Breaking the Stigma

This video and my own personal experiences inspired this post:

I don’t have to say it, but I will there is a stigma with mental illness. There is this belief that it’s all in your head, and that you can just shake it off. I can’t tell you the number of times I was told that my anxiety problems were nothing but a “bad day”, or that I just needed to “get out more.” You wouldn’t tell someone with a broken leg to just “walk it off” so why would you tell someone suffering from depression to just smile more?

I think the answer to this question is simple, and it’s because mental illness is, in essence all in our head. It’s something intangible, you can see when someone has the flu, or a broken leg, they visibly look sick, but for a large percentage of those of mental illness we simply don’t look sick. I know there are exceptions to this rule, and that there are people who do show physical signs of mental illness, but a larger majority of people are high functioning and show no physical or outward signs of their illness. If someone sneezes we give them a tissue, we may even make them chicken soup, but we can’t take that same route for someone with mental illness, there is no tissue that can wipe away depression, nor is there soup that can repair a chemical misfire that makes one manic.

There is also the medical community, having a mental illness is a difficult road to navigate. First there is insurance, assuming you have some, you have to find out if it covers mental health services. That’s the first negative, the first way we treat mental illness different from physical illness. I don’t go to my doctor and wonder if they’re going to cover the flu, or be concerned if I broke my leg that suddenly I wouldn’t be able to get coverage anymore. This however is how it can feel for someone with mental illness, they wonder first if they can get treatment, and then they wonder if the medication prescribed for that treatment will be covered under their prescription drug plans. Now if you don’t have insurance or are dependent on state or federally sponsored programs this can be an even trickier road to navigate. Medicaid is the largest payer for behavioral health services in the country, but low state reimbursement rates drive providers away from the program. Leaving coverage gaps that can prevent someone from getting the care that they need.

Then sometimes it is the patient themselves that gets in the way, I know this one from personal experience. I was sick a long time before I got diagnosed and there were times when I told myself that there was nothing wrong with me or that I could handle it myself. This is where the stigma is the worse, because we can truly be our own worst enemies.  I remember a day I went to see my primary doctor and was talking about my panic attacks and he gave me this questionnaire to fill out and one of the questions was something like do you ever feel like things are going crazy, and I looked at him and said “doesn’t everyone feel that way sometimes?” and he said no, and told me that I was probably suffering from some depression. I remember feeling like my world just collapsed, “Me, depression, no way.” I thought. I drove home thinking I couldn’t be depressed, I was happy and even if I was depressed I didn’t need pills I just needed to be happier. It was two months later that I had my first suicide attempt and my eyes were opened that I couldn’t go this road alone. Several years and several diagnoses later I look back at that experience and see that I looked at mental illness with a stigma, with a fear that I would be one of “those people”, but I now know that’s not true. Now I am just another person who has a mental illness. I look just like the “normal” people.

It’s time to break the cycle, the cycle of stigma. It’s time for those of us with mental illnesses to stand tall, to show that were not a stereotype, that were not dangerous, that were not all criminals, to show that we have families, and finally to show that we are more than our illness. I don’t introduce myself as a person with a mental illness, I merely introduce myself as me. There is no asterisk next to my name that redirects to some fine print that says: has a mental illness. It’s time for us to show that for every misconception there is someone holding down a job, for every piece of misinformation there is a mother or father raising a family, and for every time someone says “those people” there is a friend or a lover who is just trying to make it through the day.

So if you are struggling don’t be afraid to reach out, to a friend, a family member, or medical professional. There’s nothing to be afraid of, and it’s not your fault, the brain is a funny place, and a few chemical misfires can cause strange things to happen. Thankfully medical science has come a long way and whether its therapy or psychopharmacology there’s something out there that can help you. The biggest, and greatest thing that I can tell you is that you’re not alone there is a world filled with people that are having experiences similar to yours, and there are places to reach out to find people who will understand.

National Suicide Prevention Lifeline

1 (800) 273-8255

Hours: 24 hours, 7 days a week

Languages: English, Spanish

Website: www.suicidepreventionlifeline.org

National Alliance of Mental illness

https://www.nami.org/

This video is also inspiring:

The Ongoing Saga of Kim Davis

Kentucky’s Rowan County clerk Kim Davis is still refusing to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples citing the fact that it violates her religious beliefs. After the Appeals Court ordered her to issue licenses she has gone on to petition the Supreme Court. After the Supreme Court denied her she still continued to refuse marriage licenses to same-sex couples. Now she has been taken into custody for defying the court order and continuing to refuse to issue marriage licenses.  Yes my dear readers she has gone to jail over issuing a piece of paper.  My original two questions were, does a county employee have the right to impose her religious beliefs on others, and should she be allowed to keep her job based on her refusal to follow her job description? The first question is easy to answer, the second I learned is a little harder since as I discovered that Kim Davis is an elected official.

Now I’m all for freedom of religion, and I understand that some people hold very strongly to their religious beliefs, but they must also understand that not everyone else shares their religious beliefs. When you go to work you are in an environment where you will encounter people of many races, religions, and orientations so one must learn to be tolerant, and to respect diversity. This is especially true when you work as a civil servant, as a civil servant you must truly leave your beliefs at the door, because it is almost a guarantee that at some point during your tenure those beliefs will be challenged. In this generation the challenge is same-sex marriage, but imagine if you will 50 years ago when the first interracial couples attempted to get married in the South, I’m sure the beliefs of many a civil servant were put to the test on those days.

The Constitution offers us two guarantees when it comes to religion: the prevention of the establishment of religion, and the free exercise of religion. In this situation these two guarantees clash with each other, because Kim Davis’ free exercise of religion and her work as a civil servant promotes the establishment of a religious belief. This marks another reason why as an employee, especially a civil servant that we must check our beliefs at the door. Obtaining a marriage license is not a religious ceremony it is a business transaction, and thus should not be subject to anyone’s religious beliefs. So the simple answer is no, as a County employee she does not have the right to impose her religious beliefs on others.

With Kim Davis being an elected official it is not as easy as she is not doing her job, fire her. The county has to prove some form of misconduct or other such inappropriate actions in order to remove her from her post. Thou refusing to do one’s job may sound like misconduct, it is not always that easy. Several times during this ordeal Kim Davis has claimed religious persecution and if she is terminated from her position that can come back into play, since equal opportunity employment prevents termination based on religious beliefs. Kim Davis has put herself in an interesting position, she has set herself up to be a martyr for her cause, but I think this article more accurately sums it up.   

In the long run this comes down to choice, Kim Davis chose a job in the secular world. A job where imposing her personal religious beliefs is not part of her job description. If she wanted to she could have chosen a job in the religious world. In her role as a civil servant she is bound by the federal and state laws, and must abide by the edicts of those laws. If she cannot abide by those laws maybe it’s time to consider another line of work.

Caitlyn Jenner Costume, bad jokes and bad taste

It’s almost Halloween, well it’s September and that means Halloween has been popping up since about June, but this all started in August when a costume company called Spirit Halloween decided it would be a great idea to make a Caitlyn Jenner costume, this costume has spawned a deluge of online hate including a change.org petition calling to have it removed as being transphobic. Spirit Halloween has stood by its creation. According to this article in The Washington Post:

“At Spirit Halloween, we create a wide range of costumes that are often based upon celebrities, public figures, heroes and superheroes,” Lisa Barr, the outlet’s senior director of marketing, told NBC News. “We feel that Caitlyn Jenner is all of the above and that she should be celebrated. The Caitlyn Jenner costume reflects just that.”

Now this is not the only Caitlyn Jenner costume out there, and some of the others don’t treat her with the same respect. A costume from AnytimeCostumes.com refers to Caitlyn as the “softer side of the popular Olympian.” Which I will admit is offensive to her gender identity.

This is brings us to the issue at hand. When do you cross the line between bad taste, and transphobic? Personally I find the costumes to be in bad taste, but not necessarily transphobic. Am I saying that I buying Spirit Halloween’s superhero idea? Not really, we all know that the costume is a bad joke meant to make men look funny dressed as a girl. Think about though, regardless of who slips into the costume they are still honoring the fact that Caitlyn Jenner is female, even though it is in bad taste. It is hardly the first time that a costume has been in bad taste. From Slenderman to Prince Harry as a Nazi we have seen bad costume judgement recently. I guess I look at it this way, I would find it more transphobic if people were creating Bruce Jenner costumes for Halloween. The Caitlyn Jenner costume however is no more offensive than a sexy nurse, sexy policeman, or fat ballerina. It simply teeters on the line of bad taste, and poor judgment, but adults will be adults, and they will choose to be fools for Halloween. Is it their intention to misappropriate someone’s gender identity? Probably not, it’s more likely they just want to look silly. I’m sure there might even be some young trans individuals who will dresses Caitlyn Jenner with pride, because frankly she looks damn good.