Honoring Kitten Mai
Kitten Mai is an advocate for mental health. She is not afraid to stand up for a cause that is highly stigmatized and for that Mental Health Awareness Retreat honors her.
Kitten Mai is the proud owner of Mad Echo. As a store owner she knows there will be countless of people who will stop by her land. In order to help others find their mental health resources and a community that cares and is there to help with such matters, Kitten has placed up a Mental Health Awareness Retreat Poster in her store.
That is not the only thing Kitten has done. She has also helped many times to decorate the land which is a safe haven for many. She has created the environments to be peaceful and pleasant. She also is the creator of our hunt poster for the Postpartum Depression Hunt. Kitten is always volunteering and always giving of her time.
Recently, Kitten Mai chose to raise awareness via her Flickr. She is also very active in the community's group, offering a listening, genuine ear.
As part of honoring a person, Mental Health Awareness Retreat gives the honored person $500L. Kitten Mai donated the money back along with an additional $2000L which will go towards the Asylum Exhibition coming soon.
It is people like Kitten Mai who make a huge! difference in the world. Who make the world a better place to live in. Her actions don't go without notice. She is helping to create the changes we wish to see.
In honoring Kitten, I would love to share some of her favorite quotes:
"The most important thing to remember about depression is this: you do not get the time back. It is not tacked on at the end of your life to make up for the disaster years. Whatever time is eaten by a depression is gone forever. The minutes that are ticking by as you experience the illness are the minutes you will not know again." ~ Andrew Solomon, The Noonday Demon: An Atlas of Depression
"You are constantly told in depression that your judgment is compromised, but a part of depression is that it touches cognition. That you are having a breakdown does not mean that your life isn't a mess. If there are issues you have successfully skirted or avoided for years, they come cropping back up and stare you full in the face, and one aspect of depression is a deep knowledge that the comforting doctors who assure you that your judgment is bad are wrong. You are in touch with the real terribleness of your life. You can accept rationally that later, after the medication sets in, you will be better able to deal with the terribleness, but you will not be free of it. When you are depressed, the past and future are absorbed entirely by the present moment, as in the world of a three - year - old. You cannot remember a time when you felt better, at least not clearly: and you certainly cannot imagine a future time when you will feel better."
For Kitten Mai, most of her favorite quotes about depression come from The Noonday Demon book written by Andrew Solomon. She says that The book helped keep her from suicide at one point.
She also enjoys this quote "Oh, the sound is just the sound. It's me who is going out to annoy it. If I leave the sound alone, It won't annoy me. It's just doing what it has to do. That's what sound does. It makes sound. This is its job. So if I don't go out and bother the sound, it's not going to bother me. Aha!" ~ Ajahn Chan
This quote was for Kitten a revelation. It made her realize that when she is about to have a panic attack over a spider...it's just a spider being a spider. It is her who is making the big deal about it. Same goes when she is afraid to leave her house. People are just out there going about their business, and it is her who is interpreting them as threats. She says that when she recognizes that she is the one creating these anxieties in a way, then she is able to fight the anxiety itself.
She goes on to say that it is not one's fault that one is anxious. It's just the anxiety coming from within, from the mental illness. Knowing that the "scary" things are not the one hurting you but the illness itself, it's empowering to her.
Besides these quotes, Kitten Mai finds Fat Acceptance/Body Acceptance movements to be really great, especially for those with mental illness. She states that Mental Illness too often affects self esteem and body image. To expose one self to body-positivity and work on body acceptance can really boost self worth.
Kitten Mai's favorite links are:
Thank you Kitten Mai for being an advocate for mental health! For raising awareness and helping people find their resources, help, and a community where they don't feel alone. You DO make a difference in the world =]
***Every month, Mental Health Awareness Retreat is choosing to honor someone who is standing up for Mental Health and raising awareness and/or advocating for Mental Health.
Submit what you are doing for Mental Health to Joshuan Banx (in world) or Joshuanbanx@yahoo.com.
You can indeed make a difference!
You can indeed make a difference!
Take a look at what I am wearing from Mad Echo, Zombie Suicide, The Rockabilly Fashion Fair and more HERE
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