We are so much more than others can see: the battles of mental health and making social change
This speech was delivered by Dr Amanda Tattersall to the Side by Side Wayside Chapel conference at the University of Sydney. Amanda co-founded GetUp and founded the Sydney Alliance. She also has bipolar disorder. This speech shares a glimpse of some of the challenges she has encountered trying to hold all of this together, sometimes successfully and sometimes less successfully.
Every moment we make judgments.Take me for instance. You’ve already made quite a few assumptions about me.
She’s a doctor. She must be smart, or at least be a bit bookish, probably a nerd. She’s a woman in her late 30s. And if you thought this, let me just be the first to thank you. For the crueler ones in the room — yes you are right — i’m actually in my early 40s — aren’t you clever. She’s articulate. She’s a bit fun. She’d be a good hire. No, she’d be a great hire. Ooh wait, maybe she’s a bit arrogant!
We make lots of assumptions about people based on what we can see.
But what about what you can’t see?
How does your impression change when I tell you that I have bipolar disorder. Bipolar one, the really serious kind. The one where you have to…
