15: Nothing's Off Limits

I wanted to know what other people wanted to ask me. Listen as my friend and mental health advocate Liza Long asks me the hard questions. and we laugh. a lot. Brooke Lacey is a 43-year-old adult living successfully with PTSD, Bipolar I, General Anxiety Disorder, and Adjustment Disorder. While she doesn’t have a gruesome story of beatings, sexual abuse, or being deployed to a war zone, Brooke's story is not unique. She grew up feeling unloved and unaccepted by the one person she needed love and acceptance from the most — her mother. From an early age, she was raised with extreme religious beliefs, which caused permanent trauma that became a heavy burden in her own adulthood and motherhood. Today, Brooke is a business owner, single mother, friend to many, and stranger to no one. And she feels lucky to be alive — abundantly blessed to have found her way and to have found what has worked for her: medication, therapy, exercise, friendship, and motherhood. Brooke believes in making the distinction that she lives successfully with mental illness but does not suffer from it. In this podcast she shares her personal experiences via a candid, no-nonsense, approach, Brooke intends to bring healing to those who may be struggling and awareness to communities at large, so as to stamp out stigma surrounding mental illness once and for all.