To begin, I have always thought I was a quiet introverted person, the kind that just listened, hung in the background, and did not speak. I have come to realize that the feeling was due to the traumas and environment I grew up in. I grew up in a household where both of my parents worked, emotions were rarely expressed and being criticized for the things I did and my looks. I was being pushed by a toxic mother to be that stereotyped Asian girl who was light skinned, skinny, dainty, who would end up in the medical field. My sibling was also abusive, physically and mentally. School life was not any better. I had bullies all throughout school, the same group that would grow in number as each level of education increased. Teachers saw and heard but did not intervene. To throw into the mix, sexual traumas occurred when I was in middle school and high school.
I feel like I have been dealing with depression since elementary school and probably anxiety. I just did not have a name for it then. I put a name to it in middle school when I developed anorexia from the pressure of being skinny, even though I was already at my ideal weight. So there was that, add to it the toxic mother, bullies and trauma. Add all that up, and you get a person who just wanted to get away from it all. At first, it was to graduate so I can get into college. That way, I can get away from my toxic mother and begin my journey to be a therapist; cliché isn’t it?
My mental health started to deteriorate when I was in my first year of college. I am the type of person who is aware of myself, after the first semester of college I could feel myself slipping into a bad depression and asked to take a semester off, but my mother said no. That semester was a whirlwind of what not to do and life lessons. I ended up underweight from anorexia, drank, did drugs, participated in other reckless activities, and attempted multiple suicide attempts. It was after a major suicide attempt where I was hospitalized, which I became to realize that I was stronger than what I thought I was. I ended up graduating with a bachelors in psychology and nursing. I currently work as a psychiatric nurse and will be starting classes to become a psychiatric mental health practitioner beginning of next year.
I have been diagnosed with depression, anxiety, anorexia, and PTSD, probably should be C-PTSD. I started seeing a therapist, surprisingly, when I was sixteen after my mother found out about one of the sexual traumas that occurred. I wanted to see a therapist before that but did not know how nor want to bring that subject up with my parents. I was going to wait until college when it would be provided by the school. Unfortunately, I was not comfortable yet with speaking with the therapists about my emotions and experiences until about a year ago. I began to open up to my therapist who I have been with about ten years now about my trauma and being upfront about what I was feeling. I also started EMDR for PTSD and a nutritionist for my disordered eating. I also felt more free and happy after getting away from the toxic environment that I was in, as I was living with my abusive sibling.
I found Asian Mental health Collective where I came to realize I was not the only person dealing with experiences that I have had. I was able to have my experiences validated and not have them pushed to the side. I have the support of my boyfriend who have been there since the college years and been through it all with me. I know my mental health journey is continuous and there will be setbacks, relapses to major depression and anorexia but with the supports I have I know I will be ok. I am that type of person who sets goals, once I accomplish it; I set a new goal, whether big or small. Currently I am trying to understand my Asian identity and learn how mental health plays a role. My current goal is to practice as a nurse practitioner, providing mental health services to the Asian community and break the generational divide/stigma about mental health. My hope for the future is that although mental health is more talked about, there is still a stigma when it comes to certain mental illnesses and speaking about ones mental health in the workplace. I want people to be able to speak about mental health as if it was as common as high blood pressure. In the end, my journey has just started as I have learned I am not that shy quiet introverted girl, I am actually smart, confident and driven woman.
Progress is rarely linear, and managing mental health is no exception. But even with this knowledge, it’s hard not to get discouraged when life throws you a curveball or you slip into bad habits that you’ve worked so hard to kick. I’ve had a lot of stops and starts in my life: sometimes, I’m a paragon of productivity and responsibility; other times, I struggle to get out of bed and do basic things to take care of myself. It’s been five years since my first mental health diagnosis, and I still don’t really know what I’m doing when it comes to managing it. That uncertainty has given me many things: fear, self-loathing, confusion, but, most surprisingly, peace. That peace isn’t constant, nor is it always comforting, but over time, I’ve become more comfortable with my own fallibility and the ups and downs of life. By sharing my story, I hope others can see how it’s okay to stumble and royally screw up in your mental health journey. Recovery isn’t about never making mistakes, but about learning from and being kind to yourself when you make them.
In 2015, I was hospitalized, diagnosed with depression and anxiety, and forced to take a hard look at myself and my mental health. Up to this point, I had not acknowledged my mental health, chalking my lethargy to laziness and my negativity to academic burnout. Leading up to my hospitalization, I’d been coming to grips with several things: my parents’ divorce, my codependent friendships, my conflicted feelings over my faith, and my growing awareness of my family’s long history with mental illness. It was incredibly eye-opening and empowering to put a name to my experiences – my feelings of sadness and hopelessness weren’t just signs of something being broken or wrong with me, but were a mental illness that I could learn to manage and heal from. I would be lying if I said this was the last or lowest moment of my mental health, but it was the first time I made the active decision to get help. Victories are victories, no matter how small, and despite the ups and downs in my mental health journey since then, I still look back at this moment and feel proud at how far I’ve come.
That being said, I still have a lot of struggles surrounding my mental health. One of the biggest challenges that I keep returning to is the idea of identity. As debilitating as my depression can sometimes be, it’s very tempting to feel like it defines me. Or in other words, that it makes me unique, and without it, I would be lost. Depression has shaped my values and worldview so much that it’s hard to imagine the person I would be without it. In times of recovery, I catch myself missing feeling sad or hopeless. I catch myself wanting to self-sabotage just because it feels right and familiar to go back to a place of suffering. I feel scared that I’m going to lose who I am if I recover from my mental illnesses. What I find the most insidious thing about depression and anxiety is not that they try to devalue you, but that they villainize change.
I used to describe myself by saying, “I am depressed,” or “I am anxious.” But I’ve changed that to “I have depression” or “I have anxiety.” It’s a small change, but it comes from a major personal realization I had about romanticizing my mental illness: I just have depression, depression isn’t me. Depression can shape who I am, but it doesn’t own who I am. And by managing my depression, I won’t lose a part of myself, but will just grow and evolve into a person who, at the end of the day, is still Camille.
I believe that the future is bright for discussions around mental health. Within the past five years, I’ve seen a massive change in how people address such issues, and I don’t see the same stigmas of mental illness being mental “weakness” thrown around as much as they used to. While access to healthcare will continue to be an ongoing challenge for the U.S., I think that compassionate awareness of mental health will only continue to grow in the coming years.
“Her legs…they just aren’t made for ballet, you know?” The instructor told my mom. I tried to pretend I didn’t hear. But the words stuck with me. What was wrong with my legs? Sure, I was clumsy and was not great at ballet anyway, but what about my legs made me bad at it? I did not understand the depth of the statement, but all I knew was that it made me feel bad about my body. I was 6.
Although ballet wasn’t for me, I loved moving my body. After trial and error with many sports, I found my love for swimming. I loved to race, I loved to compete, and I loved to win. Even from a young age, I was strong and muscular. Yet, the comments about my body persisted. “If your legs weren’t so big, you’d be prettier.” What did being pretty have anything to do with swimming fast? I shrugged it off, but I felt like my body was the problem for some reason. I was 8.
I was an early bloomer and hit puberty earlier than the other girls in school. My hips and my legs filled out, and I felt awkwardly large. I didn’t move through the water the same way and as a result, my progress slowed. And to my dismay, my legs got bigger. The comments about my body persisted. “The pretty girls are all thin, once you quit swimming you’ll be pretty like them.” I was 12.
I remember looking into the mirror, pulling at my legs, tears in my eyes. I would force my legs into the smallest size I could manage without suffocating. The comments about my body were masked now, in magazines, TV shows, and music videos. “If you were a size 0, you’d be pretty,” they told me. I remember looking into the same mirror after school, staring at the imprints my jeans tattooed into my skin. I hated my legs. I hated pictures. I hated that every single time I showed up to practice in a suit that people had to see my legs. I frankly did not even care that I was among the top performers in my sport. I hated my body. I was 14.
“A hungry swimmer is a fast swimmer,” my coach told me as she snatched my snacks away from me at a meet. I was burning thousands of calories a day. It was physically impossible for me to eat the calories needed to keep weight on. Yet, the comments persisted. My coach routinely talked behind my back about how my body fit in my suit; my teammates bullied me for the way I carried myself and the way my body looked in my suit. I was 23.
No matter what age I am or what shape I’m in, the comments will persist. However, the relationship I have with my body has changed. Through all the negativity, my legs did and still do amazing things. My legs–they walk, they run, they jump, they kick. My legs have carried me to victory in every race. My legs have taken me up mountains, through oceans, and around the world. My legs matter so much more than the way they fit in jeans or the way they fill out a dress. I have hard days still, where I feel like I am not enough. But my body is more than enough, and I am enough.
My name is Henry Zhu. I have a PhD in Clinical Psychology from Hofstra University. I am first and foremost a father and a husband. Next, I am a therapist, a gamer, and a producer of music. I’m writing this in hopes that you may relate somewhat and to slowly break down the mental health stigma that is pervasive in the Asian, Pacific Islander, & Desi American (APIDA) communities. In honoring Mental Awareness Month and Asian Heritage Month, I write this in hope to humanize and to normalize all of our mental health journeys towards wellness.
My journey starts with being born and raised in a Chinese American family. My parents were immigrants to the United States and had to work 2-3 jobs at a time to provide for the family. Academic success, grades, and certificates of accomplishment were prioritized above any sense of validation, affection, or emotional intelligence. They valued the only path towards success they knew in their world. As a result, I grew up feeling as though I always fell short of their expectations despite doing very well academically. Even though they felt so very disconnected from me, I recognize now that they did their best to raise me. Now I have the privilege of breaking the cycle, and to provide a different kind of life for my child.
My mental health concerns didn’t come to the forefront until high school. I was ignorant of the effects of being from two very different worlds – my Chinese world and my American world. I felt trapped between the two, and I didn’t feel free to find my identity in either one. There was a lot of pressure to conform but very little guidance or mentorship. I realized in senior year of high school that I was deeply depressed and anxious. I was unhappy and felt lost in the world. I was anxious because I didn’t fit in with the Eastern world or the Western world. I saw an Asian school psychologist and an Asian psychiatrist who were both very unhelpful. I left both services feeling as though I were broken and that the solution to “fixing” myself had slipped my grasp despite professional help that I wrongly assumed would understand me. Long story short, I then took my mental health into my own hands by seeking more helpful sources of healing and coping. For me, it took years of introspection, years of self-help, and the courage to give myself compassion during the long and arduous journey. I’m in a much better headspace now and I know there’s still a long way to go.
If you’re still with me, thank you so much for reading this far. I ventured into the mental health field to prevent others from feeling the same way that I did – invisible. That’s a story for another time. I want to disillusion you – the work in the mental health field is difficult and the pay is not glamorous, but I personally wouldn’t trade it for the world. I’m privileged to know I’ve been able to provide for those in need in a different way than the care I’ve received in the past. Mental wellness, to me, is a life-long battle – we can fight against the tides or we can ride the waves to calmer water. It’s not our fault we are put in the situations we grow up in. However, we can slowly take responsibility for our physical and mental wellness. Let’s surf the waves together to provide others with the tools to surf alongside.
To end – I’m genuinely inspired by the younger generations of today – for having the courage to understand their own mental and physical wellness needs. But it doesn’t stop there, I am floored by the number of people willing to be vulnerable online and to share their stories along with others who have taken the time to validate and to support each other. I am proud of the community that’s been built. If you’re just starting off on your mental health journey the community welcomes you. This is how we heal and break the cycles of stigma. We’re in this together.
I was in denial for the longest time about my mental health. I suppose this is part of my overall personality of second-guessing myself, fearing I may be a hypochondriac and that I was unable to think about things objectively.
Every time someone asks me “Did you have a specific event or did something happen in your life that triggered your onset of symptoms?” It hurts a little because I felt like it was wrong of me to not really tie the change to anything in particular. There was no death, no specific traumatic event, no sudden change in circumstances. Life was pretty normal, I thought.
There were signs though. I would say the first signs for me were loss. Was it a part of growing up? Learning more everyday and being uncomfortable with the changes? I don’t know. I was 13 and had a philosophical interest in death. I didn’t think much of it. I wasn’t sad. I didn’t want to die. I was just interested in how peaceful death would be. The real markers for me were loss. I wasn’t as interested in religion as I was. I was a voracious reader as a child. Suddenly, I couldn’t focus anymore and wouldn’t make it past the first sentence of a book, re-reading it over and over and over. There was no information retention. This is still something really distressing to me. Suddenly I couldn’t understand the world and suddenly I couldn’t understand myself. I was a smart, motivated and extremely hard-working child and defined myself by my own academic achievements (quite independent from my parents) and it felt like I woke up one day and looked back and realised that time had passed and all these changes somehow happened without me noticing and out of my control. It seems so silly and far away now but my proudest moment was passing the entrance exam into my dream school at age 11. It messes me up every. Single. Day that I can’t focus and can’t pick up a book to read casually, that doing university readings was an absolute nightmare because I didn’t understand ANYTHING when it came so easily to me as a child, despite telling myself I should stop comparing myself.
My fascination with death at 13 turned into a vast, desolate hopelessness and emptiness. Everything felt so muffled and muted. I couldn’t connect with my own emotions and couldn’t register whether I was happy or sad or anything in between. I remember at the time, I described it as an empty, snowy landscape with a thick wool blanket draped over the top. By this time, I was 16, had absolutely no idea what I was doing, understanding nothing and oversleeping A LOT. I went to an academically elite school and bounced up and down the rankings. In one term I’d be in the top 20 students across both maths and humanities, the next I’d be in the bottom 20. In class I’d eloquently discuss the topics, when handed an assignment I could make neither head nor tails of the assignment question.
I remember the first time I broke down in front of my mum and pleaded that I wanted to die. I wasn’t suicidal, I just had no desire to exist any longer. There was no joy, no feelings, absolutely nothing. I lost any sense of time or organisation that I had. I went from disciplined and motivated to asleep and lethargic when I was awake.
Was I depressed? Yep. Did I admit I was depressed? No. I went straight to uni after graduating from high school. I didn’t even make it to census date before deferring. I felt so alone and silenced and unheard. I screamed and pulled heavy furniture on myself, not in an attempt to hurt myself or anyone else but because I was so scared that no one understood what I was saying or doing or feeling.
I made one cursory attempt to see a therapist. After 3 sessions they expressed their frustration with how I wasn’t trying hard enough. We never made a follow up appointment.
Because I wasn’t studying, I started working in the gap year. Then my year was up, and I was back at uni and still working. My focus and ability to digest information was still severely compromised but still I did not seek help until I noticed tremors in my hands. That was kind of scary, so I started seeking mental health support, first from uni, then from outside therapists.
I was diagnosed with severe depression and anxiety. I don’t feel I benefited much from going to therapy, and a lot of therapists focus on CBT and mindfulness tools, which don’t seem a good fit for me, but I showed up to every appointment. They trialed me on different medications. At one point even an anti-narcoleptic medication when they realised how lifeless and lethargic I was all the time. At some points I was on the highest dose of medications and then would feel too down to refill my prescriptions… I went from max dose to stopping meds cold turkey and… nothing happened. I lost what little hope I had of ever getting better. The medical centre had to cancel my appointment one time and I didn’t rebook for almost a year, until they sent me a discharge follow up survey and I pushed myself to try again.
I made it halfway through my degree before I reached a point where I simply could not take it anymore and dropped out. It felt like I was being torn to shreds from the inside and I hated myself for not being able to even make it through to the end. I laughed at myself since I had really high aims for myself as a child, determined to get a degree from a top university, and learn everything there was to learn in the world, yet there I was unable to even complete my entire degree.
I started a new job, ended toxic friendships and life went on with no improvement.
At some point, due to my therapist being sick one week, the centre had to cancel my appointment and I just never rebooked again.
I made a point to “live harder” to prove that I didn’t need therapy. I went on my first solo trip (only interstate, nothing dramatic, and I was about 20), took my mum overseas for a trip, moved departments at work. My eating and sleeping habits stabilised out of sheer necessity and I was a healthy weight and reasonable sleeping patterns given my circumstances.
My new department was really, really racist, transphobic, xenophobic, homophobic, bigoted, you name it. They really loved me and never directed their nastiness towards me but as I grew older, my politics has become a lot more left-leaning and it was getting pretty unbearable hearing my colleagues espouse the virtues of a politician whose claim to infamy was utter disgust of boat people. My dad was “boat people”. My family weren’t wealthy, we were surviving. All my clothes and belongings even now are from second hand stores. It wasn’t even about me. Their constant, daily discussions in the staff room of how dreadful so and so minority were just got to me for being so blatantly prejudiced and wrong. Every time I gently questioned them, I’d be dismissed for being young and foolish. I moved departments again last year after spending a year there.
In the meantime, another problem began to present itself. This may be extremely political, and just due to varied experiences, I know the issue is hugely divisive in the Vietnamese community. Our parents fled a war, and that’s the hardest thing anyone would have to do. There is no replacing the anguish and trauma of living in a war, escaping from a war and setting up a life for yourself away from all that you care about. And actually, my parents immigrated to a country other than the United States, so we’re not even connected in a physical sense to the majority of both sides of the family who are either residing in Vietnam or the States. Full disclosure: I don’t support the brand of communism we have in the homeland, and I’m not here to discuss that or to tell you to feel the same way. Further disclosure: I also do not support the Trump administration. To me, in my personal opinion, both options represent a history of bloody colonisation and have dramatically changed the experience of being Vietnamese in both mainland and diaspora communities. Vietnamese politics has been heavily influenced by a thousand year history of attempted Chinese colonisation and I’m not about to claim western saviour from wealthy western countries looking to capitalise on less powerful countries either. Everyone I’ve met in the community is strongly in one camp or another, and unfortunately, my family have fallen into the spiral of unhealthy conspiracies in a camp I have strong moral and ethical objections to, denying facts and performing quite impressive mental gymnastics to justify the harmful trail of destruction such politics leave. My own parents have accused me of being “brainwashed” by the disgusting other side of politics, which hurts me deeply considering I have an equal amount of anger towards the “other side”. Perhaps I am not objective enough. Perhaps I am not educated enough. Perhaps I can’t begin to fathom the trauma of being alive in a war. I am not a victim here, but it is heartbreaking to see people I cared about so radicalised and unable to accept reality. The gaslighting has gotten worse and honestly, I’m at a loss. Most of all, throughout all my mental health struggles, I just feel deeply alone, having no one who is even remotely like me to not even share stories, just be comforted in the knowledge that I’m not alone and I’m not out of place.
I understand if my story can’t be posted or needs to be heavily edited due to sensitive topics, thanks for letting me get some of this word vomit off my chest! I’m not explaining myself very well either so there’s a lot up for misinterpretation, but I hope someone, somewhere will understand my despair.
My dream isn’t to be happy. My dream is to find a passion for living, and having my internal compass reset, so regardless of results, I can at least be confident and sure that I am making decisive decisions, whether correct or incorrect, to be sure the decisions are mine.
Growing up, mental health has been something I struggled with at a young age. I remembered the times where I would feel trapped, isolated and feeling as if I didn’t matter. The memories are sometimes flashbacks where it flushes the pain back into the parts where it hurts me the most emotionally. I developed a lot of anxiety and depression, which I still continue to battle all the time. My parents became the reason why I always shut myself out, distancing myself from a young age as I faced a lot of traumatic experiences that have affected me throughout my life and still continue to do so. I don’t think anyone is alone in any of it, people may share similar experiences as I do. I used to be so negative, depressed and at my worst, but over the years I’ve learned to care less, wanting to do whats best for me and being positive throughout my life. I had to heal, to learn and grow on my own. I think finding and connecting with others to share similar experiences allow me to feel understood and I feel this group helps me feel less alone in all my situations.
I was born in a poor, predominantly black neighborhood. My family stayed mostly to itself. I remember experiencing racism at an early age but not really understanding it. Mostly vandalism and theft. Both of my parents were wealthy in Vietnam, but the Communists took everything from them. My mom lived in a 2br trailer home with six other people. My dad worked hard, at one point he worked seven days a week, double shifts as an engineer for a year and a half. The only time I would see him would be when my mom would take me up to the plant to have lunch with him. My mom was in nursing school and often would have to take me to class with her. I would usually just play by myself in the lobby. I learned to amuse myself.
When I was five, my parents had officially entered the middle class. We moved into a pretty nice home in a small redneck town. Looking back on it, I remember being occasionally treated differently, but not understanding it. I was a person, like you, like them, why did some kids say mean things to me? It wasn’t egregious, but I did get punched in the face once. It was broken up quick. Not everyone was mean though, my saint of a third grade teacher told me she specifically picked me to be in her class and asked if I knew why? I didn’t. Was it because I was smart? My fourth grade teacher, however was the complete opposite. She would mark things wrong that I knew were right. I was always in time out. I once got sent into the hallway for detention because I laughed during a pizza party. Everyone else was laughing, it didn’t make any sense. I used to have to bus to another school a few times a week for this gifted and talented program. One day I was marked absent because I was late and went straight onto the second bus. My mom called the school worried sick, thinking I was kidnapped. That same miserable teacher told my mom she had no idea where I was. I saw her. I saw her see me. We made eye contact and I waved. She didn’t wave back, just grimaced.
Middle school. Middle school was when I became acutely aware of my race. I get it now. I’m the one of three Asians in the entire school. That’s when they learned to formulate their hatred into words, into slurs. Not everyone mind you, but enough. It wasn’t the only reason why I didn’t fit in. My parents wanted me to respect the power of money, because they had seen what happens when it’s all taken away from you. They purposefully didn’t let me have name brand clothes. My clothes didn’t fit me right. They were too short, too long, out of style, just… wrong. My skin already made me stand out, why did they have to make it worse? It was because they hated me, wasn’t it? Why won’t you just let me fit in?
In high school I started to internalize their hate, their racism. I started to believe the words they said to me. I was a late bloomer, I was always close to the smallest and shortest kid in the class. I definitely wasn’t athletic. I blamed it all on my race. I wanted to be one of them. I wanted to be tall, stronger, faster, but most importantly, I just wanted to belong. When I finally hit puberty, I started to learn how to fight. I’m 5’9 (and a half!) so maybe not tall, but no longer a runt. I got into a little bit of trouble. As I started to claim my independence, my parents fought to tighten the reigns. Typical generational problems. They moved me to Houston my senior year to a rich all white high school. I got in six fights in the first three weeks. I moved out of my home before the end of my senior year.
Houston had a pretty large Asian population though. I really started to connect with Asians in my late teens / early 20’s. I had finally found my people and they accepted me. The end. I wish. White people would often comment on my race, while Asians would constantly let me know I was too white. I dressed different, I talked different, I dated different, I made plenty of friends, but I was always made aware that no matter what, I wasn’t the same. It would frustrate me and I always found myself constantly shifting my personality. I became adapt at code switching.
There isn’t really a defining moment that helped me finally accept myself. It was a culmination of a thousand minor interactions that slowly let me realize that I was just me. I am proudly Asian. I am the product of proud immigrant parents that could not understand me. I am the son of two parents who toiled and gave their all and loved me through discipline and in the same language they were taught. I never agreed, but as I grew older I came to understand. I wish there was some fairy tale meaning to this story, but every one of us will build our own identity. Mine became strongest when I stopped trying to mold myself into other people’s constructs of what my identity should be. When I look back on my life, I was a distinctly different person during each stage of development. It’s so hard to imagine who you will be when you’re trapped in the moment, but every experience, good or bad, has shaped me into the person I am today. I am unapologetically me. And I hope that one day you can be too.