I have posted many articles regarding my battle with mental illness. I have said many things regarding coping skills, my own experiences with mental illness, and “coming out of the mental health closet”. In short, I haven’t been particularly shy in opening discussion around this often very difficult subject of mental illness. Recently, my sister has been working on a project that explores bipolar disorder and she asked me to record myself talking about the stigmas surrounding bipolar disorder and what it’s like to live with it. It felt good to talk about it, even if I was sort of talking into thin air, but it made me realize something - I am in the best place of my life. I grew up mentally ill. I have no recollection of ever not being mentally ill. My only world is the world of mental illness. Many would consider this world to be one of shame, one of failure and fear, one of suffering. Although that’s not necessarily wrong, it isn’t the whole truth. Yes I often feel ashamed, but I am training myself not to feel that way. Yes I often fail, but I always do my best. Yes I have a lot of fears and anxieties, but that doesn’t stop me from following my dreams. Yes I suffer, but it is because I suffer that I am who I am. I am not shy about discussing my mental health and why should I be?
We see people in wheelchairs learn to dance, people who can’t hear learn to sing, people who are blind make art, people with Down Syndrome becoming entrepreneurs. We see these wonderful people living with disabilities defy the odds and create and learn and share with the world their light and gifts and it is truly beautiful. But how often do we see the same stories for people who suffer from mental illnesses? I don’t mean depression and anxiety, because those have practically become household names (especially among celebrities). I mean the personality disorders. I mean the dissociative disorders. I mean the mood disorders and the learning disabilities and the people with schizophrenia. Where is their representation? Where are my CEOs with borderline personality disorder? Where are my teachers with schizophrenia? Where are my heroes with heavily stigmatized mental illnesses? I know they exist. I know they’re out there. But so often are we, the victims of these “underground” mental disabilities, told that we can’t succeed in these fields because our minds are hindrances to society that we don't even pursue such ambitions for fear of the stigma, and sometimes violence, that accompanies it. Our psychology is never expected to reach outside the boundaries of homelessness, hospitals, and scientific studies. We are told time and again that we simply should not even try to break through in the world through anything other than maybe art because we’re “dangerous” or “unstable” and “can’t be trusted with positions of power”. Where are all my everyday mentally disabled people and where can I meet them to let them know that they are not a burden, but a blessing? If you ever have the great pleasure of meeting someone with a mental illness and really learning about them, you will know that they, no, we, often possess some of the greatest minds and innovation this world has to offer. It is because we see the world through a different lens that we have everything to share with this world that won’t accept us.
Despite being in and out of the hospital and on and off medication and leaping through hoops of diagnoses and rigorous treatment, I became an exchange student in Ireland at the ripe age of 16 - something that had hardly been done even by neurotypical students in my town. Despite having vivid auditory and visual hallucinations, I do the most remarkable thing of staying in school unlike what Hollywood wants you to believe with the trope of the psychotic homeless girl banging her head against the wall and talking to angels. And you know what? To the psychotic homeless girl banging her head against the wall and talking to angels, I hear you. I see you. You matter. You are just as capable and you are just as valid and whole of a human being as John Smith, neurotypical extraordinaire, CEO and founder of Some Super Great Company Whose Name We All Know™. We, the ever present local crazy people, are not society’s discard pile. I don’t need to be “cured” of my mental illnesses to be taken seriously, to be respected, and to be a contributing member of society. Needless to say, there is no existing cure for any existing mental illness. So if we can learn to live with it, shouldn’t you learn to live with us? Coping skills are essential to making life livable, and life being livable isn’t always as easy as willing yourself to be that way. It can take years of intensive practice and dedication to the pursuit of happiness to get to the coveted stability but not being stable doesn’t mean you are an incapable person. It doesn’t mean you need to find a cure to become whole. You already are whole. I may be broken but I don’t always want to seal the cracks in my psyche because I don’t always need to. I may slip up and make mistakes, but that’s part of the life I’ve lived since I was 5 years old. I am a good person and at the end of day, neurotypical or disabled, if you can’t say that you’re a good person, then stability is practically for naught.
I have PTSD but even when I’m triggered, I will persevere. I have bipolar disorder but even when I’m knocking around between manic and depressive, I will persevere. I have borderline personality disorder but even when I’m splitting, I will persevere. I have OCD but even when I’m obsessing, I will persevere. I am a sister, a cousin, a daughter, a granddaughter, a niece, a friend, a best friend, a woman, a student, an employee, a tutor, an Editor In Chief. My name is Courtney Graves and I am all of this and it defines me. I am as I am and that will never change. I’m over it. Are you?
