I couldn’t wait to come home from NAD. It was not the best experience for me because I was not ready to deal with the intense social interaction. I found myself being closed off of people in general and only open up to a few. It was exhausting for me to keep on smiling and making sure I did my job while there.

I have always enjoyed NAD, but this time it became a chore. All those highly educated and sophisticated deaf and hoh people was overwhelming. I had 3 freaking anxiety attacks, one right in the middle of my guest presentation on stigma in mental health and the deaf. I cried in front of 50++ people and had to run out and to my room to calm down. It was downright scary. The other two times, was when I visited the De ‘Via room. It was a wonderful creative place and would have been an escape from the madness of the NAD Whirlwind. Except it scared the shit outta me and made me tear up so bad again I had to run to my room.

You know, if NAD had a place where people like myself could go to, similar to the interpreter or SSP room, it would have been tremendously helpful because it would also be a place where one could get peer support.

Mental Health continues to be a stigma and its even worst there because highly educated people do not have these “issues”. (hope you know I’m being sarcastic here). They were so involved in Deafhood and other deaf issues that anything else doesn’t seem to exist. The one workshop on Mental Health barely covered stigma and the ones who did talk, talked about OTHER people, not their own. I feel this is a clear disrespect of the person being talked about privacy and journey in their own lives. Professionals who work in the field know they have to keep things confidential, but those who don’t work in the field think they can say whatever they want. I guess you can guess I’m pissed about this because I’ll be damn if anyone talks about MY mental health without MY permission.

I guess the danger is, if one shares about their struggles and accomplishments, people think they can talk all they want about that person. Often what happens is everything gets twisted around and before we know it, the original story told by the person who shared is lost and the deaf community has a negative view of that person. It’s so unfair, but then, that’s life…it’s not limited to the deaf community…hearing community and those of minority cultures also deal with this stigma issues. Argh!

In a perfect world, ACCEPTANCE, RESPECT AND TRUTH would be a dream! Oh well…