These blogs are written by people with personal experience of mental illness. They review and reflect on some of the ways mental health has been portrayed in the media, including TV episodes and newspaper articles.
The way mental illness is portrayed and reported in the media is incredibly powerful in educating and influencing the public. Our Media Advisory Service works with journalists, script writers and other media professionals to help ensure fictional and factual portrayals of people with mental health problems in the media are accurate and sensitive.
By writing about their own experiences and their reactions to these portrayals, these bloggers raise awareness of the different attitudes they have encountered to their mental health and how the media can help shape these attitudes. Pledge to help end mental health stigma today >>
Describe yourself in 5 words. What do you choose?
I’m chilling out on the sofa, making the most of the last few days of the Christmas holiday by playing rubbish games on my phone, when I hear “My name is Rae. It’s 1996, I’m 16, 16 stone, and desperate for a shag. Oh yeah, and I’ve been in a mental hospital for a while”. 
Tim, 41, is one of our media volunteers and has recently featured in a Time to Change article in Rugby World. If you want to read this article, Rugby World is on shelves today (3rd Jan).
Watching the media coverage of the horrific loss of life at Newtown’s Sandy Hook elementary school left me stunned and deeply saddened, and thinking about the difficult journey of grieving that these families will face at this time of year, and for many years to come.