Personal Stories

Imagine my excitement, the hope that relief from the sucking tar of misery that dogged too many of my days was within my reach. From that moment and for thirty years to follow, I was the willing guinea pig for any number of drugs. Nothing helped for long.

Experiences such as pain, turmoil, trauma and grief aren’t separate from the person—they shape how that person sees the world, how they cope with the world. To separate those experiences from the person, to call them sick, feels barbaric. It feels as if humans are being taught to fear being human.

I have known altered states of consciousness since I was a child.  I clearly remember staring into the mirror in my mother’s bathroom and...

Editor's Note: The author has written her story using a different name.  Here, she's explained why: "In my country, Poland, the stigma attached to the...

This was my son’s answer when I was questioning him, trying desperately to find out what was going on in his mind. Why did...

In 1994, my nineteen-year old daughter, Cristina, was diagnosed with chronic myelogenous leukemia (CML). It was a diagnosis that came totally out of the blue and as a complete shock. Soon after she was diagnosed, it became clear that I wasn’t going to be able to sleep because of the tremendous stress, so I asked the very kind doctor who diagnosed Cristina if he could give me a prescription for something that would help me sleep. He agreed, and so began my “relationship” with Xanax. I had never taken anything like that before and didn’t know anything about it. All I knew was that as my daughter’s primary caregiver, I needed sleep in order to fight to keep her alive.

I was sixteen and going on seventeen and I had never gone crazy before.  I think the most startling aspect of it is how...