Some of the most evil human beings in the world are psychiatrists. Not all psychiatrists. Some psychiatrists are selfless, caring people who really want to help. But the sad truth is that in today's society, mental health isn't a science. It's an industry. Ritalin, Zoloft, Prozac, Lexapro, Resperidone, happy pills that are supposed to normalize the behavior of our families, our colleagues, our friends - tell me that doesn't sound the least bit creepy! Mental health is subjective. To us, a little girl talking to her pretend friends instead of other children might just be harmless playing around. To a psychiatrist, it's a financial opportunity. Automatically, the kid could be swept up in a sea of labels. not talking to other kids? Okay, she's asocial! or imaginary friends? Bingo, she has schizophrenia! I'm not saying in any way that schizophrenia and social disorders aren't real. But the alarming number of people, especially children, who seem to have these illnesses and need to be medicated or locked up... it's horrifying. The psychiatrists get their prestigious reputation and their money to burn. The drug companies get fast cash and a chance to claim that they've discovered a wonder-drug, capable of curing anyone who might be a burden on society... that's what it's all about. It's not about really talking to these troubled people and finding out what they need. It's about giving them a pill that fits a pattern, a weapon to normalize people who might make society uncomfortable. The psychiatrists get their weapon. Today's generations get cheated out of their childhoods. The mental health industry takes the world's most vulnerable people and messes with their heads, giving them controlled substances just because they don't fit the normal puzzle. And sadly, it's more or less going to get worse in this rapidly advancing century.

~ Rebecca Mcnutt

Even as a child the glimpse of what a normal life would have been was always beyond my vision and my grasp. No matter what I glimpsed - whether hope or warning, happiness or sadness - it all led to the same present, to me being numb.I have been formed by the events of my life and the people involved. The loss of my innocence; the watchful, paranoid eye of my mother; the rejection of the adults around me; my abusive ex-boyfriend; the ignorance of my peers; I’ve allowed all of them to shape me into this faceless, identity-less mass which in my mind, I’ve been all my life.I repress my feelings for personal autonomy by dropping them into the fathomless waters of my subconscious. Trapped behind a colossal wall made from the pain and repressed emotions of my life, I seem to search desperately for anything that will help me reconnect with the world I’ve just left behind, whether it be a way out or simply a person on the other side willing to listen. My cry for someone to feel and touch me are all the more paradoxical considering that those are the very things I am unable to do in my life. I’ve built this wall out of the fear of feeling something, and out of my paranoia of being emotionally touched and leaving myself vulnerable.I want to regress back to my childhood, back to where it all began, so that I might be able to start over and see where things went wrong. For me to progress, I must comprehend the people, the events, and most importantly the decisions that have lead to my current imprisonment behind this wall.The violent battle of selves continues inside me, and they’re forming my most deranged persona yet.

~ Denice Envall