If you’re a parent with a mental illness, or if someone in your  family is mentally ill, you may struggle with how to talk about it with  your children. You may feel embarrassed or even ashamed about your disease.

Even thought it can be difficult, it’s important to create a safe space for kids to hear and ask questions about the illness that affects you or your partner.

Here are five tips to help you get started.

When a parent gazes at a beautiful sleeping infant, the possibilities of how he or she will grow up are endless and wonderful.

No one imagines that their sweet fuzzy-haired infant will morph into a toddler who bites and terrorizes other children, or who refuses to eat anything other than chicken nuggets for days at a time.

Parents often imagine that if they just do everything right and provide the best toys and intellectual stimulation for their children, their kids will meet all of their developmental milestones and behave in socially appropriate ways. If only this were true.

And while most parents expect to deal with tantrums and coloring on the walls, there are some things that people tend not to talk about when parenting young children.

Erica* had a lot going for her. She had a good job, a solid group of friends, and was engaged to be married.

One night, after having some drinks with friends, Erica accepted a ride home with Mark.

Mark walked Erica to the door, then pushed his way in and raped her.

After the sheer terror of the assault had passed, Erica sat sobbing. Despite having done nothing wrong, she felt an intense sense of shame.

She questioned herself: why did I stay out so late? Why did I take a ride from a guy I barely knew? If I hadn’t had that last drink, I could have fought back more. The more she thought about it, the more she blamed herself, and the deeper her sense of shame grew. She didn’t tell anyone, because in the end she had convinced herself that the rape was her fault.