Avoidance is a coping strategy I have adopted for most of my life. Putting a high value on the “just keep going” mindset was what I had been taught by my immigrant parents who survived by adopting this warrior-like value system. There was no frame of reference for stopping to process trauma in my family of origin, no matter how much of it they had been through and trust me, it was more than any family should ever have to experience in multiple lifetimes, let alone a single lifetime. In an unspoken vow to this family dynamic, I was not going to take a breath; ever.
In the weeks leading up to the New Year, I’ll begin to hear and notice particular words that resonate with me deeply. It’s as if the words are calling out to me. I notice how the words feel in my body. The sensations they bring me when I close my eyes. I stay open to all the words that appear and call out to me. I ponder the essence of the words and what that essence means for me, until there’s no doubt that one word, over all the other words, is “My Intentional Word for the New Year”.
TRIGGER WARNING: suicide
I set out to write this post yesterday with the intention to honour the 30th anniversary of my father’s suicide. What happened instead was divine intervention, again. That’s why it took me till today, the day after the 30th anniversary of his suicide to finish it.
The CAMH Difference Makers Symposium and Gala was an outstanding success! The Symposium featured highly esteemed panelists that informed and engaged the attendees on key mental health issues of access to care, the role of the pharmacist, creating mentally healthy spaces, safety in social media, educating, driving social change and sharing stories of recovery.
On Saturday May 12th, I'm excited to participate in the 2nd annual March For Mental Health TO! This peaceful march will start and conclude at Nathan Phillips Square, to raise awareness for mental illness & addiction, and call for improvements to mental health and addictions services.
It’s September 2014. I am on the phone. It’s a beautiful summer’s day, which is why I have chosen to make this important call outdoors, with the sun on my face and mother earth beneath my feet. It is a discovery session with a Spiritual Psychotherapist.
The therapist explains that the intention for the call is for each of us to determine if there is a good fit for us to work together. She asks me to tell her my story. I explain to the therapist that I’ve experienced over 6 major depressive episodes since 1988, my last one being 8 years ago.
The Dalai Lama said “The world will be saved by the western woman,” at the Vancouver Peace Summit in 2009. Last Friday at the Waterfront Awards there was no shortage of the Toronto women who are doing just that.
Monday the unimaginable, unthinkable happened on the streets of a Greater Toronto Area neighbourhood. A man in a van, for reasons yet unknown, struck and injured or killed more than 25 people and shattered their lives and the lives of many, many more.
Robin Williams, the world adored him; his family and friends loved him, and those who have experienced the darkness of mental illness and/or addiction found much comfort in his openness and truth about his personal struggles with his demons. Compassion and love were his legacy and his gift to the world; the likes of which we are not likely to see again.
Her longevity and all that she created is a gift and a treasure to all of mankind. Her legacy is one of healing through art. She is of my tribe. The tribe of those that mental illness did not break and who simply by living a full and whole life are proof that the stigma of mental illness is false.
