“I think this is a beautiful idea to begin a platform not only addressing the good but the bad as well. Finding others you can genuinely connect with who share similar feelings will help to build a stronger more cohesive community. Expressing ones inner thoughts allows others to heal along side them whether that be independently or as a unit.”
We asked the TOWN community to tell us the problems that they think are the most common, but unspoken about, in our community. Thank you to those who took the time to give us feedback. The top three biggest problems we’ve heard are mental iIllness, alcoholism, opioid addiction. Racism, sexism, and loneliness were also mentioned as problems, but not nearly as often as these others.
We are starting to write a series on each called the Hard Things, focusing on mental illness, alcoholism, and opioid addiction. To make this really impactful, we’d love for WHS alumni community to share their own Hard Things stories. De-stigmatizing mental illness and substance abuse disorders can benefit our community; your story could encourage someone to finally reach out for help or give someone hope that they too can recover.
We all know someone who has struggled with at least one of these hard things. Some of us may have even experienced them ourselves. If you feel motivated to share any bit of your story, anonymously or owning it, we support you and will make sure this is the safest space to share it.
[If you are filling this out anonymously - in the fields Name, Email, just put “Anonymous” and “anonymous@anonymous.com”]
Read more about benefits of destigmatizing here: https://www.apa.org/monitor/2016/07-08/upfront-destigmatizing