"I lost teammates of mine. It not only affected me but an entire community, and I didn't want that to happen again," Eungjae "NJ" Kim said of his mission to start the TellMyStory Challenge.

The TellMyStory Challenge is an ambitious online campaign that de-stigmatizes opening up about mental health journeys in an unconventional manner. Founded recently by NJ, the campaign's mental health mission seeks to have friends, family, and coworkers "provide evidence to other victims that they are not alone and this illness is much too prevalent," according to its story. In particular, the campaign champions people who have lost loved ones to mental health struggles and people who are impacted by stigma surrounding seeking help for mental illness.

Starting with his network of friends from student-athletes in high school and college, NJ has branched out the campaign from his network to a campaign that includes everyone victim of mental health. Assisted by his high school teammate, Max Martinez, a senior baseball student-athlete at Texas Wesleyan University, NJ's TellMyStory Challenge runs across Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook, and recruits the personal testimonies for how people deal with stress and their own mental health struggles.

Inspired by the passing of a former high school teammate from his mental health struggles, NJ was motivated to continue fighting for increased mental health awareness and destigmatization. Being a witness to fellow student-athletes going through their own mental health journeys in college has made NJ a champion in the fight against mental health stigma even now. Currently, he is a researcher at Georgia Health Policy Center, working specifically on mental and behavioral health.

The project's mission is to highlight the prevalence of mental health and stress in communities and make those going through their own mental health struggles "feel less secluded". NJ told me that the objective of the TellMyStory Challenge is to fight stigma from the ground up, to have peers helping each other in their mental health struggles. While not discounting the importance of mental health providers and professionals, the most de-stigmatizing efforts come from peers and local communities because the people that make up the community create the stigmas. Once a community starts to open the conversation about mental health and individuals' own experiences, the conversation starts from the bottom up.

"If the people around you share your story, you would be more comfortable sharing your own," NJ said. "There may be a case where I had no idea my close friend, teammate, or coworker was dealing with mental health until I come across his video that he shares for this campaign. Of course, I would feel more comfortable to share my own experience with mental health with my friend since we are peers and secondly, we have experienced dealing with our stressors. Sounds a lot like the conversations that Certified Peer Specialists have with their clients/patients."

Another part of the campaign looks for donations to eventually establish a nonprofit. Currently, the TellMyStory challenge is looking to address the lack of behavioral health care services in primary and secondary schools and healthcare facilities and communities that can't afford behavioral health care providers. The challenge also looks for events for guest speakers to speak on their own personal mental health stories.

As a middle school teacher, I know that my students would greatly benefit from more mental health programs to address the daily traumas they face. It would take me thousands of words and many pages to recount the struggles I and my students face traversing the highly traumatic environment that is Baltimore City, from having a friend get shot to not having a parent in your life. For me, speaking for educators across the country, the more help we can get, the more mental health programs and social-emotional learning initiatives started, the better our teachers can teach and our students can learn.

But I digress. The TellMyStory Challenge is still in its beginning stages and finding its identity through content. Browsing through the Twitter page, student-athletes and coaches from universities across the country share their stories on how they deal with stress and manage their mental health, from universities like Johns Hopkins University, Emory University, George Washington University, Austin College, and Georgia Southwestern State University.

While the TellMyStory Challenge will eventually search for sponsors, it's still focused on content first at the beginning of its campaign. Bridging from student-athlete stories, NJ hopes to expand the campaign in coming months.

"We're not focused on donations or sponsors because it is always about the message that is sending to the people. Content drives the mission first," NJ said. "Donations are just icing on the cake. I believe that this peer-to-peer support in addressing the stigma should not require money. People optioning in to hold conversations about mental health and optioning in to hold the right conversations will start amending our culture's current view of the mental health stigma."

He also states, "We are utilizing the student-athlete platform to lead this particular discussion in society. Goal is to eventually have every member the opportunity to participate."

NJ has also networked with President of Arcadia University, Dr. Ajay Nair, in expanding awareness for the mental health campaign. NJ says, "President Nair 'love[s] the idea' and will share it with his institution's athletic department." He plans on eventually having a high-profile athlete platform to raise awareness for the campaign to give greater attention to the greater struggle.

"Mental health isn't just an athlete thing," Kevin Love wrote after half a year after a panic attack during a game. "This is an everyone thing...Not talking about our inner lives robs us of really getting to know ourselves and robs us of the chance to reach out to others in need."

And NJ hopes to build on Kevin Love and many athletes' mission of reform. About half a year ago, I wrote a story about how my and NJ's alma mater, Emory University, had to spend more on mental health to meet student demand. Students were encountering over month-long waits for an appointment at our school's counseling center, and fellow students facing mental health issues made their frustration known, especially when our university spent $20 million on constructing a new building than funneling resources into our mental health crisis center.

At our school, student demand for mental health resources increased by 44 percent in four years, showing the silver lining that substantial progress is being made that people are seeking health in the first place. Our university's mental health crisis of having many students seek out help, but not enough counselors to meet that demand isn't an anomaly, but the norm.

"The college mental health crisis shows that stigma for seeking help with mental health and counseling has largely been mitigated, certainly a victory for activism and outreach efforts from mental health advocates," I wrote in May.

And it's campaigns like the TellMyStory Challenge led by leaders like NJ and Max that have been pioneers in the fight to de-stigmatize mental health. The cultural pendulum is swinging from stoically shouldering the burdens of mental health issues to opening up and telling our stories, and the TellMyStory Challenge is a campaign that will push that shift from the bottom up.

"I have always believed in the message. I believe society is ready for it, and I believe society needs it."

Follow the TellMyStory Challenge at @TellmystoryC and #mystoryMH on Twitter or Instagram.