by Stephanie in Maine
I suffer from a variety of things. The first is being brought up in a household totally unaware of 'Mental Illness' and being 'disciplined' as my father was disciplined. My grandmother on my dad's side was the first person I believed to have a problem. My father has always had a very 'hard' way of living and was always the very first to tell us, 'stop crying' if we were being punished.
by Karen in Missouri
This month marks the one year anniversary of my nervous breakdown. While the journey is certainly not over, I thought this would be a good time to send a message about it. There are several reasons for the message - one is to make one more attempt to convince the jerks that don't believe in mental diseases that IT IS REAL. Another is for awareness. Perhaps I will find the words to describe things that other sufferers like me have been trying to find all along. Perhaps, even if just for a moment, I will help someone else feel like they are not alone. At any rate, a year ago at this time I had hit rock bottom.
by Jodi in Ohio
My name is Jodi. I live in Ohio and I have been married to my husband, Matt for 13 years, and I have two wonderful children, Alex, age 9 and Meghan age 7. Here is my story: It was Thursday, September 23rd, 1999. I had very high expectations of the birth of my son. I dreamt of a perfect natural birth with no medication, and no complications. I went to childbirth education classes and I knew what was supposed to happen. I had no idea what was in store for me. Several hours after my water broke, there was still no progress. So the resident doctor gave me Pitocin to speed things up. An hour later I was in a lot of pain.
