I am back – in more ways than one.

For the last few weeks I have been on assignment, covering the oil spill. I work for a newspaper in South Florida and I am the environmental reporter. I have been in Louisiana, Mississippi and the Florida Keys. I also snuck in a trip to Boston to visit McLean Hospital, a psychiatric hospital affiliated with Harvard.

I would love to sit here and tell you about my mental health in the last month. I can’t. Earlier today I was threatened with a lawsuit. This has happened to me before. Every journalist gets this threat at some time during her career.  Usually nothing comes of it.

But when you have a mental illness and you are open about your mental illness, the threat of a lawsuit – no matter how seemingly frivolous – is a very serious matter.I know. About 10 years ago I was subpoenaed to testify at the trial of a former co-worker who had sued the newspaper for discrimination.

I had gotten sober about a year earlier and the attorney for my former co-worker hoped to discredit me by revealing to the jury that I am an alcoholic. The attorney even called my ex-husband to get details about my getting sober. The newspaper’s attorney assured me that my alcoholism had nothing to do with the case and that the judge would not allow the plaintiff’s attorney to question me about it.

Wrong.

The judge did allow it. Then after I testified about my alcoholism and recovery, the judge decided it wasn’t relevant. I was furious – not because I was forced to out myself to my employer – but because this attorney (also my neighbor whose daughter had played at my home) wanted the jury to believe that I was not a reliable, trustworthy person because I am a recovered alcoholic.

Since then I have gone public with my bipolar and a very serious clinical depression I experienced several years ago. I am not embarrassed or ashamed of being mentally ill. But I do not like being portrayed as erratic, unstable and not believable because I am mentally ill.

When you are open about your mental illness you live with the fear that when you are very happy and excited, angry and resentful or sad and tired someone will look at you sideways and use it against you – “she must be off her meds.” I spent 12 years covering the courts for my newspaper. I have witnessed attorneys throw all kinds of innuendos against the wall to see what would stick. Sometimes jurors buy it. Sometimes it ticks them off. You never know.

When an attorney throws mental illness against the wall to poke holes in a witness’ credibility — and I have seen this in many divorce cases — it’s often about stigma. I don’t like that. I don’t know what, if anything, will come of this threat. I do know that it is best to shut up.

So, I have all kinds of great stories to tell about the bayou in Venice, Louisiana and the dead turtles on the beaches near Gulfport, Mississippi and the tar balls found in the Florida Keys. But I am not going to tell you how I felt while I was chasing after these stories.

I have worked too hard over the years to now let someone use my therapy, medications and sobriety against me. And I will keep working hard to keep it that way.

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From Psych Central's website:
PsychCentral (May 28, 2010)

    Last reviewed: 27 May 2010