Miss Riki

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I Support Mental Illness Awareness Week

October 3, 2011

In 1990 U.S. Congress established the first week of October as Mental Illness Awareness Week (MIAW) in recognition of the National Alliance on Mental Illness’ efforts to raise awareness for mental illness. This year between October 2nd through the 8th, people from all over will stand together to bring a collective consciousness to this issue that is often misunderstood.

MIAW is especially important this year as severe budget cuts threaten mental health services in many communities around the country. People who do not receive treatment often end up in hospitals, shelters, in jail, or even dead. Most importantly, this is a week where we fight stigma for serious mental illnesses such as major depression, bipolar disorder and schizophrenia.

This is a cause that is very close to my heart because I have been diagnosed and living with bipolar disorder for nearly thirteen years. Everyone experiences their mental illness in a different way, and mine has had its bumpy moments, peppered by even harsher moments, and then thankfully capped by growth. I do know that I am among the lucky ones who have an incredible support system. I have always had ample health insurance and the financial means to pay those premiums. I have a loving family with endless patience in helping me heal when things take their down turns, and I am blessed with friends who have made me a part of their lives even when I am a less than desirable companion. I understand that not everyone is fortunate enough to have this kind of endless support. This is my opportunity to stand up and remind people that everyone deserves the kind of backing I have had in my life.

I read somewhere today that the only reason that people like me support Mental Illness Awareness Week is to drum up sympathy for myself, since I am clearly one part of the 25% of people who have a diagnosable mental disorder who are considered the “worried-well.” This phrase displeases me in the worst way. Anyone who has ever experienced a bout of depression so awful that they contemplate no longer living at all understands all too well the “worry.” Those of us who manage to come out of it a little better and tell our story are not any more “well.” To undermine the cycle of pain and recovery by using the demeaning moniker is a disservice to everyone. We are not the “worried-well.” We are the survivors. We have seen hell and have returned to life. We know pain yet live with the faith that things will get better, and I am living proof.

I am proof that treatment works. Drug therapies work, and talk therapy works. Together, they have saved my life. The thought that there are people out there who do not have access to these necessities is deplorable to me. The idea that communities are cutting the necessary funding to maintain basic mental health care is unacceptable.

I have been unfortunate enough to experience the ultimate price of mental illness, and that is the loss of life by suicide. I lost my younger brother at the age of eighteen when he took his own life. I will spend the rest of my life fighting for the opportunity to stop just one person from ever leaving the world in that way again; to stop just one family from feeling the pain of loss that we felt when we lost my brother.

Am I attempting to drum up sympathy for myself?  Not at all. I don’t want your sympathy. I want your support. I want you to stand beside me and say enough is enough. Do the thousands of seriously mentally ill people locked up in jail or in a psychiatric ward of a hospital deserve our utmost support? Yes they do, but so do the so-called “worried-well” who very well could be two moments away from being there themselves. If you know anything about mental illness at all, you know that things can change in an instant.

So, take my hand and stand up with me this week in supporting Mental Health Awareness Week. Visit the National Alliance on Mental Illness (http://www.nami.org/) to see how you can help. Together we will make it better. Lives depend on it.

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9 Comments · Labels: All Miss Riki's Posts Tagged: Bipolar Disorder, depression, health and wellness, mental health, mental illness awreness week, suicide prevention, support, therapy, Ultimate BLog Challenge

My Shameless Request for Your Support

July 15, 2011

To my dear blog family,

Please allow me just one post to shamelessly request your support in an effort to raise funds for a cause that is very near and dear to me. This coming January 15, 2012 I will be walking in the P.F. Chang’s Rock and Roll Marathon/Half-Marathon in Arizona to support the EMPACT Suicide Prevention Center (http://www.lafronteraarizona.com/). The money I raise through sponsorship will go directly to support the Survivors of Suicide support group that was so instrumental in my healing after losing my younger brother in October of 1998.

My life was completely torn apart when I lost my younger brother, Kevin to suicide. He was eighteen years old and the light of so many lives. There are no words to describe the feeling of loss and hopelessness that permeates your life when you lose a loved one in such a dramatic and unexpected way, and with a suicide there are so many compounded feelings of guilt and anger that accompany natural grief. Thankfully EMPACT-SPC had a Survivors of Suicide (SOS) support group in our area, and we were able to attend. It was in that group that I found others who had lost a loved one to suicide and in an instant I felt that I was never alone in my grief.

It has now been nearly thirteen years since Kevin took his own life, and a day does not go by that I do not think of him and wish with all of my heart that he were with me. As time has passed, slowly people have forgotten the past, or I have met new people in my life who never knew him. This walk is my way of honoring his memory while serving the EMPACT-SPC community that made me whole again when I thought there was nobody. Please consider sponsoring me by donating through our secure online page at http://www.firstgiving.com/fundraiser/EMPACT-SPC-Riki/PFChangsRockRollMarathonHalf-Marathon.

Thank you for allowing me to use this space to request your help. I am very much looking forward to the training that will lead up to January 15th, and cannot wait to wear Kevin’s photo on my back with the love of a very proud sister.

Riki

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Leave a Comment · Labels: All Miss Riki's Posts, Miss Riki's Musings Tagged: EMPACT-SPC, PF Changs's Rock n Roll Marathon, suicide prevention, suicude, support, walking

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Miss Riki’s Bookshelf

Riki's books

Isla and the Happily Ever After
Lola and the Boy Next Door
The One
The Elite
The Selection
If I Stay
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
Kissing Kris Kringle
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone
Ex-mas
Decked with Holly
Dash & Lily's Book of Dares
A Very Grey Christmas
My True Love Gave to Me: Twelve Holiday Stories
Let It Snow


Riki's favorite books »

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