“Simply put, treatment works, if you can get it. But in America today, it is clear that many people living with mental illness are not provided with the essential treatment they need.”
—Michael J. Fitzpatrick, executive director of NAMI National, National Alliance on Mental Illness, Grading the States 2006, Arlington, Va.

My mission is to help others going through extremely difficult times by letting them know my personal story, that I can relate to the unimaginable suffering and that I eventually got to a place in my life where I can say I find joy where there was once only pain. I can admit that this took a long time and sometimes I wanted to give up but I want to tell people you just have to hold on. You have to find some way to keep you here and find a way to prevent harming yourself. I want to tell those that are suffering that they have a gift. They have the gift of inspiration and they can use that when they are on the edge about to break. It just takes a pen, pencil, and some paper and they have the power to conquer prose or poetry with the emotion that is inside of them. I just want to let them know there is a light at the end of the tunnel...... they just have to hold on.