What does social media do for mental health?

• social media gives us a bigger voice and more choice without the fear of stigma.
• social media can help change laws that govern society and the workplace.
• further insight, inspiration, and communication
• recently lost my best friend…not in a good state of mind. My twitter friends, I believe, are saving my life
• Blogging has been a source of healing and also an avenue for spreading awareness, as well
• the transparency of social media is a wonderful antidote against the stigma associated with #mentalhealth

Mental Health in the work place

• companies lose a lot of $ from employees in denial or fear about dealing w/ #mentalhealth issues
• maybe we should call out employers who stigmatize employees with #mentalhealth problems.
• i wouldn’t want to work for an employer that had a problem that i openly talk about #mentalhealth

Stigma

• labels are neutral. can be used for good ie find diagnosis, treatment, resources or for harm ie stigmatizers
• calling out stigmatizers is not just for you but for others too afraid to call stigmatizers out
• there can be stigma attached to talking openly about mental health but sometimes you also find unexpected support.
• One thing I have noticed lately is that when one opens up on Twitter about struggles, there can be a stigma attached.

Misinformation

• we should remember that misinformation is also a problem outside of social media and the internet
• Is misinformation a “big” problem regarding #mentalhealth and social media?
• around the topic of #ADHD the ignorance & stigma on social media esp twitter far outweighs the facts

Therapy

• therapy and social media – maybe social media will change therapy the way it has other ways of communication?
• Perhaps it can…even in subtle ways… e.g. homework: blog about so and so this week

To that end, Raul and I thought we should work out some ideas on confidentiality during the actual camp. First I thought I’d just quickly throw together a few ideas but as I’m doing this I really become of all the nuances that this entails.

So what I’d like to do is to propose this draft – I’d REALLY like to have some input from you! Please comment!

• As a participant at MentalHealthCamp, please feel free to identify yourself however you wish – if you’d like to remain anonymous, no need to write down your real name on the ubiquitous “Hello My Name Is” tag (sorry, we don’t have the money for fancy lanyards
• We will ask photographers to be mindful of the fact that some of the participants may be people who do not wish their faces to be shown in the media (that includes the internet)
• There will be members of the mainstream media present. We will ask them to direct themselves to our lovely PR person Cathy Browne whenever possible. Cathy will then put them in touch with people who are comfortable discussing matters with mainstream media
• If you are approached for an interview, please remember that whatever you say is your choice. You can talk freely as much as you want, you can decline, or you can get guidance from Cathy as to how to respond
• We are hoping to record two or three sessions, ones that promise to be of a general manner where presenters and participants are likely to delve less into personal stories than in other sessions. When you participate in such a session, please be aware that you may become famous!
• At the beginning of each session, we will remind people that a) we need to respect confidentiality wherever we can, b) social media is all about transparency, c) we will try to marry the two as best as we can and d) notwithstanding a) and c), be as careful as you need to be!

There is an immediate gratification when using social media. Simply by typing a word, phrase or sentence and hitting publish or enter one can release a thought, idea, response or inquiry into the unknown. One can release: that is the beauty of it. You can release that pent up anger, happiness, love ad nauseum. This unknown can even respond, add to or reject what you say within mere seconds or, years down the road as it’s all cached, recorded, re-hashed and echoed into the tubes. What a wondrous extension of the human psyche we are privy to these days.

I only imagined this possible in 1998 after going into remission from Chron’s disease and leaving my ex-husband shortly after in 2000 and living on my own for the first time. That option didn’t exist in 2000 for me as a print graphic designer. Social Media was a dream and blogging was in its infancy, privy only to those who knew HTML.

You begin to build a thick skin that perhaps didn’t exist offline; a protective barrier from those who are out to maim, spam or say unjust and untrue things about you. I find I carry that thick skin into real life now but prefer the comfort of home to holding a real job. The real job made me sick; made me thirst for drugs.

Eventually, that pent up emotion will focus into your own self-guided online universe and it will evolve into whatever you want it to be.

And yes this job of blogging, twittering, facebooking, selling on Etsy, posting to flickr and sharing my thoughts and ideas on umpteen sites is demanding, and at times I do wonder why, I continue …  simply put: I love it. It’s easy for me to do. I experience an issue, I write, research and google until I find the answer. If no answer can be found I move onto the next task and usually a few days, weeks or months later the issue presents itself again and the answer is clear. Problem solved.

This isn’t to say that working online doesn’t get frustrating. It does especially when you are learning something new. As you learn though, each new task will become less tedious and daunting to implement or forget, if in the end it doesn’t fit into what you do.

My coworkers are people I’ve never met in real life. We don’t even share the same boss, office, city or timezone for that matter but we do all work towards a better life of freedom far away from the bureaucracy of offices, collapsing economies and institutions.

The stigma only exists if you don’t talk about it

I think the hardest thing to deal with is rejection online and it was the hardest to deal with offline to. It’s almost as difficult to deal with as elation or appreciation. The feelings are very intense with both and come on so strong at times that it’s all I can do to bear it. I take no prescription drugs having weaned myself off of the Paxil and Valium under the guidance of professionals. There is nothing to mask the emotion I feel at times and at times it does get overwhelming.

And creating daily whether it be drawing, painting, cooking, gardening, writing and even cleaning at times frees my mind of it’s past constraints and learned patterns opening up new frontiers to explore and draw inspiration from.

Limiting one’s time in forums and other social areas of the web is a good idea, too, as they will suck your time and creativity dry if you let them. I learned that the hard way. Haha! If you don’t like crowds in real life chances are you will not like them online. One on one is great. Think of it this way: you sit, write and read alone while someone else sits, types and reads alone from their screen. And escape is just a click away

A quiet life does suit me best.

This isn’t to say that the odd bit of excitement or routine isn’t welcome or wanted but it does mangle my mind into rhythms less understood and more infrequently visited when life turns hectic. I made it to the top of my trade in real life and during that climb up I lost it both mentally and spiritually.

I do pay my due tax. I keep records of ingoing and outgoing business monies. I take breaks when needed. I socialize. I laugh. I live and eat healthy.

Life after Abuse

I do consume alcohol in moderation and choose to stay clear of all hard drugs. GHB (a sedative) was my nemesis, the epitome of all happiness and a cure for my *ADD, **GAD ***PTSD, trichotilomania and tendencies towards OCD. For a short period of time it was my best friend, lover, the companion who traveled everywhere safely tucked inside my purse or handbag and sipped on hourly 24/7 and nearly cost me my life on more than one occasion.

I am 1,318 days sober as of writing this. I am no longer a functioning addict but a functioning adult.

Cheers!
sincerely,
Jessica Doyle

^{*ADD – Attention Deficit Disorder
**GAD – Generalized anxiety Disorder
***PTSD – Post Traumatic Stress Disorder}

And I’m hoping that’s where social media can really make some inroads. For one thing, it’s always there – you can post to a blog or go on to Twitter at any time. And when you feel you have no one to talk to, no friend to call, it’s nice to know that you can find whole communities of people who may be dealing with some of the same things as you or even just fellow twitterers to help distract you from what you may be going through.

When I first « came out » as having a mental illness, I was really hoping – almost expecting that I would be accepted, even embraced by those around me. That it would now be easier to get the support I needed – but that wasn’t the case at all. If anything, I felt that people would use my diagnosis against me – in ways that even affected my daughter. Friends, family, colleagues, the government, it seemed like I was taken dismissed as being almost a lesser person because of my diagnosis.

When I started my first twitter account about three months ago, I was worried about what to put in my bio because having a mental illness is a big part of who I am. But I decided to be open about my struggles, and for the first time, I was embraced for it. People followed me BECAUSE of my diagnosis, not IN SPITE of it. If I tweet that I am feeling down, people respond with virtual hugs.

And I have found out about things like the Coping Digitally panel at Northern Voices, MentalHealthCamp and other events, ressources and contacts where I can be be myself, be proud of who I am and – the best thing of all – not have to feel lost, alone or helpless.

My goal for MentalHealthCamp is of course to expand my knowledge of both mental illness and social media, but most of all, I’m looking forward to meeting in person the people I have met online and coming up with new ways to fight both mental illness and the stigma that surrounds it online and off.