Elyn R. Saks

My good fortune is not that I've recovered from mental illness. I have not, nor will I ever. My good fortune lies in having found my life.

Mental illness" is among the most stigmatized of categories.' People are ashamed of being mentally ill. They fear disclosing their condition to their friends and confidants-and certainly to their employers.

Dropping in and out of your own life (for psychotic breaks, or treatment in a hospital) isn__ like getting off a train at one stop and later getting back on at another. Even if you can get back on (and the odds are not in your favor), you__e lonely there. The people you boarded with originally are far, far ahead of you, and now you__e stuck playing catch-up.

The humanity we all share is more important than the mental illnesses we may not

No one would ever say that someone with a broken arm or a broken leg is less than a whole person, but people say that or imply that all the time about people with mental illness.

The simple truth is, not every fight can be won.

There__ a tremendous need to implode the myths of mental illness, to put a face on it, to show people that a diagnosis does not have to lead to a painful and oblique life....We who struggle with these disorders can lead full, happy, productive lives, if we have the right resources.

Stigma against mental illness is a scourge with many faces, and the medical community wears a number of those faces.

in my experience, the words __ow just calm down_ almost inevitably have the opposite effect on the person you are speaking to.