I took back my power today.

when I was younger, I used to never want to play in my tool by myself anymore and my mom asked me why one day and I said “because of the man upstairs with the sharp teeth.” So my mom didn’t think anything of it at the time. My brother used to always hear me talking to voices and he never told my mom cause he thought it was normal, he used to always keep me safe at night when I was younger. 6 years later I was diagnosed with autism, ADHD, Depression, OCD, Paranoia and psychotic episodes. I used too attend a special needs school called James brindley, things was going well so far, until the day they made a bunch of changes and didn’t even think of any of the outcomes for any students. So I left that school and never really had any education for 6 months. I ended up getting a place at hallmoor school and things was going well so far, I made a few friends, I had my first proper girlfriend, I bought her a ring and turns out things didn’t go so well. She is one of them girls who are high maintenance (she doesn’t know what she wants.) so for months on end she kept playing with my heart and I was depressed for a while. I finally got over her, a few weeks later I met a girl online called Demi, me and Demi didn’t last long as I wanted us too. One day at a school Hannah (my first proper girlfriend) asked me if there was a chance of us getting back together and I said hell no. She didn’t respond and went back to class. Me and Demi broke up as I said and honestly it was my first time breaking up with a girl, I hate breaking up with girls cause I feel like such an asshole after. About a year later I dated another girl in school called katy, she was dating me and two other lads at the same time. So that relationship didn’t last long. A lot of more months later, I went out with this girl called seema, things went well for 3 months straight until rumors were going around saying I was gonna break up with her and I even told her to her face I would never break up with her. At the end of the day, she broke up with me, said some horrible stuff to me like “ever since I dated you I’ve had nothing but bad luck and you never treated me right.” Even though I bought her flowers, a ring, Beyoncé perfume. Months on end we still wouldn’t talk to each other, she got other people to start ignoring me and no one to talk to me and that was for a whole year.

I didn't even know that Borderline Personality Disorder was a thing until I was twenty-six years old and it was fall of 2019. I remember I had a sore throat so I went to express care, next thing I knew I had strep throat and I was on an antibiotic called penicillin. I can't exactly remember when I started taking the medication, however I do remember the very next day was not a happy one. I was getting ready for work and playing with my daughter on the couch, she was about a year and a half old at the time. I was perfectly fine and then all of a sudden I wanted to kill myself.

It started with ignoring my problems because I thought if I ignored them, and act strong, then the problems would go away. Then, I bottled up my emotions, and my problems got to the point where it was affecting my life. I was bottling things up so much that I did not know how to release my emotions and tell people my problems. I felt like a different person to the point where I thought I would feel like this forever. The dark cloud that was hovering over my head was following me, my life was on stand still, and my problems were out of control. I felt myself slipping away, and my boyfriend looked at me and said, “You need help.” I was scared to death to reach out for help because I knew that would mean I would have to admit that I have a problem. It is not easy for people to admit, “hey, I have a problem with depression.”

1 in 5 adults in America experience mental illness. Nearly 1 in 25 adults suffer serious mental illness. One half of all chronic mental illness begins before the age of 14; 75% by age of 24. 1 in 100 (2.4 million) American adults live with schizophrenia. 26% ( 6.1 million) American adults live with bipolar disorder. 6.9% (16 million) American adults live with severe depression, 18.1% ( 42 million) of American adults live with anxiety disorders. 46.4% of American adults will suffer a mental illness in their lifetime.

It’s 4pm, and I’ve only had a small breakfast. I fell asleep before I finished my morning coffee and woke up in the afternoon.

“The Social Dilemma” brings together social media app leaders to discuss the unstoppable monster of their own creation. This Netflix Documentary is a bold warning of the unforeseen strength that lies within our technological devices. Some ramifications of tech usage have undeniably negative consequences which are highlighted in the film, but will it truly lead to civilizations' downfall as the documentary suggests?

If reports are to be believed, internet trolls have chased yet another famous face off of Social Media.

Savage warmongers or animal-loving pacifists? Uncivilized beasts or trainable inferiors? Early settlers of North America perhaps debated these questions amongst themselves when encountering the indigenous peoples of The New World. Regardless of the discussions that took place, one thing is certain: the decimation of Native American (NA) populations is a black mark forever ingrained in United States history.

Dear (Suburban) Black Girl,

On February 15th a 40 year old woman took her own life. I may not have known her, but she was one of the 7 billion+ humans I share this planet I call home with. She had a life to live, family and friends who loved her, and so much left to add to the shared experience we are all living through. But n0w she's gone. And though I didn't know her, I can't help but feel pangs of genuine anger and sadness.

An Open Letter to Lady Gaga -

I am a mother to 5 year old boy, he is the greatest thing in the world. But I am also an addict, I’ve been an addict since well before he was born. I love him dearly but love doesn’t conquer addiction. I wish he was all I needed to stop. I’ve been a great mother most of the time and sometimes not such a great one. There have been times addiction has gotten the best of me and my mother in law was the one that helped me with my son, so my son didn’t have to seen me like that. I am greatful for the support I have around me, but I didn’t always have that support. Before I had that support I was a mess ! I would go back and forth from being clean to not being clean and back to clean again, all the while I had my son. Trying to put him and his needs first some days I could barely get out of bed from being sick, but I still got up and did the things I needed to do. The worst part was me using around him when he was a baby to a toddler. I always did what I had to make sure he had everything he needed and made sure he was taken care of. Even though I did make sure he was taken care of and had everything I still felt like a horrible mom because I couldn’t give up the drugs and even more horrible because I couldn’t give them up for him! No one understands that no matter how much you love someone especially your children, the drugs always have a tighter grip on you.

about alcoholism…

What do you bring with you when you are literally running for your life? Well, like the reasons that brought you to that point, the answer isn’t really all that simple.

You’ve been there.

Mental health is one of the main issues among young people. There are over a million children and youth who are dealing with mental illness in Canada alone. According to the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH), around 75% of people who have a mental illness do not have access to specialized treatment.

As you know, we've been working together on our agoraphobia for a little while now and again, I'm doing this series because I'm hitting the decade mark for my diagnosis (thanks doc, it really helped to know). I'm not going to lie to you when I say that I had never even heard of the word when I was first diagnosed, I had never heard of either of my anxieties: agoraphobia and hypochondria. But, I am not going to lay down dead and do nothing but pop pills for the rest of my life. And there is no reason you should too. Your medication is very important but it can only go so far. Other things you should do is practice some habits that you can use to get your mind off those intrusive thoughts.

Anxiety. It happens to everyone.

Let me pick up where I left off in Middle School, a dream deferred. With my goal of being a quarterback, a leader of my peers over in my eyes I decided to make the most of my time as a left tackle. I didn't realize it then, but that's actually a very important position. I'm glad I didn't because it would have made my anxiety that much more serious. I also played Defensive tackle which means I was the first line of defense against the opposing teams running game. I would have been pretty good if I could keep my mouthpiece in my mouth. My anxiety caused me to be nauseated most games and having a mouthpiece in only made the issue worse. I was warned multiple times by coaches and refs, but they didn't know the real problem. That monster in my brain telling my body that it was time to panic whenever my number was called. I couldn't focus on play calls, so remembering the playbook was a moot point. I would just block the guy in front of me or crash the gap when I was on defense. Most of the time I got it right and the other times I would get yelled at or one of my teammates would pay the price. Anxiety affected not only me but everyone and everything I was involved in or with. I couldn't even take a shower after practice because I was so afraid of doing the wrong thing or messing something up around my band of brothers. That made me the stinky kid in school.

It was about 8:30 PM on Tuesday 20, 2018. I just got off my first ever job at Toys R Us, which was only a 15 minutes walk away from my apartment, and that was perfect for me being a 16 years-old with no driver's license because I am terrified of driving. I couldn't call my dad to pick me up because he would complain about my work not being too far away from the apartment, and he would be mad that I called because he had to go to work very early the next day. I was in a great mood that night, so I decided to walk instead of giving my dad an excuse to yell at me and ruin my mood.

As I sat in a video call with friends who are continents away, crushing Oreos into sub-par vanilla ice cream, I realised that I was depressed again.

Imagine being completely submerged in a pool of blissful love. For the first time in your life you actually know what love is. When you compare this feeling, with the relationships of the past you realize that the others only paved way for her. There is something special about her. You can’t find the words to adequately convey this - feeling? That word seems too shallow for this…

Bipolar is like a house.

He was impressed by the bikes that crossed the street. The pure sight of their shape, the people who sat on them, the history of the people who made the construction possible, the physics which seemed to be self-evident. it had been a few hundred thousand years before that point was reached. Shouldn't they just collapse? Sink into the ground? He imagined how they shattered into their individual parts, each particle, small, completing the whole. They came from the spirit.

I was a liar—a big one. Not because I wanted to be but because it was easier that way. People didn't want to hear my truth. Most of them would instead have believed that I was alright, and all was well with my world because then they didn't have to do shit. Humans always seemed to want to take the easy route, in my former opinion, probably because "the easy route" means less mental stress and less physical work. Here is an example that should help me illuminate this to you: a few years ago, while attending university, I was in a deep depression, and like your average learner, I tended to struggle with keeping up with the workload of multiple courses. Which meant my homework didn't always get done when it needed to be. So I often found myself lying to professors in hopes of getting a second chance of finishing whatever needed to be completed, and it usually worked. There was this one time, in particular, where I had procrastinated past a due date; when I went to the professor's office to ask for more time, I lied and said I was under a lot of stress and was sorry for the inconvenience it would cause her, my professor, of turning in late work if she allowed me to submit it.

Mental health is the condition of the successful functioning of all our mental functions. It is difficult to explain this but when a person is mentally healthy he is able to perform daily activities successfully and is able to deal with good human relationships, he is able to cope with change and deal with diversity . Although in our daily lives we do not see what mental health is all about, we become curious about it as soon as we realize that there is something wrong or absent in life. mental beauty and yet most of the times we choose to ignore it.

It started with ignoring my problems because I thought if I ignored them, and act strong, then the problems would go away. Then, I bottled up my emotions, and my problems got to the point where it was affecting my life. I was bottling things up so much that I did not know how to release my emotions and tell people my problems. I felt like a different person to the point where I thought I would feel like this forever. The dark cloud that was hovering over my head was following me, my life was on stand still, and my problems were out of control. I felt myself slipping away, and my boyfriend looked at me and said, “You need help.” I was scared to death to reach out for help because I knew that would mean I would have to admit that I have a problem. It is not easy for people to admit, “hey, I have a problem with depression.”

I wonder if it's just me that's constantly struggling to find some peace.

Depression is a funny thing. There is no big defining moment where you finally conquer your inner demons. More like a lot of small battles that don't seem to matter that add up. I remember back when. I would wake up look at a few bottles of pills and think not today, today will be better. I never actually believed and was convinced I was lying to myself because don't you know there is no deception like self-deception. Every day before I went to sleep, I looked at those bottles thinking that I would wait till morning to decide after a night's sleep. In truth I don't know how long this cycle went. I don't even remember when it stopped. The thought of death was always present in the background. I was isolated not talking to anyone. I was subconsciously trying to lessen the impact my death would have. It's weird you think if you push everyone away, they won't be sad at your death. While not trying to plug the idea of smoking it was cigars that caused the first many victories. I'm a smoker and someone reached out to me to meet for cigars. Now if you don't know anything about smoking actual cigars hand rolled make cigarettes look pathetic by comparison. How could I pass it up? Something about the extra nicotine made me more relaxed and let me enjoy myself for a while. It started to be a thing to meet for dinner and then talk over cigars. Small amounts of human contact helped distract from the feelings making me depressed but, not enough to make them go away entirely. The next small victory came from someone new being hired at work. Now this whole time I had learned to act normal in public. I normally let myself only let my guard down by myself. I don't why I wanted to spend more time with them. I imagine it was probably a mix of those cigar meetings made me realize how much I missed human contact, wanting to spend time with someone close to my own age, and the fact she was almost contagiously happy most days. I even caught I genuinely smiling around her instead of faking feeling happy. It's funny someone can affect someone without realizing it. Not going to lie I was kind of awkward trying to talk her but, hell it had been a while since I had initiated trying to spend time with someone socially. The other person I was spending time with initiated the idea of spending time socially. Now before this goes off the rails and people start thinking this is a love story, I'll clarify. It was something so much simpler just someone trying to make a friend, so they didn't feel so lonely and trapped. It may sound stupid but without all those small meetings for cigars which were in themselves small victories I don't think I would have gotten to this point. Over time I started feeling more comfortable spending time with them and those things I had been telling myself in the morning and night didn't seem like lies anymore. One day I woke up drank a cup of coffee with a cig and it wasn't till about halfway through I realized I had skipped my dark morning ritual and then I realized I had skipped it for a few days the night one to. It had stopped so gradually I didn't even notice right away. Wasn't long till I was starting to have hopes and dreams again. I tell this story for two reasons for those of you who feel lost and hopeless it can get better and for those not struggling it took someone reaching out to me for the change to start. This story could have had a very different ending if not for that.

I didn't even know that Borderline Personality Disorder was a thing until I was twenty-six years old and it was fall of 2019. I remember I had a sore throat so I went to express care, next thing I knew I had strep throat and I was on an antibiotic called penicillin. I can't exactly remember when I started taking the medication, however I do remember the very next day was not a happy one. I was getting ready for work and playing with my daughter on the couch, she was about a year and a half old at the time. I was perfectly fine and then all of a sudden I wanted to kill myself.

"I wish that people could understand that the brain is the most important organ in your body. Just because you can't see it like you could see a broken bone doesn't mean it's not as detrimental and devastating to a family or an individual" - Demi Lovato

It’s 4pm, and I’ve only had a small breakfast. I fell asleep before I finished my morning coffee and woke up in the afternoon.

People say a picture is worth a thousand words... So, what does it say when that picture is a quote on your body that is worth your life?

Have you ever stress ate even when you were not hungry at all? Have you finished a whole tub of ice-cream just because you were feeling very emotional or were not in good mood? Or even worst, ate and felt guilty or shameful after having your favorite food? If yes, you have started binge eating. If this is done on a regular basis, like eating just because you are too emotional or feeling stressed or feeling anxious or depressed for some reason, and over-indulge with food more than twice a month, you might be suffering from binge eating disorder. At this time, where we binge-watch on our favorite series or do movie marathons, we tend to binge eat too, without even realizing that we are eating a large amount of food in a very short span which can lead to guilt or shame after the realization of what you did.

*****Warning this article may be triggering*****

COVID-19 is a haven for narcissists and psychopaths to amp up the abuse at home. It is an opportunity for them to be menacing, abusive and to sabotage the career of the target, whilst disrupting the children and family and subjecting them to persistent chaos.

Eliminating sociopathy from the gene pool, now that is a concept. If we could rewrite the genes of a baby at conception, this idea could work. It is one way to treat genetic disabilities at any rate, and since I have 22q, Velocardiofacial syndrome, it is a way to treat this disorder that researchers at major clinics like Stanford are working on. Narcissism or sociopathic spectrum mental illness is not always something that you are born with but rather it is something that a person can develop due to something that happens at the age of 2 or 3, due to parenting styles.

1 in 5 adults in America experience mental illness. Nearly 1 in 25 adults suffer serious mental illness. One half of all chronic mental illness begins before the age of 14; 75% by age of 24. 1 in 100 (2.4 million) American adults live with schizophrenia. 26% ( 6.1 million) American adults live with bipolar disorder. 6.9% (16 million) American adults live with severe depression, 18.1% ( 42 million) of American adults live with anxiety disorders. 46.4% of American adults will suffer a mental illness in their lifetime.

There were many reasons why watching the first presidential debate was infuriating. Donald Trump’s childish tantrums and displays of disrespect were worse than usual. I’ve seen grade-schoolers with better impulse control and guests on the Jerry Springer show behave better than he did during his first live debate with the former Vice President.

I have spoken and written openly about my mental health struggles for years. In fact, my first poetry collection - Dark Nights into Brighter Days - is an honest account of my experiences with depression and anxiety during my time at university and beyond.

Do you remember this little girl? This sweet girl who deserved love, who deserved to be cared for. This little girl who deserved to be protected. This little girl who grew up to have PTSD and anxiety and crippling mental issues because her family didn't protect her.

I grew up the youngest of a blended family, between my mom and dad it was just me, on my fathers side he has a daughter, my mother side she has a son and daughter making it four of us.

As a 19-year-old, I may not have as many stories as others sharing about their mental health. Unfortunately, my trauma started early, so early that I'm not even really sure when it started.

When I think about my years spent growing up in the public school system, my stomach knots up and I cringe. But not for the reason you may think. I don’t get that yucky feeling because the school system failed me. I get it due to the memory of how awful it felt to have ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) and go undiagnosed for forty years.

Psych ward E

It all started the beginning of my freshman year. I was a very soft, naïve kind of person and I was getting to know my new environment a little better. I was learning where to hang out at break and lunch, my classrooms, getting to know my teachers, all that fun stuff. Pretty soon I felt like high school was going to be a walk through the park and everything would go perfectly. I'd get through all four years and walk out the same fella I was when I went in. I couldn't have been more wrong at any time in my life. One of my particular classes was called AVID (Advancement Via Individual Determination) which was a fairly cheery atmosphere. After about two months through the year is when I met a girl, which for the sake of protection, we will refer to her as GG.