Deconstructing Stigma

Deconstructing Stigma

Changing Attitudes About Mental Health

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The Campaign

Deconstructing Stigma: Changing Attitudes About Mental Health is a series of larger-than-life photographs and interviews with people from across the United States and beyond who have been affected by mental illness.

Since the campaign’s initial physical installation at Boston’s Logan International Airport, it has found homes in various US states, and has traveled the world with pop-up installations across the United States and in almost every inhabited continent. The installations, website, and the companion books serve to capture the complexity of living with a psychiatric disorder, seeking treatment, navigating insurance and healthcare systems, and facing stigma.

Told through the eyes of its participants, Deconstructing Stigma boldly challenges the misconceptions of what those with mental illness look like. The volunteers in this project are more than just statistics or nameless faces. They are mothers, fathers, wives, husbands, lawyers, doctors, engineers, musicians, and more. Each one has been affected by mental illness, and each one has also faced stigma.

Travelers look at airport exhibit — The physical installation of Deconstructing Stigma, on view now at Boston’s Logan Airport

Stigma—it’s an ugly word, and it’s even uglier to experience. Yet 75% of people with mental illness say they have endured the pain of stigma. Despite the concerns of being labeled and risking further stigma, the volunteers in this project are courageously sharing their stories of hope and resilience so that you will have an opportunity to “walk in their shoes” and perhaps step away with a different view of what it is like to have a mental illness.

1 in 5 Americans will experience mental illness in his or her lifetime. It is something that affects us all. If you are struggling with symptoms of an illness, or if you feel like no one would understand what you’re experiencing, this campaign is for you. You are not alone.

This project was developed by McLean Hospital, in partnership with local and national organizations. Together, we are deconstructing stigma, and together, we are changing lives.

Debbie

Denial will ruin me quicker than the condition itself

As a young mother and wife, Debbie never imagined that she would receive a diagnosis of dissociative identity disorder (DID). It wasn’t until a child psychologist, who was working with Debbie’s daughter, witnessed Debbie’s symptoms firsthand that her DID was recognized.

This diagnosis forced Debbie to shift how she viewed herself and her place in the world. Now, she takes pride in being a survivor of the challenges that she has spent the last 30 years battling.

Debbie is part of the 1.5% of the population that lives and learns every day through the lens of DID. Having DID means that Debbie is not alone in her brain—she has multiple alternate personalities, commonly referred to as “alters.” Today, Debbie is thankful for the ways in which her alters have aided in her survival.

They held on to trauma and brutality until I could process it, and that saved my sanity. My alters kept me going until I could get to a place where we, as a whole, were safe.

Debbie compares her alters to a family of foster kids who have different needs as a result of experiencing a traumatic past, but now need to come together to collaborate and work together as a team.

For Debbie and many other individuals living with DID, her brain developed these alters in response to the unthinkable traumas that she endured as a child.

People don’t want to believe that these types of things happen, but I assure you they do. I want to encourage people to keep an open mind and try to understand that the effects of child abuse can affect victims throughout their adult lives.

The repressed sexual, physical, mental, and emotional abuse that Debbie endured in her early life led to severe dissociative symptoms at a young age—and eventually, the development of alters that held on to her traumatic memories for years.

When Debbie was diagnosed in 1990, she found that the psychotherapies available to her at the time led to further trauma. These ineffective treatments resulted in Debbie’s denial of her condition. She left treatment and essentially shut the door to her past.

During the next 15 years, Debbie developed severe insomnia, eventually resulting in a mental breakdown. She once again found the courage to seek mental health treatment. Under the care of doctors and therapists, Debbie faced additional emotional and mental distress, resulting in several hospitalizations and severe life changing events.

Finally, at the beginning of 2023, I found an intensive outpatient program that specializes in complex trauma and dissociative disorders. The therapists have advanced training in dissociative disorders and complex PTSD, which has allowed me to feel seen and understood.

The program uses the theory of structural dissociation as the main framework for treating my condition. In addition, there is a strong focus on nervous system health, which teaches me how to feel safe and connected to myself and others.

With only a handful of programs in the country that specialize in dissociative disorders and treat DID at an outpatient level, I am so grateful to have now found something right in my own backyard.

Despite the tribulations that Debbie has faced in finding specialized care for her DID, she remains determined to continue healing and processing the traumas so she can live a more connected life within herself and within her world.

All of the alters in our system, though once abused and neglected, have learned to work together as one family. It took years, but we found a way to come together to bring light and understanding to all of our experiences.

Debbie hopes that by sharing her story she can bring awareness not only to dissociative identity disorder but also to the impact that childhood abuse has on the developing brain and how that trauma is carried into adulthood.

I am no different than anybody else. The trauma held in my body made it feel like I was an outcast and very different than the norm.

Once the alters learn to collaborate in a healthy way, you get to discover the gift of who you really are, and know that none of what led to the DID was your fault. In the face of such unthinkable trauma, DID actually is a brilliant resource in which alters are the answers.

Debbie encourages others feeling unsure of what is going on with their mind, body, and emotions to be curious within themselves.

I have learned that if you’re really curious about what’s going on inside of you, you will discover the truth within you. Now, I see that I have a beautiful gift inside of me that holds innocence and purity, and many healthy, “normal” desires and hopes that many children have who haven’t been abused have within themselves.

Now that the fragmented pieces of myself have come together, everything about all of me makes perfect sense—all of my odd behaviors, my terrors, my insecurities, and the grueling challenges that I have faced. There is nothing wrong with me. I am experiencing normal emotions and reactions to the chronic traumas that I faced, that were not okay and will never be okay. But I am okay!

The greatest gift I have received is the gift of understanding myself and my life experiences that brought me through and to where I am today. I know the universe has my back and I am safe with who I am, with the world around me, and with my God.