The Journey: Until the moment I stepped into the Psychiatric Emergency Department at our local hospital, I had no idea the speed of my son’s breakdown. I was totally and completely floored. It wasn’t as though I didn’t know he was depressed; he’d been in counseling for years. I knew he disliked school and I had […]
A Caregivers Path
A few months ago, I was asked to share my story with a local Caregivers organization. As I was reading it over the weekend, I realized that many of my readers may not know the story of how I became a Caregiver. If you are a Parent/Caregiver, welcome! I am glad to have you along on […]
Caregivers Guest Post: Self Care Strategies
I am excited and honored to end this Caregivers in the Spotlight month with a post from Kathleen Nelson Troyer. Kat and I met through a mutual friend not long after I relocated to the Bay Area. I admire her work, her path and her courage. I am grateful and humbled that Kat agreed to share […]
Caregivers Guest Post: Promises Not Worth Keeping
I am excited to share today’s Caregivers in the Spotlight guest post written by Annie Slease. Annie and I met each other on twitter just over two years ago when I first launched this blog. I felt incredibly lucky to meet Annie and was grateful that she was willing to talk about her journey as a caregiver. […]
Speaking Up
The following post was originally published on the Childhood Bipolar Project site on June 28, 2014. As you read, think about this… how often do we ignore that voice inside us that says something is not right, this doesn’t feel right to me or this doesn’t honor my needs? And why do we ignore? Food […]
Fighting Stigma
Last week, I had the honor and privilege to share an original essay on shattering stigma as part of the Stigma Fighters series on oldschoolnewschoolmom.com. Sarah Fader created Stigma Fighters as a safe place for people to share their stories about living with mental illness. Sarah not only has created this non-judgmental space for others […]
Shattering the Stigma
Today, Far From Paradise’s latest post is being featured over at OldSchoolNewSchoolMom.com as part of their Stigma Fighters series – You can read it in full here. ****Head on over and show some love! Stigma Fighters is a blog series where real people with mental health issues are sharing their stories in order to combat societal stigma. Human beings […]
The Scars We Choose
Lately I have been thinking about the things we do in life to commemorate or to remember a period of time. There are many ways we remember these times; some choose writing about experiences, or photographing important memorable items and still others choose to create a memorial or select an artifact to serve as a […]
A Chat about Blogging, Mental Health and Stigma Shattering: Guest Podcast
Happy Memorial Day to all of my US Readers! This past week, I had the privilege and honor to represent Far From Paradise blog as a Podcast guest on my friend Darren’s blog Myriad of Ideas – a place to “Share and Learn”. During the podcast we chatted about blogging, mental health and shattering the […]
It’s Their Journey
Spring has finally sprung up here in the northeast USA. It has been a long, cold winter as it is every year. As much as I dislike the cold and grey days, it truly allows me to appreciate when winter breaks and spring arrives. There is a buzz that I feel, like I can actually […]
