Me Too Van: Engaging Community in Meaningful Conversations

Since the fall of 2015, some of the CREST.BD and I have been involved with a series of conversations titled “Me Too” in Vancouver, Canada. These conversations are about mental health and how it affects us all — from everyday anxieties to mental health conditions and everywhere in between.

“I love someone with a mental illness.”
“Me too.”

Each night encompasses a different theme. For example, I spoke at the March, 2016, event that was all about social stigma; you can find a recap of that by checking out this page. The next event, airing the same day as this post, truly speaks to the power of community and its role in fighting stigma. Me Too encompasses the idea that no one is alone and we all have something that connects us as people. Engaging in these conversations is pivotal in the way mental health is treated in society. The more we engage with each other, the more we learn, and the more we can help one another.

These community bonds are significant at all levels, from a personal note to policy change. It may seem like we’re tooting our own horn here, but I would be discrediting the principle of community engagement if I didn’t mention why I’m writing this post. Being involved in an organization such as CREST.BD has helped me find my voice as someone who lives with bipolar disorder — to the extent that they gave me the opportunity and ongoing support to speak at the Me Too event that I did. It’s hard finding your own voice to begin with, and it’s harder still finding people who will listen to you.

Partnership is the essence of a better future for mental health. You never have to fight your battles alone.

A strong sense of community is one of the pillars of a new, mentally healthy foundation for society. When we engage in conversations like Me Too, we make history. We live in a new time where we have the opportunity to hear and appreciate such deeply profound stories like what the Me Too speakers offer to their audience. To know we have cultivated this as a community is to know we have made a lasting impact on this world. And we have, indeed, done this together.

Me Too is sponsored by the Andy Szocs Foundation, the Kelty Patrick Dennehy Foundation, VGH & UBC Hospital Foundation, and Vancouver Coastal Health. To learn more about these events, click here. To read about some research CREST.BD does on stigma, take a look over here.