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.

Stories

Sandy

I am a whole and dynamic person

Sandy taught history at a local high school. It was her passion to help kids. She led the running club, school newspaper, and debate club. As an immigrant herself, she volunteered after school to help newcomers to the country.

I knew a career in service and teaching was for me.

She was the picture of a put-together middle-class working mom. But she was introduced to the world of mental health treatment when she had a seizure while teaching.

I was diagnosed with epilepsy and spent hundreds of hours on electroencephalogram machines that measured the electrical activity in my brain while doctors tried to determine what was causing the seizures. I spent eight years in therapy for depression, but my condition only worsened as the seizures continued. Eventually, I began to feel suicidal, and I began to have troubling flashbacks. My diagnosis changed from simply epilepsy and depression to epilepsy and a mood disorder with psychotic episodes.

None of Sandy’s initial providers asked about her history of trauma. If they did, they would have discovered that Sandy was a survivor of child sex trafficking. She was forced into sex work from the ages of 11 to 16.

I hadn’t thought of the time I was trapped in sex work as trauma. I just thought it was something I went through. I thought it had happened to me because I was a bad person. This kind of sexual exploitation makes you feel like you’re not worth much. I wasn’t sure I deserved to be ‘fixed.’

During an emergency psychiatric hospitalization, a provider noticed that Sandy dissociated often. After her inpatient stay, she was finally sent to an outpatient facility that specialized in trauma-based care. There, she was connected with psychiatric care that gave her the diagnosis of dissociative identity disorder (DID). At first, this diagnosis did not make sense to Sandy.

When I was a child, my dissociation wasn’t a disorder. It protected me and saved me from the world I was living in. But as an adult, part of me was still living in the past, and I was afraid.

Through the continued help of specialized DID therapy, Sandy accepted her new diagnosis. Sandy also began the long journey of seeking trauma-informed health care. She searched for a primary care physician comfortable with trauma-based treatment. When she found one, her team was complete. But even as she worked hard to treat her DID, Sandy faced stigma around her diagnosis.

When I began treatment for DID, I needed to make a safety plan. I wanted to rely on those around me. When I explained my new diagnosis, some of my friends said they weren’t comfortable supporting me. It felt like people were worried I would rub off on them, and I spent a lot of time trying to make the people around me comfortable.

Sandy is working to destigmatize DID. She is part of a lived experience advisory panel, where she can share her story with researchers studying DID. She is pushing for more trauma-based care in the medical field, relying on her experience as both a medical and psychiatric patient. Sandy’s advocacy extends beyond mental health work.

I want to help people with histories like mine, in sex work. People sometimes don’t see me as a whole person because of my past—they question my moral compass. But why doesn’t anyone question the moral compass of all those grown adults having sex with kids? The fact is it wasn’t my choice.

Today, Sandy is proud of her resilience in the face of struggle. She has worked hard to give back to her communities and recognizes her unique gifts. She wants to uplift others who share her past or diagnosis.

I am a whole and dynamic person. I have many facets of my life that I am so proud of, and I think my life of service is an example. Part of who I am is my mental health challenges, but that’s not solely who I am.

I am a wife, a mother, a colleague, a teacher. I have a superpower. I can get through life and still give back—because I had the help, because I got the right diagnosis and treatment.