stigma

Stigma is an insidious force in our world. It lies and frightens. Stigma creates division and victimizes the most vulnerable of people. Stigma at its core is ignorance. We fear what we don’t understand. It’s not just external, not just the stereotypes and misconceptions that are thrust upon those living with mental illness. It’s also internal, the untruths we grow to believe about ourselves.

The negative effects of stigma are dangerous. People with severe and persistent mental illness are not deaf to the jokes that run rampant in our society about mental illness. How many times have you heard someone joke that a person or situation was bipolar? Without knowing what these psychiatric labels really mean, we as a culture assign inaccurate attributes to people with mental illness that are far from flattering. This insensitivity to the suffering of others causes people who need help and compassion to shy away; to suffer in silence.

People struggling with mental illness often won’t get the help they need and deserve because of the fear of what others will think or say about them. If you see a therapist and psychiatrist that means you have issues or are crazy right? If you take medication to manage a chemical imbalance in your brain that means you are volatile, unstable, or dangerous right? What about the labels we get when we have a mental illness? Am I more likely to go on a shooting spree because I have been labeled schizophrenic?

The truth is people with mental illnesses are more likely to be victimized and taken advantage of than they are to victimize someone else. However, the media would have you believe that every violent attacker or perpetrator of a mass shooting had a mental illness. The first thing they say is that anyone who would commit such a heinous crime must be mentally ill. That’s just not the case. Isn’t it possible that the kind of people who commit these crimes are just criminal, bigoted, hateful and bent on the destruction of other people?

On a personal note, I have faced stigma in the work place and suffered trepidation at disclosing my diagnosis in my community. In 2007 my symptoms became unmanageable and I asked for assistance and help from my supervisor. He joked that something had better be done before I kill myself. Because everyone with a mental illness is suicidal right? I was in crisis and that flippant remark stung. If I had been a cancer patient would a joke like that have seemed appropriate to him?

So, in my mind the solution to the negative effects of stigma is education. People who have mental illness and those who support people with mental illness must take it upon themselves to educate the world one person at a time. We must resist the temptation to hide our illness and our struggles. We must be transparent and let people who have no experience with mental illness walk with us on our journey.  We need to attach a face to mental illness that can counter the one the media has put forth. This will take courage, determination and patience.