A safe place to talk openly about mental health & illness
Is there a "right" way to talk about illness and disability? The current popular favourite is person-first language. It really got going in the 1990s, with the American Psychological Association leading the charge. Instead of talking about a "disabled person", person-first language literally puts the person first, as in "person with a disability." This has… Continue reading Is Person-First Language All It’s Cracked Up to Be?
I mentioned in a recent weekend wrap-up that this was coming, and now it's here. As of today, I’m officially not a nurse any more. This isn't an abrupt transition by any means. I've known this was coming for a while now, and I’ve already been through a shuffling of role identities. My nurse identity… Continue reading An Identity Milestone: No Longer a Nurse
There are some significant barriers that people living in poverty face when it comes to managing their finances. However, these may not always be obvious, so let's talk about them. Let's consider what it might look like to be living in poverty here in British Columbia, Canada, where I live. Provincial income assistance payments, including… Continue reading Poverty Can Be Very Expensive
I don't have the economics background to speak to the feasibility of universal basic income, so I won't try; however, I did want to explore the potential benefits for people with mental illness. What universal basic income is While various implementations have been proposed, at its core, universal basic income (UBI) has several basic characteristics.… Continue reading Universal Basic Income: Benefits for People with Mental Illness
In this series, I dig a little deeper into the meaning of psychology-related terms. This week's term is the euphemism treadmill. Psychologist and linguist Stephen Pinker coined the term euphemism treadmill in a 1994 article in the New York Times. It refers to a process by which words that are used as a euphemism for a… Continue reading What Is… the Euphemism Treadmill
The last time I worked a shift as a nurse was in November 2019. Since then, I've been unable to work because of my depression, and specifically because of psychomotor retardation. I didn't want to apply for disability until it got to the point that I was quite sure I wasn't going to be able… Continue reading Adventures Applying for Disability
Recently, I came across a post that was a myths vs. facts type deal on mental illness stigma. One of the myths identified was that people with mental illness are disabled. The blogger's response was that, on some days, mental illness could make it harder to work for some people, but there are also people… Continue reading Is It Helpful to Sanitize Mental Illness?
not sp While doing some research for my upcoming book on stigma, I came across a 2004 discussion paper on Stigma and Work. It was written by Heather Stuart, a public health faculty member at Queen's University in Canada. It quickly became clear that the author's PhD in epidemiology didn't prevent her from having some… Continue reading Mental Illness Stigma Researchers Don’t Speak for Us
I've never been a big social media person. Before I started blogging, I briefly had a Facebook account, but that didn't last long. Once I started blogging, I created accounts on Pinterest and Twitter. I started a new Facebook account, but deleted that pretty quickly because I just don't like Facebook. Last year, I created… Continue reading My Depression’s Cooling Relationship with Social Media
You hear quite a bit about mental health recovery, but what does that actually entail? An Australian National Standards for Mental Health Services document from 2010 defines recovery as: ... gaining and retaining hope, understanding of ones abilities and disabilities, engagement in an active life, personal autonomy, social identity, meaning and purpose in life, and… Continue reading The Moving Target of Recovery