Author: SeanaSpeaks

The following information is provided courtesy of Heather Irvine (pictured), clinical herbalist, and professor at JSC and VCIH. Heather began her study of herbalism at Northeast School of Botanical Medicine. In addition to teaching, Heather is an experienced clinician, remedy maker, and the owner of Giving Tree Botanicals in Montpelier, Vermont. She has been studying, teaching, and practicing herbalism since 2002.

I don’t always want to tell the truth. I don’t always want to come here and spill myself for you to see, to bare my insides like they are the most casual of outsides, an ankle or a shoulder; but if I am cherry picking the parts you get to see, if I am not […]

Which brings me back to the question at hand. If you were diagnosed with HIV, would you take the medicine the doctor prescribed you? What about if you were diagnosed with a psychological disorder? If your answer to those two questions is different, you need to ask yourself why. If you’re still telling yourself that having a mental illness is a personal failing, a weakness that should somehow be able to brought under your superhuman control, you’re doing yourself and your life a great disservice.

I like the class I’m in this morning, it’s full of information about all aspects of health and wellness, and though the focus seems to be on alternative methodologies, it’s a science based course. Today the professor tells us we are going to spend the next several classes discussing psychology and mental health. I’m excited. These, […]

Again and again I talk on this blog (and much more often on the more active Facebook page about the importance of speaking out. Share your stories. Speak your truth. Stand for what is right. Defend those who are not yet able to defend themselves. Define discrimination when it has not yet been defined. Name stigma where it […]

I can stretch my legs and feel already sore muscles groan. I can stand, feebly perhaps, to my feet as my body demands the rest it thinks it deserves. One hand to sore back I can take one more step forward. It may complain, but my body will move. They may ache but my feet will carry me. I may be tired, but I am strong. This is what growth looks like.

And I don’t know if it’s because I have my own mental illness that I bounce around a bit more often between the really balanced mom of awesomeness and the ‘life is stretching me’ mom of passableness and the ‘I should really get a sitter because I’m going to seriously start saying shit I might regret’ mom of awfulness, or if that’s just normal.

“What if we tried to be brave instead of perfect.” Unknown I could not love this any more. I don’t think I could strive more for it than I do but I still fall short and so I keep trying. Perfect seems so important. How do I look? How about the kids? The house? Are […]

After a particularly awful anxiety attack, like the one I had this morning, it might be a time to live your life in such a way as if to say, “I’m sorry, my body just reminded me it can kill me at any given time without notice and my Self is in need of my attention. Your opinion of that is currently invalid.”

Look at that little smunchy faced baby. It would only take her three short years from this photo to shout “I don’t love you mommy! I don’t love you and I want you to move out so Daddy will stop loving you too!” She’s thorough, at least. I probably don’t need to explain that today […]