So it turns out that talking about your mental health is a revelation and a rollercoaster! My first blog here was published just as I slipped into a bit of a crisis. Seeing it appear on my own Facebook page was a moment of stunned wonder. I spent a disproportionate amount of the rest of the day clicking refresh and waiting for a friend to recognise me and blow my cover (sorry boss!). They didn't but I really wasn't prepared for what came next either. As the comments came in on Facebook and under the post on Time to Change, they made me cry. Not in distress I hasten to add, but sheer unadulterated relief. I never expected that people would recognise their own experiences in my story; I never expected such kindness or support and encouragement from strangers.

At a particularly low point I learnt my first valuable lesson about the benefits of speaking out - it really can help and by taking just one timid step I was lucky enough to receive what felt like a huge cyber hug. Just imagine what might happen if I get really brave and tell people I actually know!

So have I? Steady on ... I did however tell my therapist that I had shared my feelings online and about the transformative experience of acceptance. This is, as others on this site have testified, a big step. But the challenge that people face is that it isn't a one-time thing. Not only do you need to accept it for yourself but you need to be accepted many times by many people - family, friends, colleagues and new people you have yet to meet. Each and every time that moment is fraught with anxiety, the fear of rejection, dismissal or worse. That is why removing the stigma around mental illness is so crucial - mental illness is hard enough without an added layer of guilt and shame simply for being who you are, and without the fear of what disclosure will bring.

A fellow blogger on here, Mark, recently talked about depression being an illness of paradoxes; that "the harder you fight it, the harder it gets". And suddenly I find that because I'm no longer in so much denial, I'm not fighting so hard (at least, not always!). I am experiencing, it seems, the Paradoxical Theory of Change - "To become who we can be, we must first become who we are" - a concept first proposed by Albert Beisser and now core to the theory of Gestalt therapy. It's a strange sensation and one I'm not yet sure what to do with.

In the meantime though, while I continue my rollercoaster ride, I want to highlight the power and impact that every single person who engages with this campaign has. Every pledge, every comment and every tweet, not to mention every conversation you now have that once you would have avoided, matters. You might get a 'thank you', maybe a smile or a hug, or you may see nothing at all but to someone, somewhere, you will have made a difference.

Pledge to share your experience of mental health today >>

Or find out how talking tackles discrimination.