YOU ARE NOT ALONE - A companion online community discussion board for The Mental Illness Happy Hour podcast with Paul Gilmartin

Raised by attentive, loving parents she nevertheless grew up with a pervasive feeling of emptiness that she sought to soothe through relationships with men. In her words she, “Burnt her life to the ground”, but used the experience and pain to grow.

I got really frustrated early on in the interview when she was explaining how damaging it was that her parents let her be sexually active in their home as a teen and Paul was just like, "That sounds great! Sex is awesome!" Reeeeeeeeally felt like he was missing her point.

He can't help it, guys are built different from women. She doesn't understand why she's screwed up when her parents were so loving; I'll explain it. When you're exposed to sexual subjects and situations too young it's a form of sex abuse. You end up acting just the same as someone who was molested at a very young age. I know because it happened to me too. I don't know for sure if I was ever molested but sex and the exploitation of women was around me constantly from living with a hypersexual teenage brother before I was 8 years old. He was my babysitter. It screwed me up real good for the rest of my life. It's taken years of therapy and support groups to understand.

The story about her journey to a healthy life was fascinating. I feel like she discovered mindfulness: self talk and meditation (prayer), keeping a daily (mood) diary, and going to a support group (church). Doing these things lead to thinking about thinking (meta-consciousness) and having a low stress lifestyle. Stress is all about perception. Knowing God and your support group will help if required greatly reduces stress.

She said she didn't have Bipolar. I agree she doesn't have "full on" Bipolar but Adrienne had all the classic signs: uncontrolled crying, manic sexy times, grandiose ideas (starting a business), and, finally, heavily into religion. I feel the antidepressants kicked off the manic episode which lead to sexy times which lead to her divorce. It sounds like she is has leveled off. She is older and wiser she can quickly identify when she is getting slightly depressed or slightly manic. It takes a lifetime to get a handle on your brain and she definitely has! Based on her interview she sounds super healthy now!

As far as her childhood... sounded pretty healthy except for the parent's apply the 1970s counterculture to parenting. Definitely a bad combo. Having sex too young can definitely screws people up.

I specially love Paul questions and how he poses the question. Paul has really grown as a host! His tone and voice inflection really puts his guest at ease.

Thank you for this episode. I especially loved the end when Adrienne talked about her religious experience. Good stuff!

After listening to this podcast episode, I was absolutely horrified. Paul and Adrienne are going back and forth about why each were damaged by situations of sex at age 15, and coming up with totally asinine conclusions for each situation (having sex at 15 with other 15-year-olds or accumulating loneliness via masturbation). Are they both scratching their heads and missing the other options available that are actually much more healthy and viable perhaps because neither are remotely qualified to speak about the reasoning behind these issues?!

Paul directed questions to Adrienne- who is also not mental health professional- about deeply personal experiences and put her on the spot to give explanations and theoretical advice about them. How totally inappropriate. While she was trying to be helpful and speak from only what she knew, she is not qualified to give those answers! The interviewer clearly did not do his research, and you can tell as she stumbles to offer some sort of helpful (yet misinformed) answers to these deeply important, clinical issues.

When he said that 15-year-olds are listening to the show, desperately looking for answers, I was completely heartbroken by the misinformation these kids are eating up from this podcast. Truly disgusting. I am 100% advocate for opening the conversation about mental illness and sharing personal testimonies, but this is was repulsive. Please consider a new strategy.

I've listened to ALL of the MIHH podcasts, and this is the first one that ever provoked a really negative reaction in me. I got turned off right at the beginning when Adrienne was getting all high-and-mighty and worked up about how damaging it was to be having sex at age 14 or 15, and things just took a nosedive for me at the end when she was discussing her religious revelations. Just...a strange interview. I felt no empathy towards her at all, I just felt kind of annoyed and irritated by her abrupt manner and holier-than-thou attitude. And the stuff about how you can't always just be a seeker, you have to eventually become a finder...Uh, how is one exactly supposed to do that? Do you just wake up one day and say to yourself "OK, I guess it's time to shit or get off the pot, let me just pick something to believe in and stick with it so I don't stay a seeker forever." Really??

Amen! (He said sarcastically)

My inner Freud wants to know if her Mom had sex (or worse) before she was 15.

Few things bother me more than people who say they were former atheists. In this case, it was particularly annoying because she found a religion because she was told she had to and then just really wanted it. So, no compelling evidence or personal event? Just wanting it super bad and drawing a connection in your mind?

All I heard here was an addict trading one addiction for another.

Interesting thought, MackLuster. Being addicted to religion...I never really thought of that but it makes perfect sense.