Curtain Call: Ending the Stigmatization of Mental Health Through Sharing Lived Experiences

By: Kaitlyn Hall

When most think of someone struggling with a mental illness, the images they see in their brain are often heavily influenced by what Hollywood has shown on the big screen. Panic and anxiety attacks are reduced to breathing into paper bags. Behavioral health units are reduced to symphonies of alarms echoing off of padded walls. Depression is reduced to crying more than the average person and having a messy room. While a few movies and media sources get mental health right, most are perpetuating the stereotype that everybody with mental illness, whether diagnosed or not, are violent and harmful to themselves or others. According to an article published by the American Psychological Association (2024), up to 72% of 2022 film characters who have a mental illness on screen are painted as the villain or as a source of violence and pain for others.

Due to my lived experience with panic attacks, derealization, severe anxiety, bullying, flashbacks, and more, I have gotten a firsthand look at the impact of this harmful stigmatization and portrayal has on youth struggling with their own mental health. I have personally experienced what that false hope feels like when your favorite character has the same mental health issue that you do, but it is so obviously written in to fill a “plot hole.” I am a public speaker on my experiences as a survivor of mental illness and severe bullying, and I work to undo the harmful stereotypes and stigma that Hollywood casts onto our youth, one speech at a time.

I remember my first panic attack like it was yesterday, though it’s now been over seven years. I was 10 years old and in a bathroom stall at the funeral of my great uncle, and it suddenly felt like I couldn’t breathe and that the room was falling around me. I had several more of these episodes for years, and stayed in a state of denial that what I was experiencing was, in fact, a panic attack. This finally stopped when I was 14 and I had a panic attack so badly that I almost passed out in the middle of the school day. I knew something had to change. I began being more open with others about the struggles I was facing, pulling back the curtain on the stigma of mental illness. Since beginning my journey as a public speaker, I have witnessed the impact that my commitment to openness has made. I have had several conversations with attendees of my speeches after I step off stage and “after the curtain closes” about how my courage to share what I have experienced gave them the courage to do the same.

Fast forward to now, I have come to terms with the fact that I struggle with Generalized Anxiety Disorder, Seasonal Affective Disorder, and possibly Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder as a result of the trauma I have experienced. I am greatly aware that others have not had the opportunity, support, or resources to do this, and that is a large motivator for me in continuing to be outspoken about my experiences. I’ve known since I was 13 years old that I have wanted to go into trauma surgery, and I’ve faced bias and outright discrimination as a result of my mental health. The ones that stick with me most include “How are you going to be a trauma surgeon with anxiety? You’ll kill someone if your hands shake” and “Seasonal affective disorder? Who would want to hire someone who is a liability for three months out of the year?” Due to my outstanding academic achievement, post-traumatic growth, and how I chose to put together what was broken, my struggles were invalidated by healthcare professionals when I decided it was time to seek treatment for the issues I had been facing.

I am now a senior in high school, and plan to go to college to study psychology and neuroscience, with a research concentration in the connection between Seasonal Affective Disorder and trauma. I still want to be a trauma surgeon; in fact, that’s the only thing I can ever see myself doing. Past my career aspirations and above everything else, I want to be for others what I never had for myself. Like many others, I have faced biases, discrimination, and skepticism based on factors that are out of my control. However, like everybody who is reading this, I am a human being. I have hobbies, likes, dislikes, hopes, dreams, friends, and things that get me out of bed in the morning. I see myself as a part of a larger community. This community is one that does not deserve to be painted as the villain, one that does not demand to be seen as the hero, but desires to simply exist and be seen as a human being.

          Those with mental illness do not deserve to be demonized based on outdated stereotypes that continue to be driven home by the biggest industry worldwide. Together, we can work to build a future that closes the curtain on harmful stigmas surrounding those struggling in silence. We can build support groups and find strength in numbers and, most importantly, strength within ourselves. We often ask ourselves who we are and what we stand for, yet we keep standing, even applauding, for a curtain that is doomed to fall. We clap for endings, but often forget that beginnings deserve their own celebration. How human it feels to be able to connect with someone in a way that we often forget is an option - backstage, standing side by side, hand-in-hand, sharing our experience as the curtain falls.

REFERENCES

Medaris, A. (2024, March 1). Is mental health still misconstrued on screen? Psychology goes to Hollywood to dispel stigma. https://www.apa.org. https://www.apa.org/monitor/2024/03/psychology-hollywood-mental-health#:~:text=And%20yet%2C%20AII%20has%20found,with%20mental%20illness%20are%20violent.