Personal Stories

The biggest injustice done to a person with such a diagnosis is to give up on them for the rest of their life.

“These things we do, so others may live.” It took a small army of my brothers and sisters in and out of uniform to drag me out of my abyss.

This is the story of a young woman who suffered through the agony of "kindling" and other drug-related harm, eventually dying by suicide. This is also the story of her mother’s path ahead.

When images of myself climbing over the Golden Gate Bridge’s unmistakable red railing appear on the screen, questions shoot through my mind: Where did this footage come from? Why is it on TV?

No one is prepared to have the ability to feel attraction or fall in love taken away from them. I am incapable of what makes humans human: emotions, emotional bonding.

I painfully and gradually learned to function with my dysfunctions. Over time, I noticed genuine improvement.

Recovery from PTSD and from all the drugs I was prescribed was a journey filled with ups and downs, setbacks, and breakthroughs.

Mood tracking can make someone realize: I’m starting to become manic, and this is why, and this is what I can do about it.

It’s time to seek out and rescue those pieces of me still trapped in that time and allow them to finally be at peace.

Does my complex PTSD, depression and rage go back farther than I think? Back to the womb and my earliest days of life? Is that even possible?

If the Veterans Administration is sincere in wanting to reduce veteran suicides, the first place to start is to collect information following these deaths to try to better understand the causes.

After my VA mental health team prescribed Prozac, I began experiencing rapidly escalating behavioral changes. The drug was never considered as a potential cause.

In a way, the hospital had made me feel better. It had shown me a vision of hell that was going to become my future if I didn't take drastic action.

It's hard, if not impossible, to impose on my son’s story any kind of literary “sense.” As a writer and a mother both, this has been my challenge. 

My beloved mother was mistreated, cheated, abused mentally, and alienated from her family by her conservator and the courts.

The feeling of being institutionalized and medicated over minor ailments is difficult to shake. I have been to countless therapy sessions attempting to deconstruct the feelings of dehumanization into digestible morsels.

I made a series of videos with psychologist and researcher Anders Sørensen, answering the questions that haunted me the most throughout my tapering process.

There needs to be more informed consent with these medications. If Joey was more aware of the potential side effects at the very beginning, I feel he would still be here today.

You go from enjoying writing to dreading the idea of ever scribbling words on a piece of paper ever again. What was once your escape has now become your prison.

I know now that I can trust myself and listen to my intuition. Within the mental health system, I trusted everyone but myself.

Sam Ruck shares his fourth excerpt from his book Healing Companions, which describes his life with, and love for, his wife and her “alters.” 

If the wounded healer doesn't work on their wounds, they become the wounded wounder, keeping the client and themselves trapped in their roles.

I wake to what has happened every day, and must filter my every action through the memories and the fallout of what I did when I was psychotic as a twenty-four-year-old kid.

Sam Ruck shares his third excerpt from his book Healing Companions, which describes his life with, and love for, his wife and her “alters.” 

If one person is struggling, everyone in the family is struggling. Families need support.