Issues and Advocacy

In my nine years I have been involved in writing about my illness and in attending support groups and conferences, I have listened attentively to thousands of patients and their loved ones. The bottom line is we all want to improve our lives. We want to get well and stay well. We want peace within ourselves, we want rewarding social and personal relationships, we want productive lives.

It comes down to fair play. We want our illness to be taken as seriously as the person who has cancer, we want access to treatment and to information, we want basic respect. On one hand, we want full equality, on the other we are looking to be cut a bit of slack.

There are two operative terms, one that embraces our hopes and dreams, and the other that defines all that stands in the way: Recovery and stigma. Everyone is talking about recovery, and we all know about stigma.

Recovery is all about setting our own goals for what we want out of life and assuming responsibility for achieving those goals. It is about taking charge of managing our illness, and holding everyone we deal with fully accountable.

Stigma acknowledges the horribly unjust world we live in, from a medical system that doesn't treat us to drug companies and doctors who lie to us to a legal system that abuses us to family and friends and colleagues who shun us.

This section makes no effort to report on every advocacy issue that affects our lives. Instead, the articles offer some examples on what we are doing to help ourselves.

Personal note: Very recently, I have started to refer to myself as an advocate. My advocacy issue is the same as my writing mission has been from has Day One, namely "Knowledge is Necessity." We cannot hope to play a lead role in our own recovery unless we have the right information in our hands.

These days, I am active with this Website, an email Newsletter, a blog, a book, public speaking, and media appearances, plus I have facilitated a DBSA support group. I have both a state and an international public service award to my credit, so like it or not, an advocate I am. And as an advocate, I find myself butting heads with other advocates. The pay is lousy, but the abuse I receive more than makes up for it.

For free online issues of McMan's Depression and Bipolar Weekly, email me and put "Sample" in the heading and your email address in the body.

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