I am a big fan of Rick Mercer and love his rants.  Yesterday I was reading a book and it said that we have to know what we are passionate about and then work on that.  When I ask people what their passions are the most common response is: family.  People value family, friends and the connections that they make with those other people.  So last evening on my evening walk I asked myself what I am passionate about and the usual answer presented itself: my family. Then, as I walked along a few other things crept in as possibilities; I like to sew, I love  reading, knitting, walks, and my neighbourhood is pretty great.  I value all of those things.  But… then this thought crept on little cat feet into my old brain.

Oh my goodness Deborah, you are passionate about mental health! That’s when the rant started.  I want every stigma around mental health to disappear.  I want all people to know what healthy relationships for them look and feel like.  I want all people to have access to free mental health services.  I want there to be no stigma around phrases that include mental illness. For example my heart hurts because I am sad, my brain is not processing well right now or I live with anxiety and or depression or bi-polar disorder or whatever.  But the disorder is not the person! The person is much more than a disorder.

This weekend I had a conversation with someone about how celiac disease presented itself into my life and what my symptoms are.   She told me about a relative who had recently been diagnosed with celiac.  We told each other our stories.  She was curious about me and I was curious about her so we asked questions, talked openly about symptoms and how they were unique for each person.  So… in other words a pretty sensitive subject that 50 years ago would not have been discussed so openly. 

That signifies to me that change is possible as well as needed.  Let’s begin to make those changes around mental health issues.  Many of the most outstanding people I have ever met also happen to have: depression, anxiety, OCD, schizophrenia, addictions, and personality disorders, and so on and so on.  I get to be the lucky person who has open conversations about mental health and I get to hear stories about challenging lives, triumphs and the trials of living with a mental illness.

I think all mental health services should be free for everyone, services should be available in a timely fashion, there should be a take what you need philosophy around counseling, all counsellors should have adequate supervision. Seeing a counselor, social worker, psychiatrist, should have no more stigma than seeing your family doctor.  If we don’t have a good fit with the counsellor then we should be able to get a new counselor without feeling guilty about it!  Counsellors should be well trained in how mind, body, and spirituality work together. This is the end of my rant. 

FOG by Carl Sandburg

The fog comes

on little cat feet.

It sits looking

over harbor and city

on silent haunches

and then moves on.