Of course it improves your mental health! The therapeutic value of work comes in all kinds of ways -- having the responsibility of being somewhere at a certain time gives your week a predictable framework to work around, socializing with your co-workers helps keep your social skills alive, watching your contribution to a project and seeing your name on a paycheque are both validation of your contribution.

I'd love to get back to work, at least part-time, preferably somewhere where they don't know my history. My favourite grocery store hires lots of part-timers, including some who seem ... [I need a new word to use. These people aren't "disabled" as they're fully functioning. "Different" isn't particularly descriptive. "Differently abled" is awkward and sounds politically correct. Neurodivergent?]

I don't particularly want to work as a cashier but I'm tempted by the inclusive atmosphere and the obvious goodwill that the staff have towards each other.

Even when employers don't overtly discriminate against people with psychiatric labels, just having a long period of time when you weren't working or in school can dramatically worsen your chances of finding employment. Unless a person can come up with a socially acceptable explanation for long periods of unemployment, they'll probably miss out on a lot of job opportunities.

Another thing is that people who've been psychiatrically labeled all have different strengths and weaknesses, just as is the case with everyone else. If mainstream society has widely held beliefs about what kinds of jobs allegedly crazy people are capable of doing, then it's even less likely that the kind of job a diagnosed person can get will be something that they are good at -just because the pool of job opportunities is so much smaller.

All this is probably part of the reason why people in less developed countries often have a better chance of recovery from this type of thing than do people in developed countries like the United States.

Great points, Kent. But you know how employers lie to you at the interview? (Can they really all have fun atmospheres, great benefits, competitive pay scales, opportunities for advancement??? 'Cause that's pretty much what every newspaper ad says in my former line of work.)

My suggestion: lie back to them. You need a "socially acceptable explanation"? Make one. Invent a family, then allude to a nasty divorce. Pretend to have written a book, but don't tell them your "pseudonym" for "legal reasons." Allege educational advances but refuse to provide particulars. Ask what your interviewer knows about the Federal Witness Protection Program.

Just remember to use all those skills you've honed and put them to good use. You'll be fine.

When I was 19 or so I was committed to the State Hospital for a few days following a suicide attempt and I was then hospitalized twice more in the next ten years for PTSD and depression.

Thankfully I was also smart enough to hide my mental health history and stubborn enough to keep working despite being severely disabled at times. It is obvious from my academic records that something was wrong though so I never applied to graduate school nor applied for a job where they asked for my transcripts. When I graduated from college I actually ended up working as a consultant for a number of social service agencies (I built housing for people who were chronically mentally ill).



Eventually I was in a position that allowed me to hire "clients" of a local mental health agency (where I had in fact at one point received services years earlier). Even though I continued to suffer from recurrent major depression and was often in intensive therapy I was able to provide people living with schizophrenia and bi-polar disorders with high paying jobs.

Some of them hadn't worked in years but it was hands down one of the most healing experiences many of them had. I treated them with respect and worked around their disorders (one young man would hear voices if he worked near power tools for example) without much of a problem. My biggest challenge was to not give them too many hours or they would lose their medical coverage. My biggest fear though was that I would be "outed" as a former mental patient myself or end up needing services from an agency that viewed me as an enlightened employer and not as a former client. As a women it is often easier to get away without working for a long period of time.



People actually assume that I am taking time off to raise kids but since they can't ask that in a job interview I usually am able to skate over the lapses in time. It also helps to work in an industry (high-tech) where you can work on projects that are time limited. Frankly people living with AIDS are less discriminated against then people who are living with a serious neuro-psychiatric disorder (mental health disorder)and I never ever disclose it to employers. There are a number of companies that self-insure and I wonder how long before risk management companies start to advice that they not hire people with mental health histories in the same way that many no longer hire smokers or those who are over-weight.

Hi, Cascadia. What a great post. You're absolutely right. Not only is discrimination worse for the mentally ill, but it's the only discrimination that is actively promoted by virtue of having its own legislation.

The brain is the most complicated organ and, in spite of E. Fuller Torrey's blather, biologically speaking, we know next to nothing about mental illness.

Upon this shaky foundation rests the most vicious legislation on the books. NAMI-type "charitable" organizations (actually political action committees) want to strengthen that legislation to make it even easier to lock people like me up.

I carry around a MHA Form 8 in case I'm approached by a police officer carrying a MHA Form 4. In order to get my Form 8, I had to convince a three-member Review Panel to release me after a month of incarceration, while my psychiatrist and mother testified against me. In order for the cop to get his Form 4, a third party had to phone him and tell him to round me up. Why the ACLU doesn't pick up this issue is beyond me. Substitute "black" for "crazy" and they'd be all over it.

Cascadia, I'm glad you found a solution that works for you. I've run into people like you over the years and your contribution has been immeasurable.

Hopefully programs like this will assist MI folks to transition into all jobs they are capable of, not just the ones that no one wants.