Mental Health Bias Quotes & Sayings

To my mind, the prose in a non-fiction work that's going to endure has to be of the same quality as the prose in a work of fiction that endures. — Robert Caro

Mental illness is among the most stigmatized of categories.' People are ashamed of being mentally ill. They fear disclosing their condition to their friends and confidants-and certainly to their employers. — Elyn R. Saks

The difficulties in diagnosing DID result primarily from lack of education among clinicians about dissociation, dissociative disorders, and the effects of psychological trauma, as well as from clinician bias. This leads to limited clinical suspicion about dissociative disorders and misconceptions about their clinical presentation. Most clinicians have been taught (or assume) that DID is a rare disorder with a florid, dramatic presentation. Although DID is a relatively common disorder, R. P. Kluft (2009) observed that "only 6% make their DID obvious on an ongoing basis" (p. 600).
- Guidelines for Treating Dissociative Identity Disorder in Adults, Third Revision, p4-5 — James A. Chu

Holding one's self responsible is a critical feature in stigma and in the generation of shame since violation of standards, rules, and goals are insufficient in its elicitation unless responsibility can be placed on the self. Stigma may differ from other elicitors of shame and guilt, in part because it is a social appearance factor. The degree to which the stigma is socially apparent is the degree to which one must negotiate the issue of blame, not only for one's self but between one's self and the other who is witness to the stigma. Stigmatization is a much more powerful elicitor of shame and guilt in that it requires a negotiation not only between one's self and one's attributions, but between one's self and the attributions of others. — Michael Lewis

Like children, we have dreamt, that what gratifies our desires, or contributes to our convenience to-day, will prove equally useful and satisfactory to-morrow, without reflecting on the growth of the body, the change of humours, the new objects, and the new situations, which every succeeding hour brings in its train. — Mary Hays

Mental illness is nothing to be ashamed of, but stigma and bias shame us all. — Bill Clinton

I have a sense that God is unfair and preferentially punishes his weak, his dumb, his fat, his lazy. I believe he takes more pleasure in his perfect creatures, and cheers them on like a brainless dad as they run roughshod over the rest of us. He gives us a need for love, and no way to get any. He gives us a desire to be liked, and personal attributes that make us utterly unlikable. Having placed his flawed and needy children in a world of exacting specifications, he deducts the difference between what we have and what we need from our hearts and our self-esteem and our mental health. — George Saunders

In a proud fatherly sadomasicisticly way, I am thrilled when I get hit. As every deep purple bruise on my body represented a perfect swing.
If I were to lift my shirt at any time there would be 4-5 bruises on my body ...
As soon as I was able to, I would throw batting practice again from the short distance, and take another shot if necessary to keep the boys in the zone. — JohnA Passaro

He who wishes for anything but Christ, does not know what he wishes; he who asks for anything but Christ, does not know what he is asking; he who works, and not for Christ, does not know what he is doing. — Philip Neri

No one would ever say that someone with a broken arm or a broken leg is less than a whole person, but people say that or imply that all the time about people with mental illness. — Elyn R. Saks

The columnist gives these words to the longings of an 11-year-old he meets with Tourette's syndrome: Wisdom is encoded in our common language. We all have, to some extent, a complex, sometimes adversarial, relationship with our physical selves. And I more than most people know that it is correct to say,'I have a body.' There is my body, and then there is ME, trying to make it behave. — George F. Will

If you would keep your soul
From spotted sight or sound,
Live like the velvet mole;
Go burrow underground. — Elinor Wylie

Persons who have a painful affection in any part of the body, and are in a great measure sensible of the pain, are disordered in intellect. — Hippocrates

Well, that day is gone, and it will not occur again. — Dianne Feinstein

Where there's life, there's the hope of change. — Timothy Zahn

Eighty two percent of the traumatized children seen in the National Child Traumatic Stress Network do not meet diagnostic criteria for PTSD.15 Because they often are shut down, suspicious, or aggressive they now receive pseudoscientific diagnoses such as "oppositional defiant disorder," meaning "This kid hates my guts and won't do anything I tell him to do," or "disruptive mood dysregulation disorder," meaning he has temper tantrums. Having as many problems as they do, these kids accumulate numerous diagnoses over time. Before they reach their twenties, many patients have been given four, five, six, or more of these impressive but meaningless labels. If they receive treatment at all, they get whatever is being promulgated as the method of management du jour: medications, behavioral modification, or exposure therapy. These rarely work and often cause more damage. — Bessel A. Van Der Kolk

After months of speculation, the sitcom star Ellen DeGeneres admitted that yes, she's gay. Inspired by her courage, today, diet-guru Richard Simmons admitted that he is really, really, really, really gay. — Norm MacDonald

This disease comes with a package: shame. When any other part of your body gets sick, you get sympathy. — Ruby Wax

1 in 5 people have dandruff. 1 in 4 people have mental health problems. I've had both. — Ruby Wax

You are not your illness. You have an individual story to tell. You have a name, a history, a personality. Staying yourself is part of the battle. — Julian Seifter

I think the stigma attached to mental illness will disappear just like it did for cancer years ago. — Sally Graham

The mentally ill frighten and embarrass us. And so we marginalize the people who most need our acceptance. What mental health needs is more sunlight, more candor, more unashamed conversation. — Glenn Close

Stigmas speak to the idea of difference and how difference shames us and those we know. — Michael Lewis

It's overwhelming ... to know there are hundreds of kids out there that look up to me. I know that's a big responsibility. I am also very confident to say that it is wonderful and I'll do my best that I can do to be the best role model I can be. — Selena

It is always some consolation in sorrow to feel that it is shared, and any burden laid on several is carried more lightly or removed. — Heloise

There will always be people afraid of the monsters in the night. They are usually the ones that look for them because they have proven they exist in themselves. — Shannon L. Alder

A lie will go round the world while truth is pulling its boots on. — Charles Haddon