give it to whom I chose in my will. So, in this respect, I feel a little brutalized.

Black, Christian and Mentally Ill

Black, Christian and Mentally Ill

By Robyn Carrothers

In case you haven't noticed, I'm African American. My people did not ask to come to this country yet it was built on their blood, sweat, tears and backs. I'm proud of the sacrifices that my ancestors made. Therefore, I stand on their shoulders and strengths.

I'm a Christian. I believe you have to accept Jesus as your personal savior. I attend a good church. The people there are very friendly and giving. They also support you when it's needed. They are also very caring. I've gotten a lot of support and love there.

I'm also mentally ill. Yes, I said it. That's the part that gets to everybody. I have to take three pills a day to remain stable. If I don't, I will be in serious trouble. Not to mention, I've been in the hospital five times because of it.

Okay, you think I'm a hot mess and full of contradictions. I am not supposed to be black, Christian and mentally ill. Black and Christian, yes, mentally ill, no. So there is a taboo with that.

Being black and mentally ill is something that black people shy away from. In the black community, some consider it to be weak or retarded. If the illness pops up, yes, they'll say we're crazy. Sometimes, families will not support you. Whispering and talking about it won't make it go away.

In the Christian faith, it's either you get delivered or you're not trusting God. Yes, I would like to be healed. This is my cross to bear. This is the thorn in my flesh. If God chooses to heal me, then that would be good.

These three qualities together seem like a contradiction. Some people will say there is nothing wrong with you. You just need one good piece (if you get my drift). Others feel, this is something you will grow out of.

I try not to think about what people or my family think. My family had a hard time with it at first. When I got a correct diagnosis, they were relieved. Many people feel that I want attention when I have a mental breakdown.

The point I'm trying to make is that it doesn't matter if you're black or Christian. What matters is how you and the people around you take it. Some can be supportive, others will say, “Go away.” I'm not weak, but I'm going to be okay with the support of my family, church, friends and peers.

So I'll hang in there along with this illness, trusting God and hoping this will encourage someone to hang in there, too.

Crazy Is Not A Bad Word

Crazy Is Not A Bad Word

By Cathy

How I Survived My Childhood

I'm crazy. I used to feel ashamed of that. I see the world through the eyes of a lunatic. I earned my crazy the hard way. I was raised by maniacs. I reckon I've finally accepted the fact that they probably couldn't help themselves any more than I can sometimes. I was also raised in the Deep South, in a place I lovingly call the asshole of the Bible belt. If you've been there then you know exactly where I'm talking about.

When my parents split up, I bounced from house to house. My reverend grandfather and grandmother opened their Baptist home to me and my mother on many occasions. It took me awhile to forgive mom for that one. It's always funny to me that people act so shocked and indignant when it turns out preachers can be vicious bastards. I spent much of my teen years misdiagnosed and dosed by a shyster with one black and one grey Mercedes. On days he wore his grey Armani he drove the grey Mercedes. I'm sure you've met him. He didn't treat the upper middle class kids with the double sets of parents and mega coverage. He just kept us locked up, played pill popping roulette with us, and taught us to question the validity of every thought or feeling we had. I do hope he rots in hell, tortured by all his ill-gotten gains.

People get annoyed with me because I tell them an entire story just to answer what they believe to be a simple question. I scream like a banshee at times. I learned that from my granma. My granma was a fantastic, beautiful, emotionally crippled woman. She really helped cultivate my insanity, but she loved me, and I knew it. Most of the time. She was what some would call bat-shit crazy. I miss her every second of every day.

I don't scream as much as I used to. I don't self-harm anymore either. I've been coke-free for more years than I can remember. I don't hate me anymore most of the time. When I do, we talk, and sometimes the conversation ends up falling out of my mouth usually in front of people at really inappropriate times. I don't hang my head anymore when I'm caught being crazy. Screw that! I'm the fat old crazy lady who mutters to herself and then laughs like an idiot when you give her that silly look of alarm.

I'm almost 40, and older than I should be. I'm still pretty. I don't mind saying that anymore. I'm pretty and I know it. I'm still working on liking the other parts of me. I've stopped caring that I'm the crazy lady. My old man loves me, even when I scream like a banshee. Who knew how much an old grouchy ass-pie-hermit could heal a mad woman's heart. When I have random outbursts of pure silliness (cos I really need to let it out) he doesn't walk away and pretend not to know me when it happens to be in the middle of the grocery store. My crazy mama loves me, and even though our relationship hasn't always been healthy, it is amazing now. My beloved sons love me, and I would kill for my boys. I have so much love in my life now.

And we're all freakin' nuts! We're crazy and we're the walking wounded. Everyone I know is crazy. My “sane” friends are crazy. Ohmygosh! Have you seen the state of the world? There isn't a sane person on this planet! I'm not even sure if the cosmos itself isn't bat-shit crazy! Sane people stand by and watch their governments drop 21^st century bombs on 18^th century villages? Sane people turn on each other over which political party is doing the best job of fucking the masses? Fuck sanity! Give me paranoia with a side of whatever I may need to keep it from getting stupid!

So, that's now my treatment plan. I take the medication I need to deal with the anxiety, and I have an awesome therapist. Keeping the anxiety in check helps me deal with all the other fun stuff that comes with a personality disorder, PTSD and some other fun labels that are all just part of who I am. I no longer want to be cured. I no longer apologize for being who I am. The more I accept and cherish the crazy parts, the less control they seem to have. Crazy is not a bad word, because without crazy I might not have survived my childhood or my twenties.

Bruni in the City: The Perfect Macaroons

Bruni in the City: The Perfect Macaroons

A Column by Christina Bruni

Stay True to Yourself and You'll Find the Right One

I've drowned myself in macaroons, courtesy of Cream, a new coffee bar in Bay Ridge on Third Avenue at 72nd Street in Brooklyn. My favorite is the wedding almond. I buy two and a hot chocolate with whipped cream, no marshmallows.

Cream has free wi-fi and a quartet of tables in the back, plus a restroom. I prefer going here to the Starbucks down the street. Donuts are also on offer, like the hibiscus or the chocolate with cocoa nibs. A standard variety of coffee, too.

The winter is not my favorite season. Late summer into early fall is when I have the most energy. Thus I decided to try to find a guy in the early spring or thereabouts. I bombed out on the Internet matchmaking services. Earlier this year, I decided I would never again be untrue to myself by trying to get other people's approval.

The guys online left a lot to be desired. That is, I wasn't willing to settle for one of those average guys. For a number of years, I've bristled at how sick people are praised because they hide behind a cloak of normalcy. You can be rude to customers. You can fail to do your share of the work at a job. You can be outright hostile. And you'll be celebrated because you don't have a mental illness.

The guys online were crackers. I was open-minded, so I sent a message to a vegan, and he didn't respond because I eat chicken and fish. I also sent a message to a psychiatric worker who specified he wanted to meet a "sexy" woman. No response here either.

Not only were the guys a few bricks short of a house, I realized I couldn't compete in these traditional dating arenas because 95 percent of the guys are only interested in finding out if a woman is "fuckable." If you're an intelligent, hip, socially savvy woman, you're expected to be grateful for the crumbs on the table that these guys deign to give you. You're supposed to overlook that they're unmedicated yet not normal.

As my efforts derailed, one after the other, over the last two years, I decided that I hadn't failed; it was my approach that failed me. I took myself off the market to focus on publishing my memoir, Left of the Dial, which went on sale on Amazon this past December 2014. After the book came out, I kick-started marketing it and selling it via my new website and my blogs and other channels.

The more I thought about things, the more I realized that changing myself to fit a mold of what other people in society deem acceptable is a no-win game. The self-doubt was replaced by a new confidence because it suddenly hit me: Do I really want to date a shallow guy who seeks a tarted-up, tatted-up woman? No, no, no.

Two real-life experiences cemented the truth in my mind that settling for any old guy who expresses an interest in me is not the way to live. I hold two truths to be self-evident. First, I have a best friend I'll call Josh. He has a female companion who collects SSI. He takes her to lunch. He takes her to dinner. She doesn't wear stilettos and a cleavage-baring, leopard-print dress.

This cheered me because I realized I might be able to find a great guy like Josh who doesn't immediately want to get under my skirt. I am not a bimbo. My great worry has always been that I would have to stuff down my personality and change myself to be in a relationship with a guy.

Have no fear. A free spirited woman I know wears cowboy boots with a skirt. She is always nattily attired in jeans and a t-shirt. She pulls it off with her own joie-de-vivre. And no, she doesn't wear stilettos on a date either or slit-up-to-there skirts.

That's how I realized there was hope for me. A psychiatric worker only wanted a sexy woman, and a narrow-minded vegan was critical of a woman's food and fashion choices. Since I couldn't compete online in this arena, I realized I would have to live my life and see who I met in person at a book talk I gave.

I saw the light at the end of the tunnel. I didn't have to get tarted-up or tatted-up to snare a guy. The equation is simple: Only by acting true to yourself can you find your true match. I'm convinced there's a guy out there for me. Right now, the macaroons sure are delish.

Wellness in 8 Dimensions

Wellness in 8 Dimensions
By Sharon Spieler
A Conference by Collaborative Support Programs of New Jersey's Wellness Institute
On March 26, 2015 I attended a conference sponsored by Collaborative Support Programs of New Jersey Wellness Institute or CSPNJ titled “Wellness in 8D.” The Collaborative Support Programs of New Jersey empower consumers in recovery to realize a lifestyle centered on wellness. For CSPNJ, wellness consists of eight dimensions. They are: emotional, financial, social, spiritual, occupational, physical, intellectual, and environmental.
The conference began with a welcome from the Wellness Conference Organizer Peggy Swarbrick and Executive Director Jody Silver. Attendees were acknowledged from all over New Jersey and New York. These included providers of mental health services, peer specialists, advocates and consumers.
The first speaker of the day was Chacku Mathai, Director of the STAR Center, a National Technical Assistance Center funded by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Administration (SAMHSA). He spoke on “Making Wellness in 8D Real in Our Communities.” He spoke from personal experience. Not only was he a consumer of mental health services, but had been a substance abuser in his youth. One of the best ways of overcoming his mental illness and substance abuse problems was to become a peer helping others. He offered other suggestions. The first thing to do is to acknowledge that one can recover and that wellness and recovery is for all. We have to believe that we can have an impact on our health and have the confidence and knowledge to do something about it. We then have to act by making decisions to change our actions and make self determined choices. We can do this even under stress. We have to go from doomed thinking to prevention thinking.
The keynote speaker was Patrick Kennedy. He was in the U.S. House of Representatives for 16 years before giving up his seat. It was during this time that he was diagnosed with bipolar illness and alcoholism. He fully admitted this to the audience and said that his life as a representative was on full display for the press to see and report on. He is known as author and lead sponsor of the Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act of 2008. His main belief is that mental illness and addiction are diseases much like any other disease of the body and should be treated as such. This means that mental health services should be covered by insurance companies in the same way as physical health services are covered.
The conference also consisted of various workshops. They included the value of pets and animal-assisted therapy, the role of peers in addiction recovery, how culture can enrich our journey to wellness, yoga, how peers can facilitate groups with consumers, creating places in which to meditate and reduce stress, how to bring the eight dimensions of wellness into our communities, how supported employment can enhance wellness, how music can have positive effects on an individual’s physical, emotional, social and intellectual wellness including stress management and relaxation, and how to achieve financial wellness.
I took part in two of the workshops. The first was how culture can enrich our journey to wellness. We were put up into different cultural groups based on color. My group was green. We were to hug people when greeting them and touch them while speaking. The opposite of the green culture was the orange culture who backed away from people and never touched. The red culture shook hands and touched on the shoulder with their right hands. The yellow culture was to shake hands and touch on the shoulder with their left hands. This was to demonstrate that there were all kinds of people with all kinds of traditions which were not necessarily your own. We have to get to know each other as individuals. Cultural influences are not static. They can change. Don’t create stereotypes. Ask questions. Culture can create barriers but can also create tolerance.
The second workshop I attended was how we can provide leadership in bringing the eight dimensions of wellness into our communities. We broke into groups of two. One person was the leader, the other the follower. Then we reversed roles. This was done by moving your arms in one direction while the other person followed your moves. We lifted our arms over our heads or swayed from side to side. The next exercise was to touch palms and move while touching. We were then told to figure out how we can apply these exercises to everyday situations. We have to look within ourselves. We have to figure out how to work together.

Book Ends: Left of the Dial by Christina Bruni

Book Ends: Left of the Dial by Christina Bruni

Reviewed by Columnist Kurt Sass

Christina Bruni’s book, Left of the Dial, is an uplifting, triumphant account of her ongoing battle with schizophrenia, a battle she is winning every day. I found there to be three main messages in her book: 1) Never give up, no matter who tells you what you can or can not accomplish; 2) Acceptance of an illness is a major component in the battle; and 3) that service to others in life will bring you joy.

The very first thing that struck me about Ms. Bruni’s book is that she pulls no punches and gets directly to the core. No five to ten leading chapters on how I grew up and how grade school was and this and that. The very first sentence, “It happened that night,” within the first chapter of the book we find Ms. Bruni in the psychiatric ward. No pussy-footing around with this memoir.

And no pussy-footing around with Ms. Bruni, either. While still in the hospital, her doctor tells her that she would probably never go to grad school or get into writing again. She also reads in the hospital that only 30% of people with schizophrenia fully recover. Rather than resign herself to the opinions of the “professionals,” she makes a conscious decision “to be determined to be the 30%” and begins to set up goals for herself. Immediately upon her release, she buys a computer (one goal) and was soon writing (another goal).

Shortly after this, Ms. Bruni’s journey takes her to a day treatment program. She is still feeling optimistic about the future until she reads in another “professional journal,” a book titled “Surviving Schizophrenia,” that only 6% of people with schizophrenia go on to obtain full-time jobs. At first she retreats into herself and bows to the pressure, but then summons up the courage to fight the stereotype once again.

Ms. Bruni eventually graduates from the day treatment program into a halfway house, and enrolls in a journalism class. Her hopes are crushed on the first day, however, when one of the requirements are that she keep a journal of news reporter mistakes each night on television, a task she knows will prove impossible, as the halfway house has only one shared television set for all the residents.

There does come a point in which Ms. Bruni believes that once she does in fact find full-time work, she can stop her medication and be drug-free. This day does come as her dreams of becoming the “6%” come true. Unfortunately, even though she tapers off the medication in accordance with her doctors instructions, she suffers a psychotic break and is hospitalized. This break teaches her a valuable lesson, and she comes to the realization that schizophrenia is just one part of who she is. She decides, rather than fight the diagnosis, to work with it.

After accepting her diagnosis, Ms. Bruni continues to flourish. She enrolls in a Masters of Library Science program, finding it a perfect fit. She finds love and loses it when her partner gets an out-of-state career opportunity, but is not crushed. Today Ms. Bruni continues to work full-time as a public service librarian and writer.

It is easy for any mental health consumer who has ever been told by a mental health professional that he or she can’t do something to relate to this book. In 1998, while in my deepest, darkest depression, I was told by a therapist that I would not get much better, and I would just have to learn to deal with it. Today, I celebrated my 10-year anniversary with the non-profit company I work for, so I know, to some extent, what Christina had to go through. I recommend this book very highly for any consumer in the mental health system, or, for that matter, anyone who has ever been told “You can’t do that.” Christina Bruni retorts “Yes you can.”

Bruni in the City: Love and Arrows By Christina Bruni

Bruni in the City: Love and Arrows
By Christina Bruni
I Struck Out on OKCupid
I've had a wackadoodle time online. I don't recommend any of the Internet matchmakers.  OKCupid is only for hook-ups. The six foot tall guy I contacted there responded by telling me since I was only five feet tall he couldn't have sex with me, so he wasn't interested.
Imagine that: I was too short and too skinny for a guy even though I'm beautiful: go figure.
With OKCupid you take a quiz. If it rates you as less kinky and less adventurous, no guy will contact you. The service is rigged for sluts and gigolos.
I had no great experiences with chemistry.com and eHarmony as well. eHarmony caters to conservative Christians. If you write in your profile that you like to attend and perform at poetry readings no eHarmony match will contact you. They're looking for church-going hausfraus, not left-of-the-dial indie girls.
The matches on chemistry.com were incompatible too. One guy wrote the love of his life must love animals. I detest dogs, and cats creep me out. Dog hair sheds all over and dirties your clothes. Take your animals, Jack, and open up a zoo. Or find a woman who's willing to vacuum the couch and de-lint your suits; she isn't me.
You can see why I'm skeptical of Internet dating services; they promise so much and deliver so little. The alleged matches aren't compatible if you're looking for the right person, not just an almost-perfect person. I don't think like the author of that book who proposes you should settle for Mr. Good Enough. I think you should aspire to meet and date a great guy.
No guys on OKCupid were reliable. I could tell they weren't on the level. Guys would send this message: “hi.”  Just “hi.” That doesn't bode well for their conversational skills on a date. Guys, you respond to a woman online. Refer to something she wrote in her profile. You say “hi,” and I'll say “goodbye!”
I took a dating break this winter in the polar vortex. As I write this, it's March 2nd and a snowstorm is on the way, even though there's only three weeks until spring. My goal is to resurrect the love search in June when the weather is warmer.
Any woman who is desperate to meet a guy because she doesn't want to be alone will only attract Mr. Wrong, a guy who's going to use her, or worse. My hardship is that I have other more pressing goals and it wasn't ever my number-one goal to be in relationship. Meeting my soul match would be the icing on a tasty cake. I already have the cake; it's time to frost it.
I wanted to bet my friend a wager that I'd meet Mr. Right-For-Me in the summer. “D” turned me down even though I offered him a free meal, not a monetary prize. So, I'm going to bet the readers of New York City Voices a friendly wager: If I meet the guy this summer, I get to tell you I told you so. If I don't meet a guy, you can smirk at me.
To the victor go the spoils. To the heartbroken go the Kleenex. I've stocked up on the tissues just in case.

Pullout: “Imagine that: I was too short and too skinny for a guy even though I'm beautiful: go figure.”

The Trouble With Dimps, the Vulcan, and the Hypersexuals

The Trouble With Dimps, the Vulcan, and the Hypersexuals
By Joe
One Man’s Journey With Mental Illness
In 2006, my wife accidentally found out about my 70k credit card debts. She feared she would be made homeless if I stuck around so she asked me to leave. It was October and I was on a manic high at the time. I was living in a cartoon world, disappearing for days without even mentioning where I was going. One day, I received a phone call from my psychiatrist. He was concerned about my behavior and wanted to see me. I didn’t want to see him, and said I was fine. But he insisted.
At the hospital, I was met by the senior house officer (who resembled a Star Trek Vulcan), and led me to a room. The door shut behind me with a thud. There was no handle on the inside, just another door that led to another world. She asked me some questions to evaluate me.
Did I hear voices ? “No.” When I read a book, did I think it was written just for me? “NO.” When I watch TV, were there hidden messages for me? “No.” She asked me what year it was: “2006.” The month: “October.” The day: “The 15th.”
I was doing pretty well, but then came the killer: Spell the word “WORLD” backwards. I tried “D-R-L-O-W.”  WRONG ANSWER! So she decided I wasn’t fit to be at large and I could admit myself for observation as a voluntary patient, or they could get a doctor and section me. That’s a minimum six-week stay. So, I chose the voluntary option.
I was shown to my room, the windows of which did not open. There was a bed, chair and wardrobe. A member of the staff came in. John with keys around his belt (that type) said, “Come on, I’ll show you around.” There was a game room with a three-legged pool table and about six billiard balls, a kitchen, a laundry room, and a lounge where the other patients sat watching daytime TV drivel. John said, “Make yourself a drink and join the others.”
A few residents were wearing dressing gowns. One girl had bandages on her wrists. Mike was talking on a cell to a girl he was waving at through the window. She was in another ward. Upstairs he turned to me and said she wants to know your name. This was Lorraine, who I became good friends with; we even had a fling in the laundry room. All the manic patients are hypersexual.
A new patient discovers quite soon that a ward has its own rules. I was having a cigarette in the smoke room chatting to ‘Jesus of Stockport’—an Asian with long hair and a beard. Jesus tells me he has a haulage firm and can get me cheap trainers. He also tells me he is undercover, working for the NHS. His job is to assess which patients are suitable for jobs in the outside world and in his haulage firm. The strange thing is with all this money you would expect he could afford a pack of cigarettes .He watches me as I put my dimp out in the ash tray. There is still a full centimeter left on it, and in the Arden ward that’s a lot of dimp. Gerry is keeping an eye on that dimp as well. Then Tony comes in and says, “Don’t leave your dimp in the ashtray, the Paki will get it.”
Lorraine used to pretend she was my doctor during family visits. She asked Tom who was visiting me to help put up the Christmas tree even though it was only October. It was a plastic one kept in the toy cupboard. When the tree was up, all the patients in the ward applauded. This attracted the attention of the staff, who quickly removed the tree. But an idea had been planted, and it had made everyone happy. So, every night for the next two months, when the staff had been reduced, we would put that tree up and decorate it.
I was in demand for interviews with visiting doctors and students. I was a textbook bipolar guy. They could not take notes fast enough. If they needed help, I could prompt them or lead them to the next question. I could tell the truth or lie, mix it up, do anything they wanted. I remember a Chinese student practically wetting herself when I got going. She could not believe her luck. I was released just before Christmas, after the kitchen was closed down by the health and safety inspectors.
Note: Joe's story takes place in the United Kingdom.

Medication (It’s a four-letter word)

Medication (It’s a four-letter word)
By Sarah (visit her blog at: www.doesthatmakemecrazyblog.com)
I suffer from bipolar disorder, a debilitating psychiatric illness that, for most people, requires a constant stream of medication.
Let me tell you something about medication. I need it to function. Along with psychotherapy, lifestyle and diet changes, and avoiding any number of things that might trigger an episode, I need medication to be able to achieve anything even approaching normal human functionality. I wouldn’t, and in fact, couldn’t, be without it. I want to put that out there before anything. I am thankful that I have access to medication. But getting to a place where you can be living well with mental illness is not as simple as doing all the right things and remembering to take your drugs when you’re supposed to.
Medication is a four-letter word. For all the good it can do when it’s working right, when it’s wrong, it can mess you up. Medication can make you sicker than the illness it’s intended to treat. I’ve been put on, and taken off an endless list of prescription medications. Pills of all different shapes, colours and sizes have gone into my body in the fashion of a lab test animal. The paper inside the boxes that lists side effects may as well be written just for me. There’s not one unpleasant side effect that I’ve yet managed to avoid. At some point over the last five years, I have experienced them all.
Some of them made it impossible for me to get out of bed. Some have made me repulsed by food. Others have made me insatiably hungry. Some have made me vomit unpredictably, or made me so dizzy that I couldn’t keep my eyes focussed or my feet on the ground. I’ve been so weak that I couldn’t walk. One made me shake so severely that I had to be carried to the bathroom, and couldn’t brush my own teeth without help.
I’ve regularly slept for sixteen hours a day because of medication, and been literally a zombie for the other eight hours, barely able to sit up straight, held down to my seat by the incredible burden of holding open my own eyelids, having no energy left over to do anything else.
I’ve gone through medication hell with the aspiration that I would find a combination to give me back the use of my brain, one that would make my thoughts make sense and convince the darkest version of myself that life was worth living.
This part of my journey has been horrendous. Even worse was that I developed a severe form of allergic reaction which meant that once my brain was settled, and finally deciding to cooperate, my medication then had to be abruptly stopped, making me a slave to whatever my brain wanted me to feel at a moment’s notice, most of which was unpleasant to say the least.
But this isn’t a cautionary tale against the use of prescription medication. Quite the opposite. If you’re treated for a significant period of mental illness (and chances are, at least one in four people will be), it’s more than likely that you will experience the side effects of prescription psychiatric medication. I want to emphasise the importance of pushing through it. Never take yourself off your medication without medical consultation. If, like me, you are within the tiny percentage of people unfortunate enough to experience potentially life-threatening side effects, seek medical attention immediately. Read the insert in the box so you’ll know to distinguish between benign side effects and potentially dangerous adverse reactions (which I stress, are rare).
Don’t give up. Communicate with your doctor. Give yourself the best opportunity to find a combination that works for you. I’ve spoken to many people who refuse taking medication for fear of side effects, but medication is an important part of self-management and a balanced care plan, and for me, it’s worth every ghastly side-effect possible to come out of the other side with a combination of pills that allows me to be part of the normal world.
Despite every adverse effect I have had to contend with, it is nothing compared with now having medications that work for me. When it comes to drugs, you name it, I’ve tried it, and in the process it’s probably made me vomit, pass out, cry uncontrollably, or tremble so badly that I can’t hold my own cup of tea.
I lost a month at work because my medications were waging war on my body and brain. But now that everything is as it should be, (within the limitations of my illness, at least), I can do many things that I wouldn’t be able to do unmedicated or without the right medication. Things like getting out of bed, or standing on the platform before the train arrives without wanting to throw myself under the next train that comes. I am able to have a conversation without slurring my speech, or speaking so quickly or with such urgency that I frighten whoever is listening.
Because of my medication, I’m confident in my prognosis, and though I have a life-long condition, I know it needn’t be life-limiting. And that’s worth all the side effects on the list.

Girl, Continued: The Double Bind of Being a Creative Intellectual with Mental Illness

Girl, Continued

By Heaven

The Double Bind of Being a Creative Intellectual with Mental Illness

Ever since I was little I imagined someone coming to my home to take me away from my family. I never quite fit in with them. It wasn’t that they were bad people, just different. Now I’m starting my second year of college in the fall. I suppose I am a young woman (if it suits you to say that), but in my head I am a child. I see things in a way that others don’t and am amused by things that others have ceased to take pleasure in. I have yet to find a way to express myself understandably with words and with a language many people choose to communicate with.

They always called me “different,” and by they, I mean everyone in my life. I cared about writing and reading. I would try to talk to family about perception vs. reality during the 1920s about the American Dream in The Great Gatsby, or get their opinion on Saint George and the Dragon by Raphael, but they laughed and said no one cares about that kind of stuff.

I used to want to be normal. People used to want me to be normal, which was clearly but inexplicably defined as having friends, spending time with family, and people being able to decipher whether you’re happy or sad. By the time freshman year rolled around I realized I was turning into this bizarre, eccentric, schizoid teenage girl and I was falling in love with her. I didn’t mind. In fact, I preferred eating lunch alone in the cafeteria and completing and/or presenting projects solo. The one thing I hated and loved, and still do hate and love, is my mind. It never stops and so I began wearing headphones.

It started freshman year in high school and never ceased. It became a signature thing. Every time anyone saw me, I had my headphones on and my music loud. Teachers hated it. They wanted me to point fingers at my best friend across the room at the mention of partners. They wanted me to spend the hour completing homework and only read the allotted reading material by each deadline and no more. But I didn’t have best friends, I didn’t have friends and I could not figure out too many other things to do with my time but read. I didn’t care about having friends either, about being liked, fitting in. It was irrelevant.

I never cared for gossip or small chat and every girl my age did exactly that so no one talked to me. And so I didn’t talk. I read. I wrote. Sometimes I’d look up from a book and get disorientated because I was really in my room or the library or someplace that was the setting in the book. I joined a book club sophomore year but sometimes the club members would lose me. I would talk about the characters as if they were real. I would scribble in the margins, break the spine and book ear the pages. I would laugh out loud or cry while reading. I eventually quit because of the awkward looks and depressing books I suggested that everyone hated.

I am both happy and sad. I know I should be happy and grateful to be alive and be healthy and blah blah blah, but sometimes I don’t have the strength to get up from the kitchen table. I daydream often. For hours a day and it's one of my favorite things to do. I assumed I was just different with my flattened emotions and eccentric behavior. I wasn’t like everyone and it wasn’t something I did intentionally. It wasn’t something I did to make my mother angry, friends hate me, or to piss my teachers off, although it often did. It was and is who I am and I don’t know how to be anyone else. I didn’t know the things that made me “different” were symptoms of mental illness.

Things I’ve learned:

*Make sure to kiss the boy who makes you laugh, but if he takes you home and he doesn’t have any books, don’t fuck him.

*Sorry's are like oxygen masks on high jacked planes.

*Keeping things hidden is a quick way to isolate yourself and go crazy.

*Fear of suffering doesn't rule out the fact that sometimes a person has to die young as a matter of principle; such a superhuman sacrifice is no longer beyond my strength.

Note: Heaven plans to serve two years in the Peace Corps teaching English in third-world Spanish-speaking countries and after that she hopes to teach English Literature at a university. NYC Voices and its volunteers wish her the best.

Undercover Nutcase

Undercover Nutcase
By Heather
Adventures in Creative Thinking
My name is Heather. I am twenty-five years old and have lived almost my whole life in Connecticut. I graduated from high school in the top ten percent of my class, started at the University of Connecticut in one of the top three academically challenging programs and graduated five and a half years later, with a major and a minor. During middle, high school and college I was strongly involved in volunteering, community service and student organizations, often considered the quiet leader (or very outspoken leader toward the end of college). I have worked off and on since starting college and am known for being one of the best workers in the office, when I do work. One job I have always held is an Official Undercover Nutcase.
My current diagnoses are borderline personality disorder, schizoaffective, post-traumatic stress disorder and generalized anxiety disorder. I started therapy at age fifteen, but have lived with mental illness much longer. One running theme my life follows is that no one seems to notice that I am mentally ill. I move through the world with everyone thinking I am "normal." When I am hospitalized other patients don't believe that I have the diagnoses that I do. I recently told one of my aunts about my schizoaffective and she remarked that I seem so normal and well-adjusted, she had no idea. My whole family and most friends have no idea. This has led me to feel like a secret agent in my own life.
Every morning I put on my "normie" uniform and see family, friends, co-workers, the public and none of them are the wiser. Sometimes the uniform is comfortable, but other times the paranoia, anxiety, hallucinations (auditory, visual and command), depression, flashback and triggers make the uniform feel like itchy wool in the summer.
Aside from the uniform, there is always the idea that my cover may be blown. At my last paying job, I was sure I would be found out by my supervisor. More than once my supervisor made demeaning comments about the people seeing the talk therapist that shared the building with our office. I was placed there by two organizations working with disabled people and have no visible disabilities. Even after I was sexually assaulted by a co-worker I was able to keep my cool outwardly, although inwardly I was screaming.
My demeanor has changed since then, probably because of the mood aspect of the schizoaffective. At my current volunteer job I am the go-to person for the impossible projects, though I have been there less than a month. More than once I have been told they weren't even sure if the project could be done, but I did it. I am still mostly quiet, but I have mentioned an idea I had in a hypomanic state. Luckily it just looked ambitious instead of insane. I am less worried about being found out here, but am worried about the day that I will be too depressed, too schizo, or have someone set off a trigger to make it that I can no longer be there. If and when that happens, I will go back to headquarters, have a brief sabbatical and then be sent on another mission to infiltrate another organization for The Institute.
Undercover Nutcase Heather, signing off.

Losing Our Minds Over Mental Illness

Losing Our Minds Over Mental Illness
By Reginald Coleman
We Must Evolve Our System of Thinking
Nearly a year has passed since the December 2012 massacre in Newtown, Connecticut where twenty prepubescent children and six adults were savagely killed by a mentally ill gunman, and the Washington political culture has jumped out of their cushy seated slumber. With President Obama’s taskforce to curb gun violence activated, nearly two dozen formerly opposed politicians are quickly favoring a bill to ban assault rifles.
To date, 2013 has seen several more fatal incidences involving guns in the wrong hands. While talk for stricter gun policies continues, what about addressing our nation’s mental health policies?
In light of recent mass shootings by mentally ill men the fury of debate sweeps across America concerning guns and mental illness. Gun lobbyists and the President seemingly agree we need to create better laws to keep guns out of mentally ill hands. Existing federal laws prohibit anyone who “has been adjudicated as mentally defective, or has been committed to a mental institution” from purchasing a firearm. Observing the above mentioned statute, considering many Ground Zero first responders, survivors, police, firefighters and military veterans, have filed claims for post-traumatic stress disorder, a mental illness, little thought was put into drafting the law prohibiting mentally ill individuals from buying guns. The same lax, irrational, problem-solving mentality continues.
NYS Senator Kathleen Marchione and other gun advocates are speaking out to have mental health policies addressed. They claim guns aren’t the problem, but the hands they end up in, stating we must keep guns out of mentally ill hands, whom they claim are more violent. According to statistics, the vast majority of violent crimes are committed by those who are not mentally ill, and the mentally ill are 12 times more likely to be victims of violence.
Our country is at a crossroad of its “civil health,” our collective conscience deeply shaken by these events. A social attitude change about gun use similar to the one about public smoking, and drinking and driving, has evolved the past three decades.
The abolitionist and women’s suffrage movements were born of social indifference and intolerance to the subjugation of fellow Americans. However, this parallel consciousness doesn’t exist between the growing movement for gun law repeal and the push to improve mental health policy. The push to repeal current gun laws can be affected by the social attitude of intolerance.
On the other hand, the push to repeal the current mental health policies cannot be sufficiently affected by a social attitude of indifference, an attitude which has allowed our mental health systems to deteriorate, so often leaving those living with mental illness and those caring for them to be overlooked, ostracized and fending for themselves.
We cannot continue this current culture of ignoring the mentally ill and side-stepping the need of mental health policy growth. We need comprehensive mental health services and a mental health system based on transparency and compassionate treatment. We must recreate a system of care that inspires the mentally ill to seek needed treatment and those who care for the mentally ill to feel comfortable reporting relapses or changes in behavior. More importantly, there must be a social attitude change toward the mentally ill. The social and political move to improve mental health care must be a distinct movement. It cannot ride on the back of the gun law repeal movement. Both movements are inherently different.
Will this social attitude of understanding and compassion for the mentally ill take root now? Or will the outcry for gun law repeal overshadow the need to reverse the current mental health trend? Will this be another case of political pandering? Will the sound bites and blame game of the NRA and the gun law repeal advocates relegate the important issue of mental healthcare to the cellars of our social conscience once again?
Mental illness is not like a cold or flu. We don’t catch mental illness from one another. Although some mental illness is hereditary, there are no solid predictors. In fact, mental illness is often experienced by those whose parents have no history of mental illness. In many cases, the illness is brought on by childhood trauma or other psychological traumas in adulthood. There are also cases of “psychotic disorder due to a general medical condition and substance-induced psychotic disorder” whereby there is a prominent and persistent disturbance in mood caused by drug abuse, medication or toxin exposure. So, who is to say “it will never happen to me,” or that it hasn’t already begun to happen?
Mental illness is not “his/her problem”—it is our problem, a human problem. We must solve it with humanity, compassion and a sense of fellowship. We have a responsibility to ourselves. So, as we push forward to evolve in our thinking and treatment of the mentally ill, we must stay mindful of what we stand to lose.