People like me who live with a mental health diagnosis and go
through a myriad of extraordinary experiences have a unique story to tell. Not
a static biography of days gone by when recovery was just a notion, but a
living, breathing, evolving account of what it means to live with a mental
illness.
Those of us who choose to tell our story publicly do so for
many reasons. First and foremost, I think healing is the desired result of our transparency.
We heal ourselves and are the catalyst for healing for others. When we tell our
story we take the painful sting out of having a diagnosis. The labels lose
their power to marginalize us, to categorize us, to limit our perceptions of
who we are and what we can accomplish. We come, through disclosure, to recognize
that we are more than our illness.
Our openness and willingness to share our experiences with
strangers gives us freedom. We experience the freedom to be our authentic
selves with no limitations. Our transparency dissolves the fear of being found
out. No one can “out” us because we out ourselves. No one can use our lived
experience to shame or silence us.
When I tell my story to those who would listen, I am able to
better put things into perspective. I realize regularly that although I’m not
where I hope to be, I am far from where I was. Looking over the years at the
challenges I’ve faced, I could call myself a survivor. A more accurate label
though, is “thriver” because on a daily basis I choose to move beyond my
psychiatric diagnosis and live a life of my choosing.
On a broader scale, transparency saves lives by fighting
stigma. Stigma is deadly, it kills by discouraging individuals from seeking
help for fear of how they will be perceived. No one wants to be called crazy. Transparency
normalizes our experiences. By accepting our experiences as normal for us, we
normalize the experiences of others and reduce the harmful effects of ignorance.
When we tell our stories with courage and confidence again and again, we stomp
out stigma. We do this through educating people and dispelling myths about what
is means to live with a mental health diagnosis. These acts of courage empower
others to open up and embrace themselves fully. When people who are struggling
to come to terms with their own challenges hear our stories of hope they are emboldened
and given permission to live their lives to the fullest.
The more we talk about it, the more we will understand it and
better equipped to support one another. There are a couple of forums available
for individuals who want to learn to tell their stories. The Georgia Mental
Health Consumer Network has a program called the Respect Institute and NAMI has
a program called In Our Own Voice. Both provide outstanding training and
support in finding opportunities to speak in the community. Compensation for
speaking engagements is also available.
