Breaking My Silence

Hidden Children

Two decades of research indicate that children of a parent with a severe mental illness, are at significantly greater risk for multiple psycho/social problems and behavioral issues. These children are more at risk of being raised by their extended families, become wards of the court, or being in unstable home environment. Yet so little attention is paid to children who grew up like I did. Children of parents with a severe mental illness are often referred to as ‘hidden children’ because the mental health community largely overlooks these children in much of its discourse, research and services. I decided to share my story to draw awareness to the hidden children and their need for support and care. 

Breaking My Silence

First exposed to schizophrenia at the age of three when my mother was diagnosed with the disease, I understand the issues facing children of parents with severe mental illness. After years of keeping the secret about my mother’s mental illness, I break my silence in Love's All That Makes Sense, a memoir that I co-authored with my mother.

So young when my mother was diagnosed, I didn’t understand her illness which made it even scarier to me. My mom’s mental illness was like a monster under the bed. I was always a little on edge because I never knew when it would jump out. Growing up with a mother with schizophrenia was like being on an emotional rollercoaster. When my mom was on her medicine, things were good between us and we had a close relationship. When she was in crisis and not taking her medicine, I’d watch as schizophrenia stole my mother from me. When she was sick, I became a child caregiver for my mother.  

A Child Caregiver

I felt like it was my responsibility to be strong and save her. I put my needs, especially my emotional ones, on the back burner to tend to hers because she seems so fragile. When she was sick, there wasn’t much space for my emotional needs so I buried them and I continued this pattern of putting my emotional needs into my emotional junk closet well into adult hood.

I know first-hand the issues facing family and child caregivers and their need for healing and support. My yoga, Qigong, and meditation practices helped me heal and release the emotional baggage from my childhood. My belief that healing must occur on a physical, mental, spiritual and emotional level inspired me to become a qi gong and yoga therapist so I could teach others how to use these practices for mental, physical, and emotional healing.