Growing up as a Jew and Queer in a conservative part of Birmingham, Alabama, I saw myself exposed to some fairly severe bullying as a child and teenager. It was a common occurrence that I was called anti-Semitic embankments and made fun of the fact that I looked and acted differently. I was excluded from almost all of my classmates and had very little social support.
As a result, I had major mental health problems. I felt depressed and anxious almost every day, and there were times when I panicked and scared of the prospect of going to school. Since I never seemed to fit in, I was convinced that I was fundamentally unlikely and that the only positive quality I had was my almost perfect academic career. In addition to the fear and depression that I felt from the bullying, I also put tremendous pressure on myself to get perfect grades. A score less than 100 would put me in a spiral of shame and self-loathing.
I cried a lot, and this worried many adults around me. I was sent to a number of therapists during my childhood. Most of them focused on finding ways to stop crying. I was prescribed medication, exercise, and a number of breathing techniques. Some of the therapists have encouraged me to act "more normally" – maybe when I haven't talked so much about my academic interests or when I've stopped being the teacher's pet or when I'm just less sensitive , then more of my classmates would like me.
Although some of the advice was useful, I felt many times that there was something wrong with me – that it was my fault that I was bullied because I was just too strange and different to understand how to do it behaves like everyone else. Most of all, I was frustrated that I couldn't stop crying or feeling depressed.
Empowerment Approach
My experiences with and my view of therapy changed drastically when I went to college. After struggling with the transition to a new city and environment, I reluctantly sought advice from my university psychiatric center. I can still remember my first session. After answering some questions about my childhood during the recording, I said, “I know that I really seem to be confused. Everyone hated me in high school and now I just started college and I still don't fit in. Something is wrong with me. I know it. I just can't fit anywhere. "I was starting to feel torn, so I immediately apologized for crying." And on top of that, I'm so overly emotional! I have to be your worst customer. "
My new adviser raised his eyebrows and looked up from his notes. "Actually, I was just going to say that the way you react seems normal to me. It sounds like you had a pretty difficult time at school, and that was hard for you – it would be for everyone And the transition from high school to college is also difficult, which is normal. I don’t know if I met someone in the early months of college who wasn’t trying to make friends. I think so shows that you are very resilient to handle all of this and to ask for help. "
I was shocked. Here was a consultant who did not say that something was wrong with me or that I had to change to fit better. In his opinion, I had a natural reaction to the circumstances that I had been through. I had never heard anything like it.
Over the next few months, I no longer saw myself as an unlikely maniac, but as a person who is different (and maybe in a good way crazy!) But still deserves acceptance and belonging. I started to see my uniqueness as a strength. Instead of encouraging me to adjust, my advisor authorized me to go to groups and rooms on campus where I would be accepted. As a result, I joined my Hillel campus and Active Minds, a student mental health organization. My advisor also encouraged me to stand up for bullying. Above all, he never pathologized my feelings or told me it was wrong, sad or depressed. I finally felt I had room to process and respond to some of my experiences as a child.
Finding my way
Later I started to look at initiatives and organizations that focus on combating prejudice and social injustice. I did an internship during my senior year in the Philadelphia Anti-Defamation League and did a thesis on weight-based bullying (bullying based on a child's weight or height). Finally, through my student research and my engagement in various interest groups, I found the way to study disabilities, a discipline that focuses on the voices of people with disabilities and examines the philosophical, cultural and sociological perspectives on the experience of disabilities.
In general, the field of disability studies questions the notion that disability, alone or primarily, is an individual defect to be treated medically. Instead, disability is believed to be the result of a variety of factors, including social exclusion and inaccessibility. The prospects of disability studies resonated with me as someone who cares about questioning social injustice and exclusion rather than changing people in the first place. In recent years, I have been intensively involved in research and advocacy studies for disabled people.
One of my most important moments was looking at myself and accepting my identity as a person with a psychiatric disability. Acceptance of this identity has enabled me not only to accept myself and alleviate my shame about psychological problems, but also to connect with a community of people with similar experiences and perspectives. I started to work with the National Empowerment Center, an organization run by and for mental health consumers. With the center, I develop advocacy initiatives, educational programs and workshops that focus on the voices of people with experiences with mental health problems and that work for more self-determination and acceptance of people with mental disabilities.
The most significant and fulfilling part of my job was spending time with people with mental disabilities, sitting with them through difficult times, and empowering them to stand up for their rights and self-determination. My work often involved reacting to people in crisis and giving them space to experience strong emotions and extreme conditions.
A "fit" for advice?
My passion for this type of intensive interpersonal relationship work sparked my interest in becoming a psychiatric counselor. When I started examining the possibility of a diploma in counseling, it became increasingly clear to me that this was the right choice for me. There is little that interests me as supporting people with mental disabilities in gaining freedom of choice over their lives and experiencing community, connection and meaning. However, I also wondered how my disability study background and perspective would fit my role as a consultant. While the disability study area aims to increase the acceptance and consideration of disabilities in society, the counseling area often tries to treat or prevent psychiatric disabilities. Would I be able to reconcile both goals and perspectives?
I am only in my third semester at the graduate school and do not yet know exactly how I should integrate my disability study background into my role as a psychosocial counselor. However, I believe that this will be possible.
In my own experience of counseling in the psychiatric center of my university, I felt that my counselor encouraged me more to accept myself and to find spaces in which I would be accepted than to change or change "repair". I hope that I can take the same general approach with my customers. I believe that person-centered therapy and other humanistic counseling approaches provide an excellent framework for achieving this. These approaches require therapists to work with clients from a position of unconditional positive consideration and help them discover their strengths rather than using a deficit-based model.
I also think it is important to learn from consulting approaches that were developed by and for other marginalized groups. For example, while homosexuality was classified as a mental illness in the diagnostic and statistical manual for mental disorders, many counselors today practice LGBTQ-confirming therapy. This approach helps LGBTQ customers accept themselves and reduce any feelings of shame associated with their identity. Similarly, feminist therapy focuses on empowering women and people from other marginalized groups to stand up for themselves and fight injustices in their daily lives. Similar approaches can be applied to counseling clients with disabilities, including clients with mental disabilities.
I do not want to suggest that psychiatric disabilities should never be treated or prevented. Many people with mental disabilities want treatments such as cognitive behavioral therapy, dialectal behavioral therapy, and medication. Training and breathing techniques should not be neglected either, as they are very useful for many people. However, there is no reason why the social and systemic factors affecting a person should not be examined as well. Indeed, professional advisors have an ethical and moral obligation to encourage people with disabilities to stand up for themselves. If clients are prejudiced or discriminated against because of their psychiatric or other disability (or other difference), it may be helpful to find ways to solve them with them. Counselors can also encourage clients to request disability accommodation and connect them to organizations such as peer-run wellness centers and peer-supported groups through which they may find acceptance and social support.
The 20/20 Initiative: A Vision for the Future of Counseling, sponsored by the American Counseling Association and the American Association of State Counseling Boards, has a consensual definition of counseling as "a professional relationship that spans different individuals, families, and families." Groups empowers groups to achieve mental health, wellness, education and career goals. “I believe that the field of disability complements and improves this goal rather than being taken away from it. As a future consultant with a disability, I look forward to empowering my clients to achieve their goals and to withstand any injustice that stands in their way.
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Emily Cutler is a graduate student in clinical psychological health counseling at Troy University in Tampa, Florida. In addition to her studies, she offers training and advice on the topics of disability rights, trauma-informed care, suicide prevention, peers-operated psychosocial services and the paradigm "Health in all sizes". Contact them through their website at emilyscutler.com.
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The opinions and comments expressed in articles from CT Online do not reflect the opinions of the editors or guidelines of the American Counseling Association.
