Ashley Smith: from crisis to advocacy

Welcome to Why Not Me the World? Podcast hosted by
Tony Mantor, broadcasting from Music City, USA, Nashville, Tennessee. Join
us as our guests tell us their stories. Some will
make you laugh, some will make you cry. Real life
people who will inspire and show that you are not
alone in this world. Hopefully you gain more awareness, acceptance,
and a better understanding for autism around the world. Hi,
I'm Tony Mantor. Welcome to Why Not Me the World?
Humanity over Handcuffs the Silent Crisis special event. Joining us
Yes today is Ashley Smith. She's an advocate, an author,
and a speaker. In two thousand and eight, she established
the Overcoming Schizophrenia blog. It offers her candid journey of recovery.
She then went on to self publish her first book,
What's on My Mind. It's a collection of blog entries
for overcoming schizophrenia. Recently, a popular review recognized Ashley's blog
among the top twenty schizophrenia blogs and websites to follow.
Ashley continues to show that schizophrenia is not going to
stop her from being a voice to help many people.
She's here to tell us her journey, her experiences and
it's a pleasure to have her here. Thanks for coming on,
Thank you for having me. Oh, it's my pleasure, glad
to have you here. I understand that you do a
lot of writing.
Yes I am. Yes, I've been blogging since two thousand
and eight, and I've just had a thing for writing.
What led you to get into writing?
I'm not sure self expression, credativity. As a child growing up,
I had a journal and teachers gave me confidence on
my writing on my essays growing up in grade school.
So I just have enjoyful words and putting them together,
making them sound lively and ashate and good.
So once you got into that, that actually led you
to writing a book about schizophrenia.
Yes, I wrote my own, my own blog book on
my experiences living with schizophrenia. I'm in recovery.
I think that's really good that you did this. What events,
if any, led up to you actually sitting down and
writing the book.
I've been wanted to share my story and recovery for
a very long time. I actually had the opportunity to
meet up with a peer who was also a self
published author, and she guided me the steps of self publishing.
It was actually her idea just to put my blog
articles together to get my story out there, and so
she walked with through the process, and then I have
these blog books. My first blogbook came out back in
twenty fourteen. What's on my mind?
You say recovery. Can you explain or expand what you
mean by recovery.
Yes, I'm in recovery living with schizophrenia and bipolar disorder
and depression. It's a lot going on, but it's very manageable,
and I'm grateful that I'm in recovery, and I'm grateful
that I'm doing well today.
What led to your diagnosis and which condition was identified first,
given that some of your diagnosis seemed to overlap.
I got diagnosed through a legal situation. It was really
out of character. It was family crisis. It was just
a mess. When I was twenty years old, I took
a break from college and I relocated to spend some
time with family. I had wide range of symptoms. I
heard voices, I saw spirits and ghosts. I thought people
were gossiping about me. I even thought people were trying
to kill me and poison people in my family, and
so I didn't recognize the signs of mental illness. I
didn't know that was hallucinated or having these illusions. Even
when I thought it was Jesus Christ, I didn't know
something was wrong. And so one day I just decided,
I want to go back home. I wanted to make
things right again. I want to fix things. So I
got up and went to the airport. I cashed my
last check, went to airport by public transportation in San Diego,
and I tried to get a flight back home to Atlanta.
But I felt very uneasy and uncomfortable, and it was
quite a journey to get there. I was familiar with
the pope chaink system, but this day I was confused.
I didn't know what was happening, and I was afraid
of everybody, even the taxi driver when I got when
I took the taxi from downtown, and so I ended
up walking endlessly around the grounds of the airport, and
I saw this pickup truck, and I'm thinking to myself,
oh my God, this is my blessing. Because I thought
everyone was against me. I thought everyone was trying to
kill me, including family. And so I got in this
pickup truck and started driving. And as I'm driving this
pickup truck, I hear this hip hop song on the
radio and the lyrics the hiok Is girls, Girls, girls
would be suicidal. Now this is the second time I
thought the devil was trying to communicate with me through
the televide and now through the radio. And so I'm
thinking that I'm dealing with the spiritual war and that
he's trying to give me to kill myself. And I'm
highly spiritual and religious at this time. I'm so spiritual today.
But make a long story short, I went on high
speed change to the police. I was rested in jailed,
and hosplaged five months. During the course of those months,
I learned about my diagnosis of paranoids to the fronty end.
It wasn't fearful or frightening to have the diagnosis because
I had a very good doctor, doctor Woo. He told
me I can go back to school as long as
I take my medication and manage my stress. And so
that's been my foundation of recovering that legal intervention. Doctor
Wu tell me I can go back and do what
I want to do as long as I just take
my medication. And so that was the beginning of my recovery.
Back in two thousand and seven.
After receiving your diagnosis, how did it impact your mental
capacity and overall cognitive functioning, What thoughts or emotions surface
as a result, and how did you approach the process
of rebuilding and starting new.
It was a process and reflecting on what I know
today looking back. I had some symptoms in high school,
but it didn't affect my ability to function until my
third year at the university, and so I had a
lot of symptoms. I mean, I thought that everyone in
the jail was shrying poison. I thought everyone was in
on the cafeteria staff was putting stuff from poisoning my
food and things like that. So I dumped the train
intentionally and I get in trouble for it, and then
the phones weren't working after hours, and then I'll go
to seclusion, and it was just I was just a mess.
But fortunately I was forced to medicaid, and I'm really
grateful for that intervention because I was not going to
take the medication. I didn't understand what was happening to
me or that I was not well. Everyone else saw
but me. I've been on medication since then. I've been
doing very very well with my recovery. I'm just very
fortunately my medication that works well for me.
Now that you're doing well, you've taken steps to help
others and share valuable knowledge. Beyond on writing your book,
What are some of the specific actions you've taken to
share your story inspire people and demonstrate that even when
life takes a difficult turn, it's possible to overcome challenges
and lead a very fulfilling life.
Yes. Yes, And as I mentioned, this was a family
crisis because my family put a missing person's report on
No one knew where I went or what happened or
why I left this all of a sudden, And so
in my recovery, my mom told me that she saw
me telling peopleout how I made it through. And this
was at in jail, in the hospital, in the state hospital,
when she used to visit me daily and we would
do exercises with the Bible, we talk about my plans
when I got out of jail and things like that,
and so it was just very It's been a process
and every since then, I've been wanting to not only
help myself, but help other peep. And so we're introduced
to NOMI, the Nationalizes of Mental Honest Do. Doctor Wu
on my treatment team at that hospital, and I've been
a member of nonmy since two thousand and nine. Me
and my family went to an educational meeting and they
met once a month back then, and we got to
mingle with other individuals who are diagnosis and family members
and caregivers. And it was quite an experience because it
left your last impression on me, because it gave me
the desire to want to volunteer for the organization. But
I got heavily involved in Nonal Georgia and I've worked
in several capacities and I am a state trainer today.
I've been a board member, I've been assultator mentor, i
worked on that non emergency helpline resource line, and so
I've done quite a lot with the organization. It's been
quite a journey and I'm just I'm enjoining. I'm enjoying
giving back. I'm join learning more about myself and about
my diagnosis, not only through my blogging, but also through
my volunteer work and meeting other people on these trainings
and things like that.
So it is your blog one where people can reach
out to you in comment or is it just a
blog for people to read and just learn from your writings?
It's kind of both. I'm not expecting anyone to really comment.
I just share. I reflect on my experiences, and so
I write a lot, and I try to write about
once a week, And sometimes people leave me a gift
and lead a comment and I respond. Sometimes I have
guest bloggers on my blog Overcoming Skius. It's funnier and
that's a nice experience for both of us.
Yeah, I get that completely. There's no instant gratification from
blogs or podcasts or anything like that. But every now
and then you'll get someone that will reach out to
you and tell you how you've helped them or how
your blog made a difference in what they're doing with
their life. When you get something like that, it makes
a difference in your life because you know what you're
doing is helping.
Yes, yes, and do My blog is interesting. I've learned
so much more about the mental health community.
Now.
I'm also on the advisor we cancel Theorist Foundation, and
so I share my experience on the meetings and also
give advice to other individuals who are in crisis or
who need more support, family members, caregivers, individuals like myself.
We're also in recovery.
Could you expand on what the Curious Foundation is and
what you do with it.
The Curious Foundation is an awareness organization and we promote
medication for people who live with the diagnosis, and we
encourage them to consider it when all else fails, try
medication and just learn more about the diagnosis and to
seek help. We have five monthly meetings the Curious Foundation,
which I sit on the advisory council of, and so
we talk to different families and individuals who may be
going through situations like myself when they add bobus in
person's report, or other crises where the individuals living in
recovery or who are now medication or become homeless or
something like that, and so we talk situations and stories
through so people feel supported.
So I'm sure that by doing this you are learning
a lot of things yourself. You're seeing things that you
wasn't sure of. Can you give us an idea of
what it is?
Now?
By doing this that you learn and in turn it
helps you evolve even more.
The first thing I learned was that mental honest is
not what people see it seems to be. There's so
many myths out there. The stigma is so strong. I
didn't know what schizophrenia was until I was diagnosed with it.
When the doctors told me about whose nations, I didn't
know what they were talking about. And so that's the
major milestone for me. It's understanding what am I really
dealing with? What is schizophrenia and what does it mean
for me and my family? And I really go back
to saying how it impacts me and my family because
even though this is an individual medical diagnosis, it impacts
all of the person and their family, their loved ones.
And so another thing that I've learned is that recovery
is possible. Medication is one way, and there's several other
possibilities how to reach recovery. I don't define recovery by medication.
I define it by how we manage our coping skills
to get through trying times, daily struggles and stressors. And
the things that I've learned through the Gearst Foundation is
that how do you provide support and care to someone
that doesn't understand that they have a diagnosis, that's going
through some of those four symptoms sconsistentity where they don't
we're not aware that they even have a medical condition,
even though everyone is telling them their doctor, their family,
their friends. Hey, you have schizophrenia, take your medication and
everything will be okay. It's not a sense of denial.
It's a symptom of the condition. But I was very
fortunate to overcome that part of my condition through the medication,
the force medication for me in my situation. But those
are just a few things that I've learned, and also
that we're a strong community. A lot of people don't
know what schizophrenia is or what NAMI is, and the
thing is, it's a strong subgroup. There are a lot
of individuals like myself whore are living in recovery, who
are working, who have families, who are giving back to
the community and to their churches. And so the world
in society in Hollywood doesn't see this. They have no
idea about this movement that we have going on about
some of us coming up and sharing our recovery experiences.
I shared my story with law enforcement in the past
through the Crisis Intervention Team training. For those of us
that don't know what that means, it's educating law enforcement
high de escalate crises situations as the persons who are
going through a situation with either substance abuse or mental
health so that instead of using accessive force or taking
us to jail the police officer, the SICH officer will
take us to the hospital.
Your blogs often addressed topics like schizophrenia, ADHD and other
mental health conditions which carry such a heavy stigma. Many
people don't fully understand these conditions. As you said, their
perceptions can be skewed. What changes have you observed in
how people view these issues through your work? How can
we further break down that stigma so others can see
what you are emphasizing that it's not the end of
the world. It's about getting the correct medication, gaining control,
and showing people they can live fulfilling lives they might
not have thought possible.
Yes, exactly. And so I've been involved in quite a
few projects. One, for example, is a gentle pharmaceutical company
made an educational video called lydwis Schizophrenia A Call for
Hope or Recovery. I was one of three stories featured
in that documentary, and I've known some people reach out
to me to get my approval for them using that
clip from the documentary to share to their training and
classes and support groups and like that. Right, So that's
one avenue Another way that I've advocated for myself and
for others is by not only sharing my story, but
like I said, work with law enforcement. And so I'm
going to do a refresher and continue working with law enforcement.
I took a break from that program, but I'm getting
back involved in that specific program, and so I'm educating
law enforcement on how I was handled through the situation,
things that could have been handled differently, and my perception
when I was being arrested in jailed, and also the aftermath,
the after effect, because like early on I said, I'm
appreciative and fortunate to have a legal intervention enforce medication
that got me out of that symptom of not being
aware that I even have a diagnosis. So that was
that was a huge That was a huge success for
me and my recovery. It's just getting past that initial
phase and of understanding, hey, I have a diagnosis, which
is big, and then hey, I gotta take my medication
into control.
How has the police responded to your initiatives and the
goals you're striving to achieve with your work. Are they
embracing what you're trying to do or have you faced
any pushback with your efforts.
It's interesting. This is a tough group to talk to,
as you can imagine. I mean, they're thrown in fur
balls prices all the time, and sometimes it opens up
conversations that I really appreciate. Most of the time there's
not going to be a lot of conversation back and forth.
But through this specific program and our on voice when
I shared it in the past, I've learned that they'll
put me aside after the presentation, ask questions, and they'll
tell me about someone they may have known, who they
interacted with, whether they're on their job or even in
their families. And so, like I said, law en coursement
is a tough group to talk to about different situations.
But I'm just very fortunate to have the opportunity to
share my specific story so they can get the other
side and see someone who's now recovery.
So true, law enforcement officers often have to make quick
decisions about how to handle a situation. The more they
understand the context, the better equipped they are to respond effectively.
That's a big part of why it's valuable for them
to see someone like you who has faced these kinds
of challenges and come out on the other side. It
demonstrates that people have the ability to take a difficult path,
turn things around and make something positive out of it.
West Stephinitely, Yes, Mike, my recovery experience has been very
empowering for me and for other people learning about my
situation with the pickup truck. It actually wasn't an ordinary
pickup truck I took from the airport. It was a
military pickup truck. So I was facing bounty charges, but
fortunately I was able to get those charges reduced to
misdemeanors with time. So because I learned about my diagnosis
and had no criminal record whatsoever before this situation occurved.
Did the legal system provide the resolution or the support
you needed to navigate your situation and emerge successful as
you hope that it would.
Yes, I had a great experience with a jail worker
and a few of the nurses in the psych word
of the jail. I remember this social worker name was Elaine,
and she referred me to a few different programs, and
being twenty years old at the time, I really wanted
to be more independent, so she guided me to a
personal care home as well as a program for youth
with mental illness and substance abuse, and in that program
I learned more about my diagnosis, especially through the program
RAP the Wellness becover Action Plan by Mary Ellen Copeland.
And every since then, I've been inspired to be a mentor,
to be a peer counselor. And that's what I'm doing today.
When I'm not writing books, when I'm not taking care
of my family and my pets, I'm actually a peer
counselor called a Certified Peer Specialist here in Georgia. And
what that means is the main criteria to be a
CPS is to have a diagnosis, have a mental health diagnosis.
I've been at CPS since twenty twelve. Even though I've
been working with novices two thousand and nine, I was
doing work before I was actually doing the work, and
so I support people and their goals going back to work,
going back to going into groop home, taking care of
their families, whatever it is that they're working on, just
be on medication again. And so I really love what
I do. Back in grade school, I wanted to be
an actress, but then when I graduated, I want to
be a social worker, and so this is another form
of social work, being a CPS, a certified peer specialist.
What happened is when you encounter people you've mentored or
guided through tough times who just didn't seem to grasp
what you were saying or take it in. Maybe they
even pushed back a bit. How did you manage to
break through that resistance and help them understand so they
could still move forward.
I think that being a CPS or doing any type
of work, it's important to build rapport with the individuals
whoever you're working with. And so I love talking to people,
I love supporting people, and so just share my story
in them knowing that hey, I have a diagnosed system
theirs or like exactly like THEIRS. That gives them a
lot of hope. And I've actually seen firsthand how my
blog books my uh share my story vocally through my
blog has helped other people and empowered them to be authors,
to share their memoir or to share their blog stories.
Have you ever felt like things weren't going well, like
you weren't sure if you were getting through to someone.
Then one day it's like the light switch just turned on.
Everything clipped and from there you were able to keep
nurturing that relationship to guide them towards a better place.
For themselves.
Yes. Yes, I've worked with quite a few individuals and
until become in at the forefront where the communication was
really soft and really hard and early on because it
was an icebreaker. It takes time to develop these relationships.
And so now that in the beginning this individual wasn't
talking as much or they'll give short brief answers and responses,
now their face slights up, and now they're looking forward
to our sessions and they're opening up about different things
that I would have never thought was going on or
just noticed because there's just more vocal now. And so
that has been really empowering and motivating for me to
continue doing this work.
That's great. It's always nice to have a success story.
So what are your goals now? What do you see
yourself doing in the next three to five years? How
do you make this bigger and better for yourself and
the ones you're helping.
Yes, And on top of my blog books, I've developed
some other books. I've actually self published seven books today.
As of today, i have seven books out on my
Amazon author page, Amazon dot Com, slash author slash Smith Ashley.
And so I've inspired other people to write books that
I want to do more book coaching. I've done some
book coaching in the past before COVID and to people
on different aspects of book writing, and so I want
to get back strongly involved in that where I could
kind of step back a little bit from being the
CPS and be more of the book coach. And so
that's one of my major goals in the next few
years is to facilitate more writing classes.
I think that's great. Creativity can always help people feel
better about themselves, so that's a great thing. Now, how
many organizations are you working with?
Two no Me Georgia and Curious Foundation.
Do you see yourself growing within either one of the
organizations to a higher level of service.
I might, I might explore being a board member again.
I might apply down the road in the next few years,
but by now I'm just just continuing to facilitate training
and to participate in other workshops. Is like that to
share my story with law enforcement, and so I'm content
with the capacity that I'm met now, but i also
really want to see people's response after they hear my story,
Like have the conversations that I've had with some people
been very fortunate to have some people like oh, I
would never have thought of this X y Z, or
you encourage me to write a book. You've encourage me
echo like I can do this, you know. I hear
that a lot now through the Cures Foundation when I
give advice sometimes to the caregivers and family, they really
appreciate the insight as well as the other individuals on
the board sharing their recovery experienses, And so I love
those moments of giving back and seeing the reactions and
having a dialogue about it.
Have you had anyone that's question you. You tell them
what you went through, you tell them what you're doing now,
and they question you saying, well, yours wasn't as bad
as mine, and they're really not comparing apples to apples
on the diagnosis. Yes, how did you put it across
to them to get them to understand that it doesn't
matter which one was worse, They can only focus on
the now and focus on working towards a better life
for themselves.
Yes, most definitely that's a very good angle to look
at things because sometimes that I sometimes people assume that
I didn't have it as bad, or that peer is superhuman,
and that simply is not the case. My last hospitalization
was actually two thousand and three, and that was that
took me out of work for several months, I mean
four to six months, and so I had to I
had to really focus on my recuperation and my abilding
myself up again to get to where I am today.
And so I just share my story and experience and
just building that relationship. It helps in the long run,
and it's very motivating to both sides, to me and
to the peer.
What's one of the craziest questions you've been asked? Then
you had to turn it around for them because what
they were looking at and what it really was was
not the perception that they actually thought it was.
I can't think of any questions right now, but I
have thought of statements that were very bizarre and cold.
I've done really talking and speaking engaged when I shared
my recovery experiense in different groups shelters, nonprofits, law enforcements,
different groups of people, and someone actually got up and said, hey,
you're demonic, and so I, me and my col facilitator
took control of that conversation, which was a great opportunity
to break the stigma and debunk those myths and be like, no,
this is not what you think it is. This is
a medical condition. It has nothing to do with our
faith and religion, and this is characterized by you know,
different aspects and symptoms of mental health. But it's a
medical condition. And I am not demonic, and I am
just like you, you know. So that was I've been
called demonic a couple of times in my experience, which
is very hurtful. But again it opened the door for
that conversation, which is what I want to debunk the
mess and to reduce the stigma.
Yeah, that's really good that that happened for you that
way and you was able to handle it. Now, what
would you like to tell the listeners that you think
is very important that they need to know about what
you're doing with your journey.
I think that was that question Center. It's so simple,
but it's so complex to me when we're dealing with
recovery when it comes to schizophrenia, I would say that
schizophrenia requires a lot of support from loved ones, from
your treatment team, self awareness, and acceptance. But that's not
it's not a one way to recovery. There's several different paths.
So even if an individual does not accept the diagnose
so they can still be in recovery and have a
quality life, taking medication, getting you know, staying involved with
family and friends and in the community and things like that.
What point I really want to drive home is that
recovery is possible. It's possible through several several avenues, different avenues.
Everyone doesn't have to fit the same box the same
at the shoe and that I think that the top
things that helped me and my recovery was therapy, my
sports system, my family and everybody, as well as organizations
such as NAMI having the peer support to show me
an example of what recovery could look like.
Yeah, that's a great message, it sure is. Now tell
our listeners how they can contact you and find you.
If your community would take a look at my blog
Overcomings because it's spending it, or my books on Amazon
Amazon dot com, slash author Slash Smith Ashley or if
you want to talk to me directly Ashley Smith sixty
eighty two at gmail dot com. Again, my email is
Ashley Smith sixty eighty two at gmail dot com.
That's awesome. This has been a great conversation, great information.
I really appreciate you taking the time to come.
On Thank you so much for having me Tony.
It's been my pleasure. Thanks again, thanks for taking the
time out of your busy schedule to listen to our
show today. We hope that you enjoyed it as much
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