Mental Health Awareness Month: This is My Brave

By Lorne Jaffe

I struggle with many things as a sufferer of clinical depression and general anxiety disorder, but among the worst is feeling unworthy of being called “brave.” People have called me brave for everything from writing my blog to reading a piece about depression at the 2014 Dad 2.0 Summit to holding a panel on male depression at the 2015 Dad 2.0 Summit to waking up every day and taking care of my child. And when someone does call me that crazy adjective, my mind immediately attacks and tells me it can’t possibly be true.

This is why May is Mental Health Awareness Month. This is why non-profit organizations such as This Is My Brave are so important. Founded in 2013 by writer, mother and bipolar sufferer, Jennifer Marshall (www.bipolarmomlife.com), and Anne Marie Ames, This Is My Brave is a theater show designed to help people bringing the battles with mental illness out of the darkness and end the unfortunate stigma attached to it.

The mission behind This Is My Brave is to create a community for mental illness sufferers and to ignite a positive, supportive national conversation about mental illness for both sufferers and the people who love them, and to, of course, allow non-sufferers a glimpse into what mental illness is all about.

Originating in Arlington, Virginia, This Is My Brave produced its first show in 2014 and included readings of touching personal essays, original music performances and dynamic slam poetry from people dealing with a variety of mental problems. Feedback was incredible. Performers and audience members cried together, hugged each other, and most importantly realized they WERE … NOT … ALONE.

In 2015 the show expanded to Iowa, Boston and Washington, DC, and included all new performers. That is part of the idea – to get new people up on that stage; to give them a chance to show the world their courage through words, music and dance.

According to co-founder Jennifer Marshall, with the help of programs such as This Is My Brave, “One day we will live in a world where we won’t have to call it ‘brave’ when talking about mental illness. We’ll just call it talking.”

And with their help, maybe one day I’ll be able to accept that I’m brave as well.

For more information on This Is My Brave, please visit http://thisismybrave.org/ or check out this wonderful YouTube video:

Lorne Jaffe is a stay-at-home dad in Queens, NY. He began his blog www.raisingsienna.com as a means to help him battle depression and anxiety while being the primary caregiver to his daughter, Sienna. In addition to appearing in the first 2 volumes of Dads Behaving Dadly, he has been featured on The Huffington Post, The Good Man Project, WhatToExpect.com, Medium.com and CityDadsGroup.com, and has appeared on numerous podcasts including Life of Dad Podcast and Parent Nation Radio. He was also a Blog Spotlight Reader at the 2014 Dad 2.0 Summit in New Orleans and created and took part in a panel about male depression at the 2015 Dad 2.0 Summit in San Francisco.