Today, I’m Saluting the People Who Put Their Mental Health First
I have struggled with mental illness. I live with anxiety every day, and I’m not afraid to say so.
What got me back wasn’t one thing. It was family and friends who showed up. It was doing what I loved and what interested me. Eventually it was starting this newspaper, which doesn’t feel like work to me. But the most important part, and the hardest, was finally living with it, accepting it, and putting it first. I’m not cured. I’m well because I stopped fighting the fact that I have to take care of myself.
That’s why Lane Johnson’s retirement from the Eagles hit me the way it did. He has spoken openly about his own mental health, and he’s walking away on his own terms. Plenty of people never see that modeled. Young athletes in Salem County are watching.
My anxiety is there with almost everything I publish. I don’t take lightly that what I write can affect people’s lives, and thousands of you take in a piece of my work every day. I don’t know if it shows. It’s there. Journalists are often distrusted these days, and there aren’t many of us left doing this locally. A lot of us feel alone in it. I’m saying that not for sympathy but because you might feel the same way in your own job, your own home, your own head.
Right now, what weighs on me most is my nephew Tristan David. Tristan has Down syndrome and struggles with his health. My little man has spent his past birthday in the emergency room just earlier this September. On top of all that, Tristan has alopecia and in the last weeks of August, his long hair (which he loved and thought was so cool) all fell out. It broke and still breaks my heart. Tristan is my best friend and my heart.
Here’s the hard part. In my experience, getting mental health help in Salem County is difficult. I’ve had to go outside the county for care. Locally, it can mean paying out of pocket, joining a waiting list, or going to a clinic that has its own waiting list. That’s not a criticism of any one person who works in this field. It’s a problem our community needs to talk about, and this paper will and plans on covering and helping to improve for Salem County residents.
If you are struggling, call or text 988, the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline, any time. And if you’re someone who put your mental health first this year, whether that meant a doctor, a friend, a long walk, or finally saying it out loud, I salute you.
You are not alone.