NAMI-National Alliance on Mental Illness

[Beautifulsky]

I attend virtual and in person NAMI meetings. It takes a lot of courage and strength though to go to these meetings because I hear a lot of horrifying stories of everyday people struggling with mental health issues---and the medical system not working for them. I hear about people not responding to medication or treatment. I hear about people not being to afford medical insurance. I hear people not being to have enough sleep at night. I hear about people not being to live with their family and have to find another place to live because their family can't support them while sick. Just all these stories shared among other sick people...is a burden. Although I can empathize because I also have a mental illness (schizophrenia) which I suffer with daily. I think there needs to be major reform to how people are diagnosed with mental illnesses, how they are treated in the medical system, and how they can function in society without the stigma. I don't feel incorporated into society as everyone else because of my mental diagnosis...I have been weeded out of the prairie of flowers. Sick stay with sick people. Healthy people stay with healthy people. That's how I think I'm treated here in the U.S. I wish this country changed. I never imagined I would get sick this way but I developed schizophrenia like overnight it seems. I woke up very sick. I wish the healthy people out there with compassion and intelligence can fight to change how sick people are treated here in the U.S. We need more reforms and a better establishment.