Tayler McCurley, Changing the Narrative Around Mental Health, One Story at a Time

A Team Effort

In late January of 2020, McCurley and Brown launched a private group on Facebook called “Silent No More: Breaking the Stigma, One Story at a Time.”

“We created this group because we saw a very big need that wasn't being really addressed,” McCurley said.

The “Silent No More” Facebook group is still in its early stages but is growing fast. Currently, most members are from the Reno, NV and Boise, ID, areas, where McCurley and Brown are from, respectively. However, their reach is quickly expanding as they continue spreading the word about the new support group and their experience with mental health disorders on local radio shows and podcasts.

“It’s absolutely terrifying [at first] because I know that in a lot of places when you talk about mental illness, they shut you down and you're immediately labeled,” McCurley explained. “So obviously going on the radio and being very public about your story and why you're doing what you're doing is scary because people will no doubt see you in a negative light regardless of what you say or what you're doing or why you're doing it.”

Despite these concerns, McCurley believes that going public with her story will help others do the same. Ever since she accepted her anxiety and depression, McCurley started realizing she wasn’t alone.

“I've lived with anxiety since I was in elementary school and depression since I was about 15 years old, so I am up close and personal with having a mental health disorder,” McCurley said. “In high school, I tended to flock to the misfits and I got bullied a lot. So when I found my misfits, it became very clear to me that they struggled with a lot of the same things that I did: depression and anxiety. So I not only live with it myself, but I watched my closest people to this day live with it.”

Early Anxieties, Followed by Depression

Brown, too, was challenged with mental health at a young age. 

“In the last few months I really only realized how soon my anxiety started to manifest as a child,” Brown said. “I was a clingy kid because I didn't like to be alone and I asked too many questions. We write that off [as normal] in children, but it's actually an indication that they are suffering from anxiety from an early age.”

Although her anxiety had shown at an early age, it wasn’t until she was a teenager that Brown’s depression began. She says that is typical, however, as a hormonal imbalance caused by puberty is often what triggers depression for many people. Although Brown didn’t realize it at the time, what made matters worse was the pressure she put on herself. 

“I was always kind of stressed out because I had to be the perfect child,” Brown said. “I had to have the best grades, I had to be good at everything and if I wasn't, that wasn't okay. I just called it stress because admitting to myself that I had anxiety or had depression was admitting that there was something wrong [with me].”

Brown didn’t want to reach out to her parents for help because she didn’t want to disappoint them. So she turned to some of her other close family members, who were able to get her in touch with her school’s counselor. Growing up in rural Idaho, her school’s counselor was one of the few resources available for someone in Brown’s position. Unfortunately, however, Brown’s experience with her did more harm than good. 

Above. the rules of their Facebook group.

Instances of Feeling More Stigmatized

“When you hear the stereotype of a therapist asking, ‘How does that make you feel? Well, why don't you do this?’ That's what I was faced with,” Brown explained. “That automatically stigmatized me even more, which made me shut down. From that point on, I would talk to my friends about what was going on because a lot of them were experiencing similar things. But I wouldn't actively seek help again until I was 19 and in my first semester of college.”

McCurley, too, didn’t have a good experience the first time she sought help. The first time she went to therapy and shared that she felt like something was wrong, the therapist called her a normal teenager. It wasn’t until she reached out to health services at the University of Nevada, Reno, where she was a student that she found real help.

Consequently, Brown believes having mental health resources available to students is one of the things that makes colleges so crucial in addressing mental health at a developing age.

“That's the really great thing about colleges and universities is that they have those free resources that so often people from smaller communities just don't really have access to or don't know how to go about getting access to,” Brown said. “Being able to have that contact close by and in reach is so important.” 

The most critical thing Brown got out of the services provided at her university was validation that her mental health disorder was real.

“The guy that I went to looked at me after we talked and said, ‘You know what? You're doing great because I have never met someone who was so clearly, deeply depressed, but so functional at the same time,” Brown explained. “That just kind of shook me to my core because I felt that validation, that all of those things that had been going through my head, it was real. It wasn't just me making things up, it was a real thing. I was validated.” 

On campus services are available at the University of Nevada, Reno.

The Importance of Getting a Diagnosis

When McCurley was diagnosed with dysthymia and a general anxiety disorder by her therapist at UNR, she too felt validated.

“As soon as there was a name for it, it got less scary because it was real,” McCurley said. “It wasn't a figment of my imagination, it wasn't my brain just trying to trick me.”

For Brown, too, validation was the first step to changing the narrative surrounding mental health.

“You empower yourself and the people around you to recognize that they aren't the only ones who feel the way that they do and that it's okay to not be okay and to share that when you're not,” Brown said. “Right now, there are labels because that's the way society has been for way too long. But eventually over time you'll notice things that change and it may not be overnight, but the revolution that happens by empowering people to tell their story and recognizing that mental health is just as hard to cope with as a physical ailment is really important.”

Much of the stigma surrounding mental health, McCurley attributed to fear that stems from a lack of understanding about it.

“[Mental health] has only been really talked about in the last five, maybe 10 years,” McCurley said. “When people don't understand something, they tend to fear it. And when you're afraid of [something], the easier course of action is to pretend like it doesn't exist. So I genuinely believe that the stigma is rooted in fear and a lack of understanding and education.”

To Brown (above), Facebook is an appropriate place to organize a group like this because of its broad reach. “It's a platform that's readily available for everyone,” Brown said. “And growing up in a rural community, [a Facebook group] would have been something that I would have had access to even though my community didn't have those resources.”

Writing Your Own Story

“By writing down your story rather than just telling it to someone gives your story permanence,” Brown said. “It empowers you more by knowing your story is out there for people to read and it doesn't matter how long it takes, it will be seen.”

In just the short time since the Facebook group was launched, McCurley has seen the benefits of story-telling in addressing mental health.

“It's been a blessing to watch some of my closest friends just open up to complete strangers,” McCurley said. “As soon as you start telling your story, it's not as scary anymore and you start accepting certain parts and then you can start working through those parts. That's been one of the outcomes so far in our community.”

Story-telling on the page has built an atmosphere of camaraderie in the group, something that can make a big difference in the life of someone living with a mental health disorder. 

“[Story-telling] makes the very lonely nature of having a mental health disorder a little less lonely,” McCurley said. “It broadens the world just a little bit.”

Although they see the world as currently developing more resources for mental health, McCurley and Brown recognize that their Facebook group can benefit members on a more personal level.

“There are plenty of wonderful organizations out there and groups that are in place almost like ours, but it's a matter of finding them,” Brown said. “But by taking this into our own hands and by empowering people to take their mental health and control it themselves and have a say in what they do, I think that is going to help make a huge difference.”

Expanding Access in Reno

For McCurley, who lives in Reno, there are plenty of mental health resources available to those in the city, but the problem is they’re realistically not accessible to the general public.

“There are plenty of therapists here in Reno, but even I can't afford to go as regularly as I probably should,” McCurley said. “So it's not necessarily asking ‘Is there enough?’ It's, ‘Can people get to it?’ I think affordability is one of the bigger problems.”

Affordability plays a significant role in accessing mental health services, many of which are barely covered by most insurance plans. 

“The average health care insurance plan that you would have, if you can even afford and have access to it, would still only cover one therapy session every six months,” Brown explained. “And that's just not enough when one in five people will be diagnosed with a mental health disorder in their lifetime [according to the National Alliance on Mental Illness]. ”

Affordability can also be a huge factor for those living with mental health disorders as well as homelessness. When it comes to the relationship between mental health and homelessness, Brown sees a correlation between the two, particularly as she’s seen Boise undergo an affordable housing crisis not unlike that of Reno’s.

“Think about even if you don't have a chronic mental health issue, if you undergo something where suddenly you're unemployed and you can't afford to pay your bills and you can't pay your house payment,” Brown said. “So the bank repossesses [your home] and you find yourself on the street, you're going to have some anxiety and maybe even some PTSD. So there would definitely be some depression issues to work through because, ‘What do you have left?’ So whether those issues were a catalyst for why they ended up in their situation or whether it ended up being a result of the situation, I would absolutely say there is a strong correlation between those populations and mental health.”

Developing Coping Mechanisms

However, McCurley and Brown see there are a lot of misconceptions about mental health disorders that need to be addressed.

“I would like people to know that we are capable, reliable, and we are not dangerous or do it for attention,” McCurley said. “I want people to know that it's only controllable to a point. Once you learn how to have healthy coping mechanisms, you can somewhat control the way that you're behaving. But the way that you feel is not something that you can control, especially when it comes to depression, anxiety, PTSD, all of those things. They can happen without permission in our brains.”

Both McCurley and Brown say they have reached the point where they have developed their own coping mechanisms when they experience an episode of their mental health disorder.

“I've been fortunate enough to have taken most of my power back and so I feel more stable now than I ever did before,” Brown said. “But that was after going through so many, just really dark periods of my life where I just felt like I didn't control anything. My coping mechanisms at this point are just centering myself and spending time with the people I love and who loved me.”

For McCurley, being able to verbalize her mental health disorders has enabled her to take control of her narrative. She equates her depression to that of a roller coaster, with good weeks and bad weeks. But during her bad weeks, McCurley places a special emphasis on self-care.

“On the bad weeks I am a little quieter, I stay at home, and I try not to overextend myself,” McCurley explained. “I make sure that I take a shower because that is one of the biggest things is personal hygiene is the first to go because you stop caring about stuff. So when I'm having bad weeks I make sure to keep up with showering and brushing my teeth.”

When it comes to people approaching someone enduring an episode of anxiety or depression, it’s important to empathize with the individual, as an episode of anxiety or depression can make it difficult for the individual to see past the moment.

“I would rather hear, ‘I'm so sorry this is what you're going through and that sucks,’ instead of ‘Oh, well it will be okay tomorrow,’” McCurley said. “Logically I know it'll be fine tomorrow but at that moment [it feels like] the walls are closing in.” 

Moving forward in the long-term, McCurley and Brown hope to expand the reach of their group. Their goals for the future include establishing a non-profit to educate and open lines of communication for people experiencing mental health disorders. 

But in the meantime, they’re just looking to get the conversation going one story at a time.

“If there's someone that you love who is struggling, you can find us and we can help you,” Brown said. “We have both had experiences where we've lost people close to us because they just felt like they couldn't [go on] anymore and that is the most heartbreaking and devastating thing. We want you to know that you are loved and that you are welcome here and that you are wanted. You're validated and it's okay to not be okay.”

Reporting by Scott King for Our Town Reno