E-Issue3_Finallydonep

Table Of Contents 

Cover Artist 

Statement 

42 

34 

NON 

FICTION 

30 

Mental health is a very nuanced topic, with 

the kind of many layered complexity that can 

be daunting. The same could be said for art 

or media; they are both categories that often 

intersect with others like politics, philosophy, 

and science. The cover image of Volume 2 

Issue 1: Arts & Media embraces such intricacy 

and celebrates it. Centred on the idea of layers 

and intersectionality, spirals and paper art 

are the main visual inspirations for this digital 

art piece. 

The nautilus is a great source of inspiration 

and is chosen as a visual cornerstone for 

all that it could represent. The nautili are an 

ancient species that predates the dinosaurs by 

more than 250 million years. Its shell speaks 

of math, science, and the human brain’s cerebrum 

that recalls that same spiral shape. On 

the cover, each paper in the cascade following 

that shape features stylized variations on 

modes of art and media representation and 

recalls something from every article. Every 

layer plays on shadow and the 

colour of those underneath to form a fuller 

picture. The multilateral relationship between 

them is a deliberate statement on the frequent 

trend of issues and values and symbols 

to feed into and off of each other--given 

enough time. As with mental health, a closer 

look reveals a rich depth of detail: from the 

masks beneath the masks, to the boat floating 

in nothingness. 

Jenny Ann Soriano, Graphic Designer 

A fourth year student at UTSC, Jenny Ann 

is working towards a major in New Media 

Studies and a double minor in Linguistics and 

Psychology. An alumna of Norte Dame High 

School in Toronto, she credits her artistic skills 

to the encouragement and mentorship by a 

number of her facilitators and peers. 

58 

47 

STILL 

ART 

62 FICTION 

72 

74 

POETRY 

21 

16 

MUSIC 

13 

2 

8

Minds Matter Magazine Volume II Issue I Arts & Media 

Theme 

Advisor 

As an educator, there are few things more gratifying than stepping back and enabling students 

to independently realize their own creative academic projects. As Theme Advisor, I have had 

the pleasure of witnessing the assembly of an issue by a remarkable team of undergraduates 

at the University of Toronto Scarborough. Over the past year, Minds Matter Magazine’s student 

journalists, graphic designers, illustrators, and editors have worked hard to explore the vast 

and challenging issue of mental health. I commend their dedication to presenting some of the 

many ways that the arts and media influence perceptions of mental health and illness. 

Why “Arts and Media”? For some readers, this issue’s focus on creative activity may 

seem like a whimsical, maybe even trivial, approach to the topic of mental health. However, 

the growth of arts-based health research methods and interdisciplinary fields of study 

like Health Humanities indicate how the human imagination—that is, how we imagine what 

mental health and illness is or could be—can enrich conventional therapeutic approaches for 

people living with conditions like depression, or enhance health care relationships by making 

research accessible beyond academia. In this issue, several articles and creative contributions 

address the therapeutic benefits of the arts, including an interview with Workman Arts, a 

Toronto-based organization dedicated to empowering artists with mental illness and addiction 

issues. A growing evidence base further indicates that participation in the arts is a low-cost, 

low-risk, and practical enhancement of conventional mental health care. Arts- and humanities-based 

approaches to health may even have benefits for health care workers and informal 

caregivers themselves, a phenomenon that UK-based health researcher Paul Crawford calls 

“mutual recovery” (2013). 

The arts hold the potential to delight,nourish, soothe, and heal. But the therapeutic potential 

of the arts must not overwhelm another equivalent reality: that the arts are a powerful 

mode of communication that shape, for better and for worse, what it means to live with mental 

illness. A range of critical and creative contributions to this issue therefore attend to art’s 

unsettling potential to confront, antagonize, intimidate, even traumatize its audience—effects 

that may be enhanced by popular art forms that are widely disseminated through media platforms 

old and new. As someone with a research background both in the humanities and the 

health sciences, I have always been mystified by people who describe the arts and humanities 

as “soft” (as opposed to the so-called “hard” sciences). Make no mistake: art is spiky, barbed, 

and caustic just as often as it appears otherwise. The essays, poems, and articles of this issue 

grapple with this risky reality of art’s relationship to mental health. I encourage you to read on 

and consider how we might take better care of ourselves—and each other—as a result. 

Dr. Andrea Charise 

Assistant Professor of Health Studies, 

University of Toronto Scarborough 

Associate Faculty, 

Graduate Department of English, 

Core Faculty, Collaborative Graduate Program in Women’s Health 

University of Toronto 

Reference: 

Paul Crawford, Lydia Lewis, Brian Brown, Nick 

Manning. “Creative Practice as Mutual Recovery 

in Mental Health.” Mental Health Review 

Journal, 18.2 (2013): 55-64. 

4 5

Editor In 

Chief 

Incoming 

Editor 

Made with lots of love, ‘Arts and Media’ 

strings together a crafted collection of inhouse 

pieces from our own journalists, 

student artists from across Canada in our 

inaugural #MindMyArt submissions contest 

in fiction, non-fiction, poetry, still art, and 

music. Our collection this year also celebrates 

a special collaboration with University of 

Toronto Scarborough (UTSC)’s creative writing 

anthology, Scarborough Fair (SF), whereby 

MMM and SF both co-publish the top student-written 

mental health-related pieces 

from SF’s international creative writing contest. 

Throughout our e-issue, our aim is 

to broaden our freedom of thought, belief, 

opinion and expression in creative media. Our 

highly collaborative process—involving our 

masthead of 26 students and recent alumni; 

contest adjudicators from students, recent 

alumni, and faculty from the writing center, 

department of English, department of arts, 

culture, and media; students from 16 Canadian 

post-secondary institutions—is highly 

credited to the close-knittnedness of the 

UTSC campus, of starting small. 

The nature of our e-issue theme aims 

to spark the conversation of how arts and 

media in relation to mental health can preserve 

the communal sense of UTSC as our 

campus expands over the next 25 to 50 years. 

With discussions to continue on what the 

UTSC campus will look like, our e-issue hopes 

to bring more visibility and attention to the 

arts on campus. With scattered pockets of 

spaces at UTSC dedicated towards arts often 

tucked in unexpected spaces, conversations 

about mental health, too, take place in unexpected 

places. 

Karen Young 

Karen finished her undergraduate program 

double majoring in psychology and health 

studies and is awaiting convocation. 

At Minds Matter Magazine, we know we have 

succeeded when we convince another person 

that they are not alone. 

And yet, is this not the case with all art? 

To find another person who lies upon another 

entirely unique plane of perception, and have 

them realize... 

…. 

They see themselves. 

In this piece, and in someone else. 

And how utterly indispensable is this connection 

when you are in pain. 

Particularly, an invisible kind of pain. 

Keep an eye out for our next edition on ‘culture and transition’ and the surrounding 

mental health themes that accompany this. 

Alexa Battler 

Alexa is a third year student specializing in 

journalism and minoring in political science 

6 

7


What We 

Actually Know 

About Psychopathy 

By Alexa Battler 

Media sources have long since adored stories 

about ‘psychopaths,’ including classic cinematic 

villains like Hannibal Lector and Alex 

DeLarge, more recent television antiheroes 

like Dexter Morgan and Frank Underwood, 

and real-life examples like Jeffrey Dahmer 

and Robert Pickton. The term has come up 

repeatedly through the American presidential 

race, through accusations that both Donald 

Trump and Hillary Clinton may be psychopaths. 

But are any of these individuals absolute 

examples? Technically no, because no 

Illustration by Alice Shen 

singular, undisputed definition or diagnosis of 

psychopathy even exists. 

Psychopathy is a fluid concept with 

an equally unstable past. Its most common 

understanding was perhaps best surmised in 

its first official definition. In the early 1800s, 

French psychiatrist Philippe Pinel coined the 

term “manie sans délire” (insanity without 

delirium) to describe those who showed no 

outward signs of psychosis, yet still behaved 

with an exceptional moral depravity of which 

the general population was incapable. [1] The 

actual term ‘psychopath’ was coined by German 

psychiatrist J.L.A. Koch in 1888, though 

the definition was then broadened to include 

anyone who caused harm to themselves or 

others. [1] This dismissed the diagnostic roots 

in moral depravity that Pinel had established, 

and that is now recognized as a central characteristic. 

By the 1920s the term broadened 

further, and defined anyone exhibiting abnormal 

psychology. [1] People who were depressive, 

submissive, or notably withdrawn or 

insecure were all deemed psychopaths. 

"Manie sans délire" 

(insanity without delirium) 

The meandering definition was 

eventually centered in a book by an American 

psychiatrist: Hervey Cleckley, “the most 

influential figure in the study of psychopathy.” 

[2] In the first edition of his 1941 book, 

accurately titled The Mask of Sanity: An 

Attempt to Clarify Some Issues About the 

So-Called Psychopathic Personality, Cleckley 

described 21 characteristics that constituted 

a psychopath, though these would later be 

shortened to 16 in all subsequent five revisions. 

[3] In 1980, Robert Hare, a Canadian 

professor and criminal psychology researcher, 

drew heavily on ideas from Cleckley’s book to 

create a determining measure for psychopathy. 

In 1991, this test was revised to become 

what is now widely considered the “gold standard” 

of psychopathy diagnoses, The Hare 

Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R). [2] 

The Psychopathy Checklist-Revised: [4] 

1. Glib and superficial charm 

2. Grandiose (exaggeratedly high) 

estimation of self 

3. Need for stimulation 

4. Pathological lying 

5. Cunning and manipulativeness 

6. Lack of remorse or guilt 

7. Shallow affect (superficial 

emotional responsiveness) 

8. Callousness and lack of empathy 

9. Parasitic lifestyle 

10. Poor behavioral controls 

11. Sexual promiscuity 

12. Early behavior problems 

13. Lack of realistic long-term goals 

14. Impulsivity 

15. Irresponsibility 

16. Failure to accept responsibility 

for own actions 

17. Many short-term marital 

relationships 

18. Juvenile delinquency 

19. Revocation of conditional release 

20. Criminal versatility 

The PCL-R describes 20 traits used to 

examine the existence and degree of psychopathy 

in adults (Hare also modified a 

version of the test for youth, ages 12-18). [4] 

Traits are identified through a two-part examination: 

a review of collateral information 

(e.g. nature of relationships, familial medical 

and personal history, stability of education, 

8 

9

Psychopathy 

Alexa Battler 


work, and social life), and a relatively structured 

interview with the patient—though, 

in the PCL-R, a diagnosis of psychopathy can 

also be achieved without the latter. Patients 

are then given a score out of 40. A clinical 

diagnosis of psychopathy is issued at a score 

of 30 or more. People who do not have criminal 

backgrounds normally score around 

five, while many non-psychopathic criminal 

offenders often score around 22. Hare also 

asserted that results of the checklist are only 

reliable if the testing has been conducted by 

a properly licensed clinician, and in a properly 

licensed and regulated environment. It is the 

PCL-R that is used in courts and institutions in 

order to test for psychopathy, likelihood of 

recidivism, and necessity of treatment; it also 

aids in determining the type and extent of 

criminal sentencing. 

And yet, true to history, there are still 

many that denounce and challenge Cleckley, 

and the PCL-R. The PCL-R has been criticized 

for having too great a focus on criminality, 

and for being too tailored for a typical prison 

demographic, instead of for the general public.[5] 

Questions have also been raised over 

the feasibility of clinicians conducting the 

checklist to accurately identify these traits. [5] 

To rectify these perceived faults, Dr. 

Scott O. Lilienfeld, an American psychologist 

and psychology professor, created another 

test now among the most frequently used 

self-report measures of psychopathy, [6] the 

Psychopathic Personality Inventory-Revised 

(PPI-R), in 2005 (revised from the original 

edition in 1996). The PPI-R is instead self-administered, 

and has 154 traits divided into 

two categories: fearless dominance and 

self-centered impulsivity. In turn, there have 

been disputes over this test as well—some 

have argued that the fearless dominance 

category does not accurately indicate 

psychopathy itself, and that the self-administration 

aspect of the test is unreliable. [7] Professional 

consensus is spread over the many 

other significant tests, including the triarchic 

model of psychopathy, the categories for 

which are boldness, disinhibition, and meanness, 

while public consensus darts around the 

765,000 results that pop up upon Googling 

“psychopathy test.” 

"PPI-R is divided into two 

categories: fearless 

dominance and 

self-centered impulsivity." 

Despite its notoriety, there is no official 

diagnosis for psychopathy in the Diagnostic 

and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders 

(DSM-V), the standard criteria for diagnosing 

and understanding mental disorders in North 

America. The DSM has attempted to create 

a diagnosis for psychopathy, called Antisocial 

Personality Disorder (ASPD), [8] which overlaps 

with many of the items that are outlined in 

the PCL-R and that are generally agreed upon 

in psychiatry. However Hare himself, and 

many others in the field, have established 

that ASPD is not an apt depiction of what can 

commonly be understood as psychopathy. 

[9] 

Hare and others central to understandings 

of psychopathy had made clear that affective 

traits, like selfishness, egocentrism, and a lack 

of empathy, were fundamental to the 

diagnosis. However in the DSM-III, published 

in 1980, ASPD was instead characterized 

primarily by the ways in which social norms 

were broken, such as lying, stealing, and even 

traffic arrests, diminishing these traits that 

so many saw as crucial. [9] This definition was 

also far too broad to constitute psychopathy 

as established by other tests and ideas. While 

most that are understood to be psychopaths 

meet the criteria for ASPD, most people with 

ASPD are not actually psychopaths by this 

same popular criteria. [9] As it stands, only one 

in five people with ASPD could fit a diagnosis 

of psychopathy. [10] 

And yet, many believe psychopathy to 

be a finalized diagnosis supported by 

psychiatric certainty, immediately indicative 

of an individual’s character. This perception 

has been largely influenced by negative 

media portrayals, in which psychopaths are 

often cast in villainous roles. While these 

depictions may ring a vaguely relative 

truth—yes, Hannibal Lecter is a psychopath 

according to all of the previously mentioned 

tests—they are largely overly dramatic, and 

imply traits and behaviours that are not 

actually associated with psychopathy. 

“At the very least the media should 

show both sides of psychopathy, not just 

showing them as cold-blooded murderers. 

Psychopathy does not mean criminality” 

clarified Guillaume Durand, a PhD candidate 

in neuroscience at Maastricht University. 

“[Media] don’t show that there is actually 

very little agree ment on what psychopathy 

is.” 

In 2013, two Belgian psychiatrists 

addressed how movies portrayed so-called 

psychopaths. They studied over 400 films 

released between 1915, beginning with 

Birth of a Nation, and 2010, ending with The 

Lovely Bones, all of which included a villain 

that was portrayed as a psychopath. [11] The 

psychiatrists had to eliminate all but 126 of 

these films, because most of the portrayals 

were “too caricatured and or too fictional” to 

constitute even a vaguely correct reflection 

of psychopathy. This in itself is a powerful 

reflection of how movies choose to portray 

psychopathy. What they identify as the 

“Hollywood psychopath” encompasses a 

variety of symptoms not typical with 

psychopathy, including high intelligence, 

fascination with fine arts, obsessive 

behaviour, and exceptional capacity for 

violence and killing. [11] They also clarified 

that most characters largely associated with 

psychopathy, like Norman Bates from Psycho, 

actually suffer from psychosis, which is a 

disconnect with reality, not a personality 

disorder. [3] The study praised Anton Chigurh 

from No Country for Old Men, Henry from 

Henry - Portrait of a Serial Killer and Gordon 

Gekko from Wall Street for being more 

"Psychosis is a disconnect 

with reality, not a 

personality disorder." 

accurate and insightful views on psychopathy. 

[11] 

“Usually more representation is always 

positive—people always fear what they don’t 

know. But [the media] only gives one side” 

10 11

said Durand. 

Psychopathy 

This may have adverse effects on not 

only interpretation, but actual treatment and 

professional relation to psychopathy. Matthew 

Burnett, a psychology graduate student 

from the University of Saskatchewan, published 

a dissertation in 2013 on how psychopathy 

as portrayed in Canadian media (in 

this case news sources) may adversely affect 

widespread interpretation. [12] He found that 

news representation often sensationalize 

stories regarding psychopaths, and that this 

leads to popular misinterpretation of the 

disorder, and popular expressions of doubt 

over potential for reform. He also found that 

media sources overwhelmingly associate psychopathy 

with violence and dangerousness. 

In sampling a prison, inmates, correctional 

officers, and staff interviewed all maintained 

“highly negative, distorted, and damning 

[views]” of psychopathy. Because prisons are 

largely intended to rehabilitate in Canada, [13] 

this is only made more disturbing. 

“My definition [of a psychopath] is an 

individual that lacks remorse, who is in poor 

control of their actions, is guiltless and dishonest, 

but can also display positive traits, 

like fearlessness and painlessness” said 

Durand. 

References: 

[1] Kiehl, K., & Lushing, J. (2014). Psychopathy. Scholarpedia, 

9(5), 30835. dx.doi.org/10.4249/scholarpedia.30835 

[2] Crego, C., & Widiger, T. A. (2016). Cleckley’s psychopaths: 

Revisited. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 

125(1), 75-87. Retrieved from http://myaccess.library. 

utoronto.ca/login?url=http://search.proquest.com/ 

docview/1738484647?accountid=14771 

Alexa Battler 

[3] Stover, A. (2007). A critical analysis of the historical and 

conceptual evolution of psychopathy. 

[4] The Psychopathy Checklist - Doc Zone - CBC-TV. (2016). 

CBC. Retrieved from http://www.cbc.ca/doczone/features/ 

the-hare-psychotherapy-checklist 

[5] Davey, K. (2013). Psychopathy and sentencing: An investigative 

look into when the PCL-R is admitted into Canadian 

courtrooms and how a PCL-R score affects sentencing 

outcome. Western Graduate & Postdoctoral Studies. 

[6] Miller, J. & Lynam, D. (2012). An examination of the 

Psychopathic Personality Inventory’s nomological network: 

A meta-analytic review. Personality Disorders: Theory, 

Research, And Treatment, 3(3), 305-326. http://dx.doi. 

org/10.1037/a0024567 

[7] Miller, J., Jones, S., & Lynam, D. (2011). Psychopathic 

traits from the perspective of self and informant reports: Is 

there evidence for a lack of insight? Journal Of Abnormal 

Psychology, 120(3), 758-764. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/ 

a0022477 

[8] Personality disorders. (2012). American Psychiatric 

Association DSM-5 Development. Retrieved from http:// 

www.dsm5.org/Documents/Personality%20Disorders%20 

Fact%20Sheet.pdf 

[9] Hare, R. (1996). Psychopathy and Antisocial Personality 

Disorder: A Case of Diagnostic Confusion. Psychiatric 

Times. Retrieved 22 September 2016, from http://www. 

psychiatrictimes.com/antisocial-personality-disorder/psychopathy-and-antisocial-personality-disorder-case-diagnostic-confusion 

[10] Herstein, W. (2016). What Is a Psychopath? Psychology 

Today. Retrieved from http://www.psychologytoday.com 

[11] Perry, S. (2013). Why psychopathic film villains are 

rarely realistic — and why it matters. MinnPost. Retrieved 

from https://www.minnpost.com/second-opinion/2014/01/ 

why-psychopathic-film-villains-are-rarely-realistic-and-whyit-matters 

[12] Burnett, M. (2013). Psychopathy: Exploring canadian 

mass newspaper representations thereof and violent 

offender talk thereon (Graduate). University of Saskatchewan. 

[13] About Canada’s Correctional System. (2015). Public 

Safety Canada: Government of Canada. Retrieved from 

http://www.publicsafety.gc.ca/cnt/cntrng-crm/crrctns/btcrrctnl-sstm-en.aspx 

“Trying to Save You” 

MUSIC 

1st Place - UTSC 

1st Place - National 

by Nitha Vincent 

“Rope” 

by How do I know that I’m Alive (University of Toronto, St. George) 

12 

13

Trying to 

Save You 

By Nitha Vincent 

Rope 

By How do I know that I’m Alive 

Graphic by Phoebe Maharaj 

For this contest, I submitted a piece called Trying To Save You. I wrote the song myself and also 

did both the vocals and guitar. I wrote this piece in 2012, when I was 14, and wanted it be be a 

sort of pick-me-up whenever I felt unhappy or upset. Over the years, I’ve edited the lyrics, but 

most of the song is still the same. In 2015, I performed this song at my high school, Cedarbrae 

Collegiate Institute, at an anti-bullying assembly we were having, as a tribute to all the people 

who have been bullied. I wrote this song to console anyone who is having a bad day and to 

remind them that things do get better and to not give up. I’m very glad to have this opportunity 

to showcase my piece and I’m very excited to have all of you listen to it. 

Nitha Vincent 

1 st Place UTSC Winner 

Music 

Nitha Vincent is an aspiring singer/songwriter 

in her first year, and is studying psychology at 

the University Of Toronto Scarborough Campus. 

Nitha has been singing since the age of 

five, became a self-taught guitarist at 14, and 

has been writing songs for five years. Nitha 

feels that songwriting has always been a very 

important outlet to freely and safely express 

and describe their feelings, whatever they 

may be. 


The song is about hiding pieces of your mental health from a partner and the inevitable issues 

that arise from navigating whether to disclose or not. The song is left ambiguous to allow the 

listener to place themselves in the shoes of both individuals involved in the relationship. The 

ambiguousness allows the listener to focus on the tension between the relationship, rather 

than the individuals themselves. This causes the listener to sit with the shame that both parties 

are experiencing. This is intended to create an empathetic connection towards the emotionality 

surrounding the moment of tension, rather than the individuals involved. The song is titled 

Rope because the artist wanted to create imagery that highlighted tension that is created 

within the relationship. Eventually the song ends, highlighting the tension in the rope, leaving 

the listener to question the fine balance of staying connected or disconnected to both the relationship 

and one’s mental health. 

How do I know that I’m Alive 

1 st Place National Winner 

Music 

“How do I know that I’m Alive” is working towards 

a master of social work at the University 

of Toronto. They are currently employed as 

a program coordinator at a recreation centre 

for senior citizens. Their interests include 

research in social work, harm reduction, approaches 

to addiction, and post-structuralism. 

14 15


Angels and Demons Within: 

Exploring the Meaning of Hearing Voices 

By Ioana Arbone 

Illustration by Adley Lobo 

Academic studies conducted in Europe, New 

Zealand, and America during the past 20 ears 

have shown that a significant minority of the 

world population—5% to 13%—hear voices 

that other people cannot [1] . This statistic includes 

people who do and do not suffer from 

a related physical or mental illness. [1] 

It is difficult to describe what it means 

to hear voices, because the experience comes 

in many different forms—so much so that 

to describe them as ‘voices’ is inaccurate for 

many who experience them. [2] In a mass, multifaceted 

study published in 2015, voice-hearers 

were interviewed in order to better understand 

their varying experiences. [2] Some 

participants described hearing a distinct voice 

of someone standing next to them, while 

others described experiencing very realistic 

thoughts rather than distinct articulations. 

[2] 

As well, some described hearing a single 

voice, while others described hearing multiple 

voices. [2] 

‘Voices’ itself is not an entirely accurate 

term, as voices do not have to be distinct 

linguistic expressions of a human. They may 

also be sounds, other forms of articulations, 

ideas, and can come in many other forms 

than voices. [2] In each of these instances, the 

voices are interpreted by the hearer as something 

foreign, coming from a source outside 

of themselves, and as different from a regular 

inner dialogue, but are heard only by themselves. 

[2] 

In current clinical psychiatry, the term 

“auditory hallucination” is used to describe 

the experience of hearing voices. [3] However, 

Dr. Rufus May, a clinical psychologist from 

Britain, clarified that the term “hearing 

voices” more accurately expresses the personal 

experiences of voice-hearers. “Hearing 

voices” is also the preferred term of the 

the International Hearing Voices Network, a 

UK-based charity that fights to change perception 

of voice-hearing as an exclusive sign 

of mental illness, or as an automatically negative 

occurrence. [4] They feel that the term 

‘hallucination’ “is inaccurate as it gives the 

impression that the experience is unreal and 

meaningless.” [4] 

“More often than not, hearing 

voices is deeply personal, and 

many healthy and creative 

people experience them.” 

It is not currently known why these 

voices occur. There is research suggesting that 

voice-hearers tend to experience high levels 

of chronic stress in their lives, especially in 

their childhoods. [5] But voice-hearing is not a 

random experience completely unrelated to 

the hearer’s past or present life. More often 

than not, hearing voices is deeply personal, 

and many healthy and creative people experience 

them [13, 14, 15] . Neuroscientific studies 

also suggest that voice-hearing experiences 

arise in the right hemisphere of the brain, and 

that voice-hearing is possibly more likely for 

those who engage in activities dependent on 

this hemisphere, such as “music, art, poetry 

and spatial math skills”. [16] Such connections 

between creative activities and the way the 

brain works may partly explain why artists 

sometimes hear realistic voices, or feel creatively 

influenced by realistic perceptions or 

ideas. 

16 

17

Angels and Demons 

Ioana Arbone 


One study of 15,000 voice-hearers 

suggested that one in three people who hear 

voices has a psychiatric disorder, whereas two 

out of three fit no diagnosis for mental illness. 

The study also found that the main difference 

between those with and without mental 

health diagnoses was their relationship to 

their voices. [8] Individuals diagnosed with psychiatric 

disorders tended to report that their 

voices were critical, malevolent, and frighten 

ing. However, individuals that had not been 

diagnosed with psychiatric conditions more 

often (but not exclusively) reported that their 

voices were kind, encouraging, and benevolent. 

[8] Despite this, hearing voices can be a 

frightening experience, and can lead one to 

feel as though they are ‘losing their mind’. 

[9] 

Yet this fearful reaction is not always the 

case, and often seems to be particular to 

Western culture. This has been evidenced in a 

cross-national comparative study conducted 

by Stanford University in San Mateo, America, 

the Schizophrenia Research Foundation in 

Chennai, India, and the Accra General Psychiatric 

Hospital in Ghana, Africa. The three 

institutions published the study in 2015, to 

explore the experiences of hearing voices 

across each of these different cultures. [10] 

The study found that Americans often 

used distinctly psychiatric language to describe 

their experiences, well-evidenced in 

one participant’s depiction: “I fit the textbook 

on Schizophrenia.” These participants also 

more often said that hearing these voices 

were very negative experiences, including 

hearing “screaming, fighting…[and voices saying] 

jump in front of the train.” Meanwhile, 

the individuals from India and Africa reported 

less violent voices. Citizens of Accra uniquely 

perceived hearing voices as the result of spiritual 

forces contacting them, and their experiences 

appeared overwhelmingly positive. 

One individual even stated: “[the voices] just 

tell me to do the right thing. If I hadn’t had 

these voices, I would have been dead long 

ago.” 

The sample from Chennai reflected a 

balance of positive and negative perceptions 

of the voices. Unlike the individuals from San 

Mateo and Accra, 11 out of 20 voice-hearers 

from Chennai said the voices were of relatives 

who had died. These relatives reportedly 

made both critical and helpful comments. 

For example, one man heard the voices of his 

deceased sisters, which would would mock 

him at times, yet would also remind him to 

engage in certain mundane and healthy activities, 

like bathing. Eight of the 20 individuals 

studied from Chennai experienced the voices 

as highly positive. 

“just as dreams can inform us 

about our wishes and our 

challenges, so can voices.” 

But why are these interpretations so 

different across nations? One possibility is 

that differences in culture lead to different 

views of how the voice-hearing itself is commonly 

perceived by others. It seems that 

Western culture views individuals as being 

completely separate from one another, while 

other cultures (e.g. sub-Saharan Africanculture) 

place more importance on community, 

and interpersonal interaction. [10] This 

Western, individualistic perspective also 

ends to view private thoughts, emotions, and 

perceptions as purely biological events occurring 

solely within a human body. [10] Therefore, 

hearing voices that no one else hears tends to 

be seen as a problem arising within the individual, 

instead of the consideration that there 

might be something that exists that other 

individuals cannot perceive. 

In Western culture, hearing voices has 

no meaning,” says Dr. John Read, a clinical 

psychologist at the University of Auckland, 

New Zealand. 

Indeed, according to the Diagnostic 

and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders 

(DSM-V), the only meaning they have is that 

they could indicate a psychological disorder. 

However, these experiences are deeply personal, 

and these voices express and reflect 

ideas and attitudes. As such, they can offer 

the voice-hearer an alternate perspective, or 

new ideas around dealing with life events. 

Dismissing these voices as devoid of any 

useful information, and claiming that they are 

indicative of a mental illness without looking 

at the content of the voices, may lead one to 

avoid addressing important concepts. 

Vanessa Beaven, a clinical psychologist, 

interviewed 50 voice-hearers in an attempt to 

understand what deeper meanings the voices 

may carry. [11] Most of the people interviewed 

described the content of the voices as personally 

meaningful, and saw connections between 

what they were going through during 

that time and the voices’ comments. Many 

of them also had a personal relationship with 

the voices, similar to the relationships one 

has in everyday life. The voices seemed 

real to the participants, and, in this study, 

they were able to identify them as specific 

people or characters, such as a parent, a 

grandparent, a friend, a demon, or God. Participants 

also said that hearing voices impacted 

them emotionally, in positive and negative 

ways. 

“crisitunity - an event can be both 

a crisis and an opportunity.” 

Interpretations of voices can greatly 

influence what they mean to the voice-hearer. 

Dr. Simon McCarthy-Jones, an established 

researcher and author in the field of 

voice-hearing, recounted an example of these 

underlying meanings in his book, Hearing 

Voices. He detailed a conversation with Dr. 

Marius Romme, another well-known researcher 

and a prominent scholar in the study 

of voice-hearing. Romme explained the story 

of an individual who heard a voice repeatedly 

saying, “you might as well be dead”. [12] 

After exploring his experience, and reflecting 

on the meaning of voices, the voice-hearer 

understood that the voice was actually 

telling her that she was not taking care of 

herself enough, and that, if this continued, 

she “might as well be dead”. [12] As McCarthy-Jones 

says, “Voices may thus help us find 

parts of ‘ourselves’ which we cannot consciously 

access, and further study of this may 

help shed light on the creative process”. [12] 

As well, Dr. May suggests that hearing 

voices is similar to dream analysis; just as 

dreams can inform us about our wishes and 

our challenges, so can voices. [9] Similarly, 

18 19

Angels and Demons 

Ioana Arbone 

dreams can also be created narratives based 

on one’s own life, and paying attention to 

their content may be helpful and telling - at 

least for some people. Of note is that the 

voice-hearers themselves are generally able 

to differentiate when hearing voices disrupts 

their lives versus when these voices are not a 

problem and may even be helpful. [9] 

So, what should we do if we or a loved 

one hear voices? Both Dr. John Read and Dr. 

Rufus May suggest not to be afraid and to 

try and understand the experience. Dr. Rufus 

May also says that curiosity is a best friend in 

this situation, and mentions the word “crisitunity 

” – a word he invented – to show that an 

event can be both a crisis and an opportunity. 

Dr. John Read says that those who hear voices 

need to show interest in them, and view 

them as a normal variation of human experience. 

References: 

[1] Beavan, V., Read, J., & Cartwright, C. (2011). The 

prevalence of voice-hearers in the general population: A 

literature review. Journal of Mental Health, 20, 281–292. 

doi:10.310 9/09638237.2011.562262. 

[2] Woods, A., Jones, N., Alderson-Day, B., Callard, F. and 

Fernyhough, C. (2015). Experiences of hearing voices: 

analysis of a novel phenomenological survey. The Lancet 

Psychiatry, 2(4), pp.323-331. 

[3] Moskowitz, A. & Corstens, D. (2007). Auditory hallucinations: 

Psychotic symptom or dissociative experience? The 

Journal of Psychological Trauma, 6(2/3), 35-63. 

[4] CYMRU, Hearing Voices Network, Wales. (2016, August 

13). Hearing Voices Network. Retrieved from: http://hearingvoicescymru.org/positive-voices/famous-voice-hearers/ 

creative-people 

[5] Read, J., Perry, B.D., Moskowitz, A. & Connolly, J. (2001). 

The contribution of early traumatic events to schizophrenia 

in some patients: A traumagenic neurodevelopmental model. 

Psychiatry, 64(4), 319-345. 

[6] Shergill, S. S., Brammer, M. J., Williams, S. C., Murray, R. 

M., & McGuire, P. K. (2000). Mapping auditory hallucinations 

in schizophrenia using functional magnetic resonance 

imaging. Archives of General Psychiatry, 57(11), 1033- 

1038. 

[7] Tien, A.Y. Soc Psychiatry Psychiatr Epidemiol (1991) 26: 

287. doi:10.1007/BF00789221. 

[8] Honig, A., Romme, M. A. J., Ensink, B. J., Escher, S. D. 

M. C., Pennings, M. H. A., & Devries, M. W. (1998). Auditory 

hallucinations; a comparison between patients and 

nonpatients. Journal of Mental and Nervous Disease, 186, 

646 - 651. 

[9] Kalhovde, A. M., Elstad, I., & Talseth, A. G. (2014). 

“Sometimes I walk and walk, hoping to get some peace.” 

Dealing with hearing voices and sounds nobody else hears. 

International Journal of Qualitative Studies on Health and 

Well-being, 9(1). doi:10.3402/qhw.v9.23069. 

[10] Luhrmann, T. M., Padmavati, R., Tharoor, H., & Osei, 

A. (2015). Hearing Voices in Different Cultures: A Social Kindling 

Hypothesis. Topics in Cognitive Science, 7(4), 646-663. 

doi:10.1111/tops.12158. 

[11] Beavan, V. (2011). Towards a definition of “hearing 

voices”: A phenomenological approach. Psychosis, 3(1), 

63-73. 

[12] McCarthy-Jones, S. (2013). Chapter 12 - The Struggle 

for Meanings. In S. McCarthy-Jones, Hearing Voices: The 

Histories, Causes and Meanings of Auditory Verbal Hallucinations 

(pp. 315-354). USA: New York: Cambridge University 

Press. 

[13] Ability Magazine. (2016, August 13). Brian Wilson — 

A Powerful Interview. Retrieved from Ability Magazine: 

http://www.abilitymagazine.com/past/brianW/brianw.html 

[14] CYMRU, Hearing Voices Network, Wales. (2016, August 

13). Creative People including writers, artists and musicians. 

Retrieved from CYMRU, Hearing Voices Network, 

Wales: http://hearingvoicescymru.org/positive-voices/ 

famous-voice-hearers/creative-people 

[15] Carson, S. H., Peterson, J. B., & Higgins, D. M. (2003). 

Decreased Latent Inhibition Is Associated With Increased 

Creative Achievement in High-Functioning Individuals. Journal 

of Personality and Social Psychology, 499-506. 

[16] de Leede-Smith, S., & Barkus, E. (2013). A comprehensive 

review of auditory verbal hallucinations: Lifetime 

prevalence, correlates and mechanisms in healthy and 

clinical individuals. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience(JUN). 

doi:10.3389/fnhum.2013.00367 

“Dysthymia” 



by Sara Farhat 

“An Open Letter to My Family” 

by Sabnam Mahmuda (McMaster University) 

“The Orange” 

2nd Place - National 

by m. Rana (University of Guelph) 

3rd Place - National 

“My Letter to Gaddy” 

by Shannon Hui (York University) 

Honourary Mentions 

“At Song’s End” 

by Cassandra Chen (University of Ontario Institute of Technology) 

“Closed Book” 

POETRY 

by Ross Rosales (George Brown College) 

20 

21


They murmur and screech, 

Pounding at her skull. 

Etching black dog graffiti, 

Staining mind in a charcoal tinge. 

Walls closing in, 

Trapped in a cage built by her. 

Air unable to break the shackles, 

Lungs squeezing against her rib cage 

Dysthemia 

By Sara Farhat 

The poem I wrote called Dysthymia is about a person who suffers from depression. I’ve been 

learning about mental illness in my classes, and I just wanted to take what I study and put it 

into words. I really like both science and art, I like to combine the two. That kind of unity is 

needed; it creates wonder, and that is what inspired me to write this poem. I wanted to try 

something new, take on the perspective of someone who has depression, and explain to the 

readers how it feels for someone who lives with this condition - that this is real and can really 

ruin a person’s quality of life. We need to be aware of these things and really go on in understanding 

and giving a helping hand, and treating mental illness just like any other physical 

illness. 

Entrapped within her caged bones, 

Slamming on the walls trying to 

escape. The darkness, spreading as she 

suffocates 

“You’re not good enough.” 

“Worthless, helpless, failure.” 

These negative thoughts eating away at 

her flesh, feeding the demons. 

Snap out of it! If only it was that easy 

Curtains closed, clips of everything she 

despises about herself project at the 

back of her eyes 

Photograph by Adley Lobo 

The demons, shrieking demons 

Broken record voices; on repeat 

Taunting and teasing, 

Delightful dopamine; their hostage 

Trembling hands grab a hold of pills, 

Pills silencing the monsters 

Leaving her lethargic mind, 

only to desire sleep. 

Drowning all her thoughts, 

In a long heavy slumber. 

Sara Farhat 


Poetry 

Sara Farhat is working towards a double 

major in neuroscience and psychology at the 

University of Toronto Scarborough. Sara describes 

herself as an ordinary girl who enjoys 

the little things that life has to offer. I hold on 

to that little kid at heart inside of me, letting 

my imagination always run wild.” 

22 

23


But 

You tiptoe around the shadows which bloom within me like wildflowers. 

An 

Open Letter 

to 

My Family 

By Sabnam Mahmuda 

My poem, an open letter to my family, is an attempt to showcase depression through the lens 

of culture and family. Perception of those who are close to us can tremendously impact our experience 

with depression. From my own experience as a young South Asian woman, I have seen 

how truly difficult it is to lend a voice to explain and to understand the non-physical manifestations 

of depression upon the body. This is due to the fact that South Asian cultures highly value 

endurance and in an attempt to do so, overlook the fact that some illnesses simply cannot be 

battled by the force of our willingness to ignore it. This poem is merely my way of portraying 

how depression is misperceived in my culture as a non-existent and pretentious illness which is 

used as an excuse to escape academic commitments by those who are weak. 

Dear baba, 

You say to have faith in God to help me through the darkness 

But how do I explain to you, 

That I can’t even have faith in myself, 

Much less in a spirit I’ve never seen. 

But 

You watch me go through the motions to maintain an illusion of happiness. 

Dear ma, 

You say that it’s my negativity which is to blame for everything 


That I do not control anything but it controls me 

It holds me tight and rocks me to numbness every night. 


Dear brother, 

Your say that I am bringing shame to our family name 


That I am not pretending to be sick or staying silent as an act of rebellion 

Sometimes my skin feels so tight that it chokes me and sometimes my 

skin feels so loose that it drowns me 

But 

You glance away from me as if in disgust. 

Dear my love, 

You do not say anything to me 


That when we are together I desperately crave tender words 

To pry free my mind from the fist cuffs of fear 

But 

You remain willingly silent as the void between us continue to grow. 

Shanam Mahmuda 

1 st Place Nation Winner 

Poetry 

Sabnam Mahmuda is a graduate student in 

health studies at McMaster University, and 

an aspiring writer and artist. Sabnam finds 

inspiration in nature and in others’ stories 

observed during work or while travelling. 

Through written and visual art, Sabnam communicates 

stories of their own experiences, 

and of people who have touched her life. 

24 

25


The Orange 

By m.Rana 

This poem is about identity and, really, what it means to be a person. It was inspired after 

facilitating several sessions of group therapy. I saw that each individual has many layers which 

makes up who they are, and with each layer there is meaning and there is purpose. 

Covered in my own colour 

My name is who I am 

Orange 

Thick skinned and hardened 

From the passing of seasons 

I have survived days of light and days of darkness 

But, I was picked before I was ready to fall 

Squeezed to see my strength 

Touched and scanned for blemishes and scars 

What would you have done if you found any? 

I am just the right feel for you 

Your appetite craves more 

You wish to see what’s inside, and uncover me for who I 

am 

Digging your thumb deep into my core 

Alas you have ripped and torn what was holding me 

together 

Peeling away peeling away 

Piece by piece 

Ripping me apart 

All that keeps me together, ripping me apart 


Let’s call this first piece memories 

Lines and lines of conversations 

Tales of being together and letting go 

Longing, wanting, desiring Smiling, laughing, crying 

Loving, breaking, healing 

This isn’t enough for you to swallow 

Once again, digging your thumbs deep into my core 


Let’s call this second piece guilt 

For the pain that I may have caused 

And the pain that I may have felt 

For following my heart, and not following it 

It should have never been this way 

Yet it was the only way 

It all comes in pairs, and never leaves as one 

Half way there and you still want more 

Digging your thumbs deep into my core, once again 


Let’s call this one anger 

Why is it like this? 

Unable to control my fate 

Slowly slipping away, one piece at a time 

More more more, only once more 

Digging deep into my soul 

And all that is left of me, is fear 

Fear of being alone, empty, naked 

Uncovered in my own element 

My name is who I am 

Orange 

- therapy 

m. Rana 

2 nd Place UTSC Winner 

Poetry 

m.Rana graduated from the University of Toronto Scarborough in 2015 with a 

bachelors of science in psychology, specializing in mental health and neuroscience. 

m.Rana then completed a graduate certificate in addictions and mental health 

from Durham College, and will now be pursuing a masters of science in couples and 

family therapy. Their primary interests are education, psychology, and romance. 

26 

27

My Letter 

to 

Gaddy 


Dear Gaddy, 

Comes spring melting the bitter cold away, 

Yet the ice in your soul has a permanent stay. 

You answer its call several times again, 

through dancing encounters of silver and 

flesh, 

but to only be ashamed by the summer sun. 

By Shannon Hui 


Dear Gaddy, 

Comes summer with a hot, heavy burden 

that locks your wrists in chains. 

Unable to escape the glaring stares, 

You merely hide under long sleeves of cotton, 

Waiting for fall to return. 

My work, My Letter To Gaddy, is a poem inspired by a personal connection with a friend. It illustrates 

the experiences and feelings of an individual who is depressed, and seeks relief through 

self harm. As the seasons pass, the individual encounters various difficulties, as they battle with 

their mental health. My hope is that this poem will inspire others to reach out to those with 

mental illnesses, to show them the simple beauty of life. In use and comparison of the seasons, 

I wish to open a window of awareness to increase both understanding and awareness of the 

lives of individuals struggling with mental health. I hope that the voice of this letter will not 

reach only “Gaddy,” but many others, as issues surrounding mental health are not ones which 

can simply be overcome alone, but must be conquered together. 

Dear Gaddy, 

Comes fall with yellow, orange and red, 

But blind you are, as you meet again, 

The weight of silver upon your wrist, 

Yearning warmth from the red droplets freed, 

To only be embraced by the cold of winter. 

Dear Gaddy, 

Comes winter with the cold of day, 

A sensation of a familiar experience, 

Which is difficult to ever grow accustomed. 

In search of relief from this path astray, 

You yearn for the warmth of spring. 

Dear Gaddy, 

Comes fall, winter, spring and summer. 

Such simple things the seasons are, 

Yet their beauty lies hidden past you. 

So I leave my love, my heart and my soul, 

To rest side by side to heal the scars you hold. 

Shannon Hui 

3 rd Place National Winner 

Poetry 

Shannon Hui is in her second year of the bachelor 

of business administration program at 

York University. Shannon says that her journey 

surrounding mental health is merely beginning, 

as she continue to meet new people and 

experience different things, all while trying to 

learn the importance of being healthy, both 

mentally and physically. 

28 

29


Creative Works Studio: 

Art and Community for Health 

By Ioana Arbone, assisted by Karen Young 

Photograph by Marlena Zuber 

Some bands are born of positive beginnings. Social Mystics is no exception. Born in 2007, this 

group was developed by the arts-based occupational therapy program, the Creative Works 

Studio (CWS). 

Situated in Toronto, CWS is run by St. Michael’s Hospital, in partnership with the Good 

Shepherd Non-Profit Homes Inc. They offer therapeutic arts programming to those struggling 

with mental illness and addiction issues. 

CWS serves between 80 and 100 members 

and hosts 2,500 visits per year. While the 

hospital finances approximately 40 percent of 

the studio, CWS self-finances the remaining 

60 percent. Clients can be referred to CWS 

by a health care provider from across Toronto, 

though priority is given to clients from St. 

Michael’s Hospital. The music group Social 

Mystics is just one example of the many CWS 

projects. 

Apart from participating in larger projects 

like the Social Mystics, CWS clients can 

find their passion by choosing from a variety 

of art forms, including pottery, painting, 

sculpture, songwriting, screen printing and 

digital photography. 

Minds Matter Magazine interviewed 

the founder and creative lead of CWS, Isabel 

Fryszberg. She is also the creative lead of 

band, musical compositions, and rhythm guitar 

at Social Mystics. Social Mystics launched 

their first album, Coming Out of Darkness, in 

early March of this year. 

Minds Matter Magazine (MMM): Why the 

name Social Mystics? 

Isabel Fryszberg (IF): In our group, we collectively 

inspire each other and build on each 

other’s ideas. One day, someone said ‘oh 

yeah, we are the social misfits,’ and then the 

word mystic came up and everybody said, 

‘yeah, that is a good name.’ In our group, you 

sometimes create unconsciously, in that your 

ideas, your thoughts and images, are ahead 

of you. When you think about Social Mystics, 

it is that we are, in many ways, providing a 

message that is not always understood or 

clear to people. But when we do present our 

message, whether it is through music, film, or 

art, photography, we appreciate it. 

MMM: What are some of the important ideas 

that are in your songs? 

IF: There are a lot of different messages that 

we have, such as acceptance, compassion, 

and community. Some of our music is nostalgic 

in the style of the melodies, so it kind of 

transports you in another time. In “I Could 

Build a New World”, we say in the lyrics what 

is important. We talk about love, we talk 

about talking to each other rather than texting 

and being so focused on our iPhones. We 

talk about smiling to each other, connecting, 

moving slower, breathing with ease. We also 

say, ‘hold on to the good.’ When you are dealing 

with a mental health challenge, it is hard 

to hold on to the good, especially when you 

are contemplating hurting yourself or suicide. 

So, we say it in the first line, ‘when the world 

tears you apart, hold on to the good.’ 

Photograph by Ioana Arbone 

MMM: How do you create that space of mutual 

acceptance? 

IF: This is done partly over time and partly by 

being nonjudgmental. We create a sense of 

30 

31

Creative Works Studio 

Ioana Arbone 


safety, where everybody’s ideas are encouraged, 

and we play a lot. It is about how can 

we really make an interesting art piece with 

this song. Together. 

MMM: At CWS, artists can create art through 

different mediums. How does the artist decide 

which art form they go with? How are 

people exposed to the different art forms so 

that they are able to choose which one to go 

with? 

IF: The artists have the opportunity to try 

anything. We operate as an open studio. We 

have structured programs that people can 

participate in. Some are with instruction and 

some are not. We work right where someone 

is at. People are exposed to music who have 

never sang. In this studio, we could have clay 

going on, painting going on, and singing going 

on at the same time. It is done in a way so 

that people are focused on what they are doing. 

While some people are painting, they are 

hearing live music. There is this lovely back 

and forth thing going on. Today, people are 

picking up colouring books.This whole studio 

is about colouring, and creating, and being 

in that kind of zen place. But the difference 

between a colouring book and this place is 

we have expression. And we encourage expression. 

MMM: On your website, CWS produced a 

film (What’s Art Got to Do With It?) capturing 

an insider’s view of CWS artists in the making 

of an annual art show, learning about the 

artistic process of the artists interlaced with 

their narratives on mental health challenges 

and addictions. What inspired the creation of 

your film? 

IF: A number of things. As an arts-based occupational 

therapy program, one of the U of T 

occupational therapy students interviewed us 

to understand the impact of the studio. After 

interviewing our members, she discovered 

through these oral stories that consistent 

themes came up in terms of their transformation, 

in terms of how the environment 

affected them, in terms of how they came to 

find themselves in becoming artists. She said, 

‘This would be a great video.’ 

I have a background in film, but I didn’t 

want to impose it in the studio. So when 

people were feeling the trust and safety, I 

partnered with a social scientist at St. Mike’s, 

Janet Parsons, and we collaborated with our 

members. We used a participatory community 

research approach and research design, 

and got them involved in designing the questions, 

and then we also used an arts-based 

research approach using film. And because of 

my background as a documentary filmmaker, 

I really wanted it to be not just a knowledge 

translation tool, but a real documentary, 

so that it could be accessible to the public 

shown at a festival or sold to a broadcaster. 

At the end, it was shown at the Toronto Female 

Eye Festival, a women’s film festival, and 

eventually acquired by the CBC. 

MMM: How do patients come to CWS and 

transform into artists? 

IF: A lot of people come to the program, 

many who have never worked in clay or painting 

before, and then they discovered that 

they can create, that they are an artist, and 

that they can move from being a patient to an 

artist. People are given a new identity. They 

take on the role and culture of being an artist. 

It is not art therapy, although it is therapeutic. 

My background is as an occupational therapist 

as well as an artist, so they are given a 

new form of occupation. 

MMM: In this media article, they quoted you: 

‘Art isn’t a luxury, it’s something that we 

need,’ said Fryszberg. “It’s important to have 

a space that is creative because together it 

creates a place of health.’ [1] 

Why is art something that we fundamentally 

need? 

IF: It gives you permission to express, take 

risks, to have a reflection of beauty, to have 

a reflection of truth. It is your culture, art 

creates culture. And I feel that science, true 

science, true math as an art. If you lose your 

arts, you lose your humanity. You lose a lot. 

You also lose your innovations. And you become 

robotic, mechanized and that’s dangerous. 

CWS has important goals for the future. 

The program plans to develop a toolkit 

to replicate their model after receiving numerous 

requests from organizations and curious 

students. Some could potentially focus on 

the needs of specific demographics, such as 

postsecondary students. 

Fryszberg encourages any student to 

volunteer and help with the program. Also, 

Social Mystics can be booked for playing by 

contacting her at www.creativeworks-studio. 

ca. They have their album available for sale, 

along with paintings, sculptures, photography, 

and more created by the CWS artists 

themselves, available through the studio. 

This interview has been edited for clarity and length. 

Isabel Fryszberg OT Reg.(Ont.) 

Creative Lead of Creative Works Studio 

St. Michael’s Inner City Health Program 

793 Gerrard Ave 

416-465-5711 

www.creativeworks-studio.ca 

Isabel Frysberg is a graduate of the Occupational 

Science and Occupational Therapy 

Program at the University of Toronto. 

Reference: 

[1] HealthCanal. 28/09/2013 02:27:00. Toronto mental 

health documentary What’s Art Got to Do With 

It? Set to screen at TIFF. Mental Health and Behavior. 

http://www.healthcanal.com/mental-health-behavior/43398-toronto-mental-health-documentarywhat’s-art-got-to-do-with-it-set-to-screen-at-tiff.html 

32 33

NON-FICTION 


“Becoming Silver Girl” 

by Larissa Fleurette (University of British Columbia) 


“A View From the Inside” 

by Kelly Aiello (University of Toronto, St.George) 

Honourary Mention 

Becoming Silver Girl 

By Larissa Fleurette 


I wrote this submission, Becoming Silver Girl, about my time in the hospital when I was a 

16-year-old who had just been diagnosed with a mental illness. I think it captures a glimpse of 

what it’s like to be 16 and in the hospital, feeling out of place and vulnerable, and how the stigma 

surrounding mental illness is still very much alive in the world. This story speaks about the 

despair and depression that comes with an illness, but eludes to also feeling inklings of hopefulness. 

“An Open Letter to the Guy Who Gave 

Me Courage” 

by Kelly Aiello (University of Toronto, St.George) 

We trick-or-treat dressed in our normal 

clothes: jeans, t-shirts and hoodies. I feel 

queasy as we walk from house to house. I 

remember my face in the mirror back in the 

mental health unit at the hospital and how 

awful it looked. I feel torn between wanting 

to go back and hide, and wanting never to go 

back there ever again, not back to where it’s 

confirmed that I am, in fact, crazy. Being in 

there only makes me crazier, anyway. 

I grasp at things to make myself feel 

better: the smell of the grass? The feel of the 

wind against my face? The memory of 

trick-or-treating as a child with my parents 

and with my siblings, dressed up in the 

costumes Mama created with her sewing 

machine? 

After half an hour, I’ve collected a fair 

amount of chocolates and candies and a 

random can of Coke. The other patients and I 

approach a lit home with a scarecrow hanging 

by the mailbox. About seven 

twenty-somethings stand in a circle next to 

the car parked in the driveway, drinking from 

beer bottles. They turn and watch us approach. 

“Aren’t you a little too old to be 

trick-or-treating?” calls one of the men. 

“Trying to take the candies we’ve got 

specially for the little ones, eh?” 

I’m afraid that someone will answer 

him. No one does. We walk past them to the 

porch and to the front door. 

34 35

Silver Girl 

Larissa Fleurette 


The twelve-year- old patient, Jason, rings a 

few times. When no one answers after the 

third ring, we turn to leave, but the man who 

spoke earlier puts down his beer bottle. 

“Is no one coming?” 

“No,” answers Jason. The man comes 

up to the front door, opens it, and suddenly, 

the smell of fresh flowers comes wafting 

through that front door. 

I think of my mother and her flowers, 

the flowers she slaves away arranging 

through the night in order to make it in time 

for the couple who have ordered them for 

their wedding the next day. Even more 

unexpected is the sound of a piano flowing 

from somewhere inside the house. It gives my 

heart a twist, unfurls it and leaves it feeling 

wrung out and tired of fighting. 

The man reappears with a basket of 

candy and starts to hand out chocolate bars 

as the piano starts to play one of my favourite 

songs. 

you have better things to do than take c 

hocolate and candy meant for little ones? 

You’re not even dressed up! If you’re going to 

go trick-or-treating at your age, you might as 

well make an effort to dress up.” 

I feel myself crack a little inside. It’s the 

exact same thing I think of when I see 

teenagers without costumes at my own door. 

Everyone accepts his chocolate bars 

and leaves until finally I’m the only one on 

the porch. I stand in front of the man, holding 

out my limp, half-empty Longo’s plastic bag, 

feeling small, pathetic and stupid. I stare at 

this stranger before me, at his ruffled hair and 

bloodshot eyes, feeling more connected to 

him in this moment than I have to the other 

patients in the past two weeks, because he 

knows what it’s like to feel robbed by 

teenagers on Halloween night, and he’s doing 

what I’d be doing if I were home right now. 

He tosses the candy from where he 

stands at the door, but it misses my plastic 

bag. 

Before I can do anything, he bends 

down and picks up the plastic hospital 

wristband that the nurses put on me when I 

was admitted. It says my name, the hospital’s 

name, the unit where I’m staying, and that 

I’m allergic to penicillin. 

I see his face change. 

“Here you go!” he says in a happy 

voice. I hold out my palm but he slips the 

wristband on. “There! Here—here’s more just 

for you!” 

He grabs a handful of candy out of his 

basket and drops it into my bag. 

“Have a nice night, sweetheart!” 

His bloodshot eyes stare at me, round 

and bulging. 

“Thanks. You, too.” 

I’m surprised at how normal my voice 

sounds. 

“I feel the same way. I wish I was Silver Girl, 

sailing on by, with a friend right behind me, 

waiting to lay his or her life down for me.” 

He looks down at me without moving 

his head. 

“You’re weird,” he says. 

“I know.” 

I can tell from the look on his face that 

he’s confused about what I said about being 

Silver Girl, but all the same, I feel like I’ve 

made a friend. 

Janice waves furiously from down the 

block. We jog towards her, swinging our plastic 

Longo’s bags in our hands, and when we 

catch up, we open the Coke cans that we got 

from an old lady a few houses back and drink 

to getting out of the hospital. 

“Yo, what did that guy say to you?” 

Jake asks me. 

“Sail on, Silver Girl, sail on by....” He 

sings under his breath in time with the piano. 

“Your time has come to shine, all your dreams 

are on their way… You’re doing great, Dora!” 

he shouts. 

The piano stops. 

“Thanks, Tony,” says a little girl’s voice. 

Then the piano starts up once more. 

He glances around at us in disapproval. 

“Why do you guys go trick-or-treating? Don’t 

“Whoops!” he says in a loud voice. 

I bend down, pick it up and toss it in 

my bag. 

“Thank you,” I say before I turn to 

leave. 

I love being one of those people who 

says thank you on Halloween. 

“You dropped something,” the man 

says and points. “It fell off your wrist.” 

I walk down the porch, past his 

beer-drinking friends and towards my group, 

which has already moved two houses ahead 

of me, so I run to catch up with them. A tall 

boy is lagging behind. I’ve seen him before 

and heard the other patients call him Jake. 

“Hey, Jake,” I say. 

He glances over at me. 

“I wish I was at home,” he says after a 

moment. “I wish I was trick-or-treating with 

my buds, or at least, not in that shithole.” 

“Oh. You know, he didn’t really say 

much with words. He said a lot of things with 

his eyes. He looked really sad when he realized 

I was from the hospital.” 

“Stupid drunkard. We don’t need his 

goddam sympathy.” 

“I wish I were back there, smelling the 

sweet smell of flowers from inside where it’s 

warm and listening to the piano. I love that 

song, Bridge Over Troubled Water.” 

“Lovely song,” says Janice. 

36 37

Silver Girl 


“I think I was meant to hear that song 

tonight,” I say. 

“What do you mean?” Janice asks. 

“I feel that God played that song for me 

because he knows I love that song and that I 

would feel hopeful if I were to hear it. So He 

played it for me tonight, because I was losing 

hope.” 

“Losing hope?” Janice looks at me like 

I’m about to slit my wrists in front of her. 

“What do you mean?” 

I’m about to speak, but Jake interrupts. 

“That’s crazy talk,” he says. “You’re schizophrenic, 

aren’t you?” 

“That’s none of your business, Jake,” 

says Janice before I can answer. “We ought 

to be heading back to the hospital, guys. It’s 

getting late.” 

As we walk back to the hospital, I pretend 

I’m Silver Girl and all my dreams are on 

their way. For some reason, it doesn’t seem 

impossible. 



Non-Fiction 

Larissa Fleurette is an alumna of the University 

of Toronto Mississauga, currently pursuing 

a master of fine arts in creative writing at the 

University of British Columbia. Larissa is passionate 

about travel, food and mental health 

awareness. 

A View From 

the Inside 

By Kelly Aiello 

My heart has been racing lately – I have 

been reflecting. But when reflection turns 

into a tumble down the Rabbit Hole, my 

heart races, my chest tingles. My fingers go 

numb. My emotions commit mutiny and 

Mr. Hyde comes out – that’s what we call 

him, my therapist and I. Mr. Hyde. I couldn’t 

think of a more apt name. He takes me 

over; hijacks my insides and I walk through 

the days in a fog of anger, humiliation, fear 

and elation. My puppet strings in the hands 

of a vapid and elusive entity. I can take over 

the world – no, fuck you, I hate the world. 

I can’t sleep, I can’t stop sleeping. It’s too 

bright, the sunlight is my muse; I can’tstopcan’tstopcn’tstpc….NO! 

I fall. 


My work is a short, non-fiction about my first experience as an inpatient due to mental illness. 

I was diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder during this experience and subsequently 

with co-morbid Bipolar Type II Disorder. This work is a reflection on my experience with healthcare 

during my stay and the stigma attached to suicide, attempted suicide and the mentally ill. 

I have bipolar type II disorder. 

Today I have been reflecting on a very brief 

time in my life that I realize, I have never 

actually spoken of. Only parts I can write because, 

quite frankly, my memory is a broken 

puzzle, pieces of the event missing. Blank. 

And what I do remember, it’s difficult 

to write. It hurts. 

I was twenty-one and I remember 

bright lights. I remember feeling cold. Cold 

right through my entire body. I could smell 

vomit and iodine. The sterile yet somehow 

disgusting smell of a hospital. 

I’m thrown back into the memory. 

38 

39

Inside 

Kelly Aiello 


I turn my head, feel the stiffness of a pillow 

beneath my skull. I am weak on the bed, and 

can see a silver bedpan filled to the brim with 

thick, black muck. 

My heart is still racing. All this time later. 

I feel nausea. I am not able to control my 

muscles. I raise my hand, help, where am I, tremors 

through my arm, my fingers uncontrollable. 

My arm falls to the scratchy sheets of the bed. 

I feel more vomit rising. More black mess into 

another silver bedpan. A thick, soft hand holding 

the bedpan. I vomit more. 

“Get it out,” the voice is not kind. “Get it 

out girl. You have to drink more.” 

I shake my head, more of a swivel on my 

neck. Look up to the nurse, the woman holding 

the bedpan I am rapidly filling with my barf. Her 

eyes are blank. She places the bedpan on the table 

beside her. Passes me a cup filled with black 

goo. 

“If you don’t drink this, I’ll have no choice 

but to shove a tube down your throat. Do you 

want that?” 

eyes. 

The doctor comes in. He is tall. With glasses. 

Bitch. I feel the tears stinging under my 

I hate you I hate you I hate you. 


“We need to take your arterial blood. 

What you ingested has a dangerous effect on 

blood pH.” I know. I’m not stupid. “This will hurt.” 

I have a name. My mouth gurgles words 

perfectly formed in my head. I feel a prick in my 

wrist. A tugging sensation. Then like a thousand 

spikes being shoved up my arm and into my 

heart. 

I scream. I keep thinking that he is going 

to rip my arteries out through my wrist all the 

way up to my heart. My arm is burning; every 

bone breaking. I plead, stop, please stop. I see 

the nurse behind him. She looks at me, disappointment 

masking any kindness she may have 

had. 

Patches, stickers, are then placed on my 

bare chest. Beeping machines pulled up to my 

bed. “Your heart is in danger,” the doctor mumbles. 

My heart is already dead. Why do you 

think I’m here. 

Then everything goes dark. 

I wake up in a room. A brightly lit room. 

It smells different. The sounds are different. I 

can’t hear the rhythmic beeping of the machines 

anymore. My belly hurts but I no longer feel the 

urgency to barf. The sense of panic, of franticness 

around me is gone. 

I look to the side, down to the floor. I 

can see sunlight spreading its fingers across the 

linoleum tiled floor. I look to my feet and see I am 

covered in a blue blanket. And a hospital gown. 

My arm is taped up. Bruises upon bruises. I open 

my mouth, hello? – a croak comes out and pain 

radiates through my throat. 

I look up again, to the source of the 

sunlight, the window. I am horrified to see bars, 

two inch squares, covering the entire small window. 

No, no, no, no. 

“Hello, sleepy-head,” a voice comes from 

the doorway with no door. I turn and see at a 

small, dark haired woman. “May I come in?” Her 

face is kind. Wrinkles creasing her eyes as she 

smiles at me. She’s spent her life smiling. 

I look back up at the window, the bars, 

and nod. 

“I need to take more blood, sweetie.” She 

starts to unearth my arm from the gown. I look 

down and watch her small fingers work and she 

slaps on gloves. I see a splotch of dried blood in 

the crux of my elbow. My wrist is purple. 

“From where?” I mumble. Swallow. Another 

shot of pain. 

“Oh honey, I’m really good at this.” She 

smiles at me again. Skin pulling up to her brown 

eyes. I want to like her smile but it feel like she’s 

smiling at a child. But maybe that’s okay. Maybe 

she will take care of me. Maybe she will make the 

pain go away. “How are you feeling this afternoon?” 

Afternoon? 

I just look at her. 


“Pretty rotten no doubt,” she answers for 

me. “Do you know where you are?” 

I shake my head, no. No, I don’t fucking 

know. And why are there goddamn bars on my 

window? 

“Honey, you tried to hurt yourself. Do you 

remember that?” 

Fuck off. I turn my head, the pillow sheet 

rustling under my greasy hair. Look up to the ceiling. 

“You’re in Homewood. You’ll be spending 

a few days here, honey.” 

That’s when I hear the girl in the room 

next to me shouting. I look through the doorless 

door and see the uniformed men rushing into the 

room. The small woman beside me smiles but 

her head is shaking, back and forth. No crinkles 

around her eyes. 

I don’t remember much about that…day, 

days, events. But I remember that girl’s cries. 

Moaning cries. Get me out of here. 

My heart is still racing. Fifteen years later. 

Kelly Aiello 

2 nd Place UTSC Winner 

Non-Fiction 

Kelly Aiello is a second-time undergraduate 

student at the University of Toronto St. George 

Campus, currently studying neuroscience and 

psychology. Her first degree is in political science. 

She is an advocate for mental health and strives, 

through her writing, to help break the stigma 

around mental illness. In her free time, Kelly 

writes, paints, gardens and travels. 

40 41

The Problem with Romanticizing Cognitive Difference in 

Comedy Shows 

While it is obvious that negative representations 

of mental illness in media - such 

as stereotyping in film and television, and 

overrepresentation in news - have perpetuated 

stigma, this harmful influence appears 

to have persisted in new and unique ways. 

[1] 

In recent years, some media outlets have 

begun to romanticize—that is, to reframe 

as desirable—those with mental illness and 

cognitive differences. This can further stigma 

and misperceptions, and may also discourage 

help-seeking behavior. 

Perhaps the most clear examples of 

this romanticization are found in the several 

sitcoms or comedy series that use mental 

illness or cognitive difference as a vehicle for 

laughs. The sitcom The Big Bang Theory bases 

much of its comedic nature on Sheldon Cooper, 

who, based on criteria mentioned in the 

DSM-V, seems to show symptoms of autism 

spectrum disorder. [2] While diagnosing fictional 

characters is not usually accurate or effective, 

much of the comedic nature of The Big 

Bang Theory seems to rely on viewers seeing 

Sheldon as cognitively and intellectually ‘different.’ 

Despite representatives of the show 

explicitly stating that the character does not 

have autism, [3] his difficulty connecting with 

others, high attention to detail, and peculiar 

habits, coupled with his exceptional intelligence, 

seem to similarly match this particular 

diagnosis. [2] 

As well, Monica Geller, a character 

from the classic sitcom F.R.I.E.N.D.S, seems to 

show signs of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder 

(OCD), based on the criteria mentioned on 

the Centre of Addiction and Mental Health 

(CAMH) website. [4] She exhibits obsessions, 

such as her fear of contamination, which 

manifests in a compulsive washing of her 

By Christina Gizzo 


apartment, though is interpreted and conveyed 

by her friends as a simple love for 

cleanliness. She also shows an obsessive 

fear of things becoming disordered, which is 

portrayed in her acute sensitivity to things 

being moved even slightly out of place, and 

her subsequent distress when things have not 

been ordered in the ‘right’ way. [4] 

However, before proceeding it is important 

to note that these characters aren’t 

necessarily seen as harmful portrayals. Sheldon 

Cooper has actually been very well received 

among some members of the autism 

community. Advocates from Autism Speaks 

stated: “in our community, the biggest reason 

why people seem to be drawn to [Sheldon] is 

that he’s absolutely genuine. He is who he is 

and doesn’t pretend to be someone he isn’t. 

He’s just his own unique self.” [5] This points to 

the weight behind their slogan: “If you’ve met 

one person with autism, you’ve met one person 

with autism.” [5] Even though it may not be 

the producers’ intent, Sheldon Cooper seems 

to be perceived by those in the community to 

have a ‘mad pride’ mentality, in that he embraces 

exactly who he is; he accepts his cognitive 

differences as part of his identity rather 

than viewing it as a pathology. 

It is also refreshing, and can be positive, 

to see characters who have overt symptoms 

of mental illness or cognitive difference, 

yet are very successful in demanding fields. 

This is not only a positive connection to be 

made for those with abnormal psychology 

in general, it has also given hope to some 

families in the autism community, who have 

stated that they were curious about what the 

future of living with autism would look like. [5] 

These families found that seeing Sheldon as 

an adult and a functional member of society 

with full independence, a job, friends, and a 

girlfriend, gave them hope and comfort for 

the futures of their children. [5] 

Despite this, these representations are 

still problematic, and offer incomplete views. 

In the portrayals of both Monica and Sheldon, 

it is not accurately conveyed how thoroughly 

42 43

Comedy Shows 

Christina Gizzo 


a mental illness or cognitive difference can 

infiltrate almost every facet of one’s life. This 

downplays what can be the intense and consuming 

struggle that can occur. The illnesses 

these characters have are portrayed as mere 

parts of their personalities—harmless traits 

that makes them cute, quirky, interesting, 

even funny. This leads to both trivialization 

of the illness itself, and at the same time 

establishes that these tendencies are socially 

desired. Would we love Sheldon just as much 

is he wasn’t a stubborn, awkward genius, or 

Monica if she wasn’t hypersensitive about 

her apartment? These romanticized portrayals 

send the message that tendencies drawn 

from mental illness or cognitive differences 

are interesting and loveable; they make them 

appear desirable. 

“he accepts his cognitive 

differences as part of his identity 

rather than viewing it as a 

pathology.” 

The common use of OCD as an adjective 

to describe being particular about 

something perfectly illustrates this effect. [6] In 

an article published in 2012, Jeff Szymanski, 

Executive Director of the International OCD 

Foundation, outlines an important difference 

between obsessive as a personality trait, 

versus an actual disorder, in the sense that 

the former is a matter of personal preference, 

while the latter affects one’s ability to function. 

[7] Szymanski acknowledges the danger 

behind casually claiming to have OCD, without 

addressing the life-altering loss of 

function that characterizes the disorder, in 

stating, “You’re now mixing a distressing 

psychological disorder with a personality preference, 

and when you mix them, you lose the 

severity of the disorder.” [7] 

On a similar note, by linking mental 

illness or cognitive difference with success 

while simultaneously downplaying its severity, 

romanticization creates unrealistic representations. 

In this case, it is the painful reality 

of living with a psychological difference made 

to appear easy. Portraying Sheldon Cooper as 

a high achiever may attract expectations of 

how one should be able to cope with mental 

illness, while what has been found in human 

psychology, and the internal struggle Sheldon 

should logically face, is ignored. With high 

expectations often comes a desire to continually 

excel, [8] and failing to meet these expectations 

may then result in perceived inferiority. 

[9] This can then, of course, lead to very 

negative thinking. [9] This effect is particularly 

seen among individuals that have high expectations 

for themselves, and encounter minor 

setbacks, [10] worsened by the fact that high 

achievers can often have little resilience, and 

inability to deal with failure. [9] In portraying 

Sheldon as an effortlessly successful achiever, 

viewers may draw conclusions about how 

someone with mental illness should be able 

to function. 

In each of these aspects of inaccurate 

portrayals, perhaps the most dangerous 

result is the potential for those who should 

reach out for professional help to refrain from 

doing so. If symptoms of mental illness make 

one loveable and interesting, why would one 

ever want to be treated, and potentially lose 

them? As well, if one would be socially 

welcomed and admired for possessing such 

‘traits,’ what makes seeking help anything but 

a cry for attention, or worse, an overreaction? 

And, as in Sheldon’s case, if one has a mental 

illness but maintains a high level of success, 

what is the need for seeking help? 

“ Misinformation fuels stigma, 

and prevents the proper 

comprehension of what is really 

needed to help.” 

Multiple studies have shown that negative 

media portrayals of mental illness can 

decrease help-seeking behaviour due to increased 

stigma. [11, 12] Despite researchers and 

those in the field of psychology recommending 

positive representations of mental illness 

to help combat this, misinformation and 

exaggeration are still in these more positive 

stereotypes, which may also lead to increased 

stigma. [12, 13] Thus, it can be inferred that the 

positive portrayals that might increase stigma 

might also lead to a decrease in help-seeking 

behavior. Although this effect has not been 

explicitly studied, it is a worthwhile topic to 

explore that has important social implications. 

In a mass literature review on stigma 

and its relation to help-seeking behaviours, 

German scientists from Leipzig University 

found that although destigmatization may 

lead to increased readiness to seek help, other 

aspects of progression of awareness, such 

as accurate knowledge about mental illness 

and cognitive difference, seem to be just as 

important in contributing to increasing 

help-seeking behavior. [14] Thus, regardless of 

whether the framing of the portrayal is positive 

or negative, the effect is still the same— 

that is, the problem of misinformation still 

exists. If those with a mental illness are being 

fed these inaccurate portrayals and exaggerations, 

they are being misinformed about what 

actually comprises a mental illness. Misinformation 

fuels stigma, and prevents the proper 

comprehension of what is really needed to 

help. 

And yet, the media can be a crucial ally 

in a pivotal movement to help increase education 

and awareness, and help those who 

live with mental illness seek the help they 

need. [12] Thus, what is needed is for the media 

to incorporate the lived experiences of those 

with mental illness or cognitive difference, 

and put these individuals at the forefront of 

the conversation. In addition, media sources 

may stress the implications that some current 

media representations can have, and how 

more accurate portrayals can improve public 

perception, and hence the lives of those living 

with mental illness or cognitive difference. 

This would lead to a wider shift in accurate 

portrayals that would better educate, further 

inform, and would help those who need to 

seek professional help to actually do so once 

they recognize the scope and severity of the 

issues they are living with. 

Moving forward, the aim should be to 

depict the reality of circumstances even within 

comedy series and the like, as the failure 

to do so could have negative consequences. 

What this means is rewriting the script - that 

is, taking into account lived experiences and 

44 45

Comedy Shows 

incorporating them into these series in order 

to better represent what actually is the 

case. 

References: 

[1] CMHA. Stigma Matters: The Media’s Impact on 

Public Perceptions of Mental Illness 

[2] Mayes, S., Calhoun, S., & Crites, D. (2001). Journal 

Of Abnormal Child Psychology, 29(3), 263-271. http:// 

dx.doi.org/10.1023/a:1010337916636 

[3] Why Our Autism Community Loves Sheldon 

Cooper. (2016). Autism Speaks. Retrieved 22 September 

2016, from https://www.autismspeaks. 

org/blog/2014/08/13/why-our-autism-community-loves-sheldon-cooper 

[4] CAMH (2012) What is obsessive-compulsive disorder? 

Retrived from: http://www.camh.ca/en/hospital/ 

health_information/a_z_mental_health_and_addiction_information/obsessive_compulsive_disorder/ 

obsessive_compulsive_disorder_information_guide/ 

Pages/ocd_whatis.aspx 

[5] Autism Speaks (2014) Why Our Autism Community 

Loves Sheldon Cooper. Retrieved from: https://www. 

autismspeaks.org/blog/2014/08/13/why-our-autism-community-loves-sheldon-cooper#comment-1541869524 

[6] The Atlantic (2015). OCD is a disorder not a 

quirk. Retrieved from: http://www.theatlantic.com/ 

health/archive/2015/02/ocd-is-a-disorder-not-aquirk/385562/ 

[7] Szymanski, J. (2012). Using direct-to-consumer 

marketing strategies with obsessive-compulsive disorder 

in the nonprofit sector. Behavior therapy, 43(2), 

251-256. 

[8] American Academy of Pediatrics. (2015). High 

achievers and perfectionists. Retrieved from: https:// 

www.healthychildren.org/English/ages-stages/youngadult/Pages/High-Achievers-and-Perfectionists.aspx 


[9] Spargo, C. (2015). Parents share tragic suicide note 

of ivy league track star, 19, who jumped to her death 

from a parking garage and left gifts for friends and 

family members nearby. Retrieved from: http://www. 

dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2920310/Parents-sharetragic-suicide-note-Ivy-League-track-star-19-jumpeddeath-parking-garage-left-gifts-friends-family-members-nearby.html 

[10] Feather, N. T. (1961). The relationship of persistence 

at a task to expectation of success and 

achievement related motives. The Journal of Abnormal 

and Social Psychology, 63(3), 552. 

[11] Pirkis, J., Blood, R. W., Francis, C., & McCallum, K. 

(2006). On-screen portrayals of mental illness: Extent, 

nature, and impacts. Journal of health communication, 

11(5), 523-541. 

[12] Stuart, H. (2006). Media portrayal of mental 

illness and its treatments. CNS drugs, 20(2), 99-106. 

[13] Klin, A., & Lemish, D. (2008). Mental disorders 

stigma in the media: Review of studies on production, 

content, and influences. Journal of health communication, 

13(5), 434-449. 

[13] CMHA. Mass Media and Mental Illness: A Literature 

Review. Retrieved from: http://ontario.cmha.ca/ 

files/2012/07/mass_media.pdf 

[14] Schomerus, G., & Angermeyer, M. C. (2008). 

Stigma and its impact on help-seeking for mental disorders: 

what do we know?. Epidemiologia e psichiatria 

sociale, 17(01), 31-37. 

“Synaptic-Qbe” 

STILL ART 


by Olive Garcia 


“Calm, Calm and Not” 

by Khadija Aziz (OCAD University) 


“A Beautiful Imperfect World” 

by Eric Chi (Western University) 

3rd Place - National 

“Misunderstood” 

by Sabnam Mahmuda (McMaster University) 

46 

47


Synaptic - Qbe 

By Olive Garcia 

The cube is made out of just under 800 Q-tips. Admittedly this was a project I did for an art 

course. Initially I wanted to name it, as per suggestion of a friend, Cube-Tip. ‘HA-HA,’ right? In 

this case, I’m officially naming it Synaptic-Qbe. I did make it with my science program in mind. 

There are 3 distinct patterns on the cube and it’s sort of an open concept structure, as you can 

see through it. What’s interesting is that even if you can see through it, the inside still seems 

mysterious. It even almost resembles a neural network. The meaning of an art piece depends 

on the individual, but what I hope is portrayed here is the idea that people and issues like mental 

health are complicated. Neither we nor our peers can see everything we’re made of. Your 

perception of this piece makes it what it is. 

Photography by Adley Lobo 

Olive Garcia 


Still Art 

Olive Garcia is a second year student at the University of Toronto Scarborough studying life 

science. Olive is majoring in mental health studies, and completing a double minor in linguistics 

and biology. Though Olive does not describe themselves as an artist, visual arts has been a 

form of therapy for them. 

48 

49

Calm, Calm and Not 

By Khadija Aziz 

Calm, Calm and Not is of synesthesia as a response of colours to sound. As an active observer of 

the environment around me, I find myself very insightfully associating the sounds I hear to how 

it makes me feel – the two most commonly identifiable feelings being calm and anxious. 

The paintings are on Yupo watercolour synthetic paper, where wet mediums elevate instead 

of being absorbed, as on rag papers. This made the paint always move around until it dried, 

giving me limited control of the final composition of my own work, and teaching me the art of 

letting go of anxiety. 

The process of creating Calm, Calm and Not consisted of recording two raw sounds that 

make me feel calm and two sounds that make me feel anxious. I used the four sounds to compose 

a short music piece, which I listened to while directly creating these paintings, intuitively 

responding to the music. 

Khadija Aziz 


Still Art 

Khadija Aziz is a Toronto-based visual artist and creative 

entrepreneur attending OCAD University. Khadija 

has a curious mind, and enjoys topics that ignite 

their imagination. Khadija’s art explores the hybridization 

of tradtional mediums and digital technologies to 

produce work that reflects their mind. 

50 51

52 53

A Beautiful Imperfect World 

By Eric Chi 

A Beautiful Imperfect World is a visualization of the beauty within imperfection. The artwork 

hopes to visually promote positive mental health through recognizing the discord within the 

mind, and linking the multiple facets of thoughts into a beautiful, harmonized symphony. Although 

everyone faces many emotions and conflicting thoughts, making people into imperfect, 

non-rational beings, we should recognize these differences and celebrate our imperfection. The 

main components of the artworks are the incomplete Zen circle, the uncoordinated blocks of 

colour, and the bold colours. The colours reflect the multiple facets of emotional thoughts: red 

represents passion and anger, blue represents sadness and self-reflection, and gold represents 

self-worth and happiness. The three bold colours pop out against the white background, similar 

to how we focus on these strong emotions, allowing them to define us. The dissymmetrical 

arrangement of colour blocks represents the eclectic thoughts that are hard to understand and 

underlies mental health issues. The Zen circle reflects the connection between these layers of 

emotions, and the importance of embracing the differences between everyone. Recognizing 

that the mental health issue faced by individuals is not a liability, but is in fact what makes 

them unique and wonderful. By embracing these differences in mental health can we create a 

positive, beautiful, imperfect world together. 

Eric Chi 

2 nd Place National Winner 

Still Art 

Eric Chi is an undergraduate student currently studying business and science at Richard Ivey 

Business School of the University of Western, Ontario. Eric believes mental health awareness is 

a very important subject, as mental health issues can affect everyone, sometimes in ways that 

are not visible, and sometimes with dangerous consequences as a possiblity. 

54 55

Misunderstood 

By Sabnam Mahmuda 

Misunderstood portrays the struggles of undergoing depression, inspired by my own experience 

as well as few people close to me. The negative labels which people attribute to depressed individuals 

are going down the mountain to showcase how these labels are not mere words. They 

carry tremendous weight, which can isolate people suffering from depression. The repetition 

of patterns for the fields and the river symbolize how depression from one day to another can 

consist of a cycles of emotions ranging from numbness to dispassionate happiness for the sake 

of your loved ones. The mists of red, blue, purple and brown around the border mimic bruises 

and symbolize the process of healing. I end simply with the words “but I am misunderstood” 

to highlight the impact of these words –by labeling and categorizing people who are suffering 

from any sort of mental illness, you are making assumptions and silencing their voices. 

Sabnam Mahmuda 

3 rd Place National Winner 

Still Art 

Sabnam Mahmuda is a graduate student at 

McMaster University, and an aspiring writer 

and artist. Sabnam finds inspiration in nature 

and in others’ stories observed during work or 

while travelling. Through written and visual 

art, Sabnam communicates stories of their 

own experiences, and of people who have 

touched their life. 

56 57


Workman Arts: 

A Canadian Pioneer in Mental Health Treatment 

By Alexa Battler 


In the heart of downtown Toronto sits a trailblazer in the mental health field— Workman Arts, 

the world’s longest-running multidisciplinary organization for arts and mental health. [1] Workman 

Arts has overwhelmingly evidenced the benefits of engaging those with mental illnes with 

the arts, through the many artistic careers and passions that they continue to foster. The organization 

produces works and supports artists in the fields of theatre, film, music, visual arts, 

literature, and more. 

Their lead in supporting arts and mental 

health could encourage investment in 

additional avenues of aid lying outside of 

traditional psychotherapy and psychiatry, 

which are so desperately needed by Canada’s 

overburdened mental health care system. [2] 

The founder of Workman Arts, Lisa Brown, 

has defined their effect through her coined 

term, ‘Therapeutic Arts Programming,’ which 

is “the creative process of making art to improve 

a person’s physical, mental, and emotional 

well-being.” Those without access to 

formal therapy, or in need of additional ways 

to address their symptoms, may find some relief 

through this type of programming, which 

Brown says differs from formal therapy in 

expectation and instruction, but can be very 

beneficial. 

For 29 years the organization has been 

growing into a powerhouse of artistic outlets 

for those with mental illness to learn, hone, 

and further their craft. Brown estimated that 

over half of the artists involved with Workman 

Arts are working towards an artistic career. 

The organization evolved from a theatre 

group to host exhibitions and personalized 

training classes in visual arts, publish literary 

works, contribute to mental health research 

and public information outreach, all while 

continuing its original theater component, 

now with over 30 original productions. Workman 

Arts has also created two innovative, 

internationally acclaimed events for those 

touched by mental illness to display their 

works: the Madness and Arts World Festival, 

a showcase of interdisciplinary arts that has 

been held in Toronto, Germany, and Amsterdam, 

and the Rendezvous with Madness Film 

Festival, which showcases Canadian and international 

films exploring mental illness and 

addiction issues. [1] 

Brown, who currently acts as the executive 

artistic director of Workman Arts, had 

been a psychiatric nurse at the Centre for 

Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) before 

leaving to commence the organization. When 

asked what inspired her to begin Workman 

Arts, Brown immediately and confidently 

stated: “The people that I was working with. I 

was quite amazed by the talent that the people 

[at the hospital] I was working with had.” 

She went on to explain, “on Friday 

nights I would pull people together and we 

would jam or we would recite poetry - and 

the talent I was seeing wasn’t ordinary, in 

fact it seemed quite extraordinary, so I had a 

talent show with the group of artistic individuals.” 

From there, Brown left CAMH to begin 

a theater troupe—a multifaceted way 

to engage painters, writers, actors, singers, 

musicians, etc.—for those with mental health 

issues, and Workman Arts was born. It would 

soon rapidly gain popularity among the many 

who felt the therapeutic benefits of art. 

Brown had known of this benefit for years, 

and mentioned that six of the seven famous 

Canadian landscape painters in the Group of 

Seven received mental health care. 

In their expansion and development, 

Workman Arts has mirrored what many other 

institutions and studies worldwide have 

found: production, consumption, and general 

engagement of art can greatly aid those 

struggling with mental health issues. A quick 

Google search yields thousands of results 

connecting arts and mental health—perhaps 

58 

59

Workman Arts 

most relevant being a 2015 study conducted 

by researchers from The University of Western 

Australia. The study found that two hours 

of artistic engagement per week in many 

of the areas Workman Arts specializes in - 

painting, crafting, reading, photography, and 

theater—led to participants (who were not 

deemed mentally ill) having “significantly better 

mental well-being.” [3] As Workman Arts, 

and many others, have found, these benefits 

are dramatically translatable to those who do 

have mental illness as well. 

Over their nearly 30 years of encouraging 

relationships between arts and mental 

health, Workman Arts’ members have repeatedly 

stated that creative activities reduced 

the debilitating symptoms of their mental 

illnesses. [4] Further, members stated that the 

training and outlets provided by Workman 

Arts made them feel hopeful and purposeful, 

that their artistic endeavours had reduced 

stress in their lives, and that relationships 

with family and friends had improved after 

engaging in these creative activities. [4] 


“[Art] allows you, I think, to get out of 

your head and focus on something else,” says 

Brown. “When you have a mental illness your 

mind can be your worst enemy, so if you’re 

Alexa Battler 

painting, or singing, or playing guitar, or 

watching a film, you’re not in your head, 

you’re actually focusing on something that 

brings pleasure. Art has the ability to really 

move us, to make us feel. Sometimes when 

you have mental illness you don’t want to 

feel, its easier to stay kind of bland, then you 

participate in art and it sparks the parts of 

your brain that may not get turned on when 

you are mentally ill.” 

Particularly in Ontario, where Children’s 

Mental Health Ontario reported in 

2015 that a rapidly growing number of the 

province’s youths (6,000 in 2015, estimatedto 

double to 12,000 in 2016) regularly wait a 

year or longer for mental health treatment, [2] 

further opportunities for aid are needed. 

CAMH has also estimated that, considering 

that mental illness constitutes about ten 

percent of the burden of diseases in Ontario, 

yet receives only seven percent of health care 

funding, mental health care in the province is 

underfunded by around $1.5 billion. [4] Changes 

must be made in order to accommodate 

the growing number of Canadians seeking 

treatment, and supporting artistic opportunities 

such as Workman Arts may be an effective 

path for those who need aid outside of 

standard talk or medicinal therapy. 

Some hospitals across Canada, including 

St. Michael’s in Toronto, have already implemented 

arts therapy programs, and Workman 

Arts facilitates a similar program with 

in-patient units in CAMH. However a greater 

push to encourage use of arts in addressing 

mental health may be a responsible step in 

enabling aid to those in need. This empirically 

beneficial practice may hold answers to effective 

treatment that creates barriers for so 

many. 


In a climate projected to be increasingly 

accommodating, the future appears a bit 

brighter in light of the widespread success, 

beneficial results, and supportive community 

that Workman Arts has helped form in their 

development. 

For more information on Workman Arts, visit 

www.workmanarts.com. 

References: 

[1] About. (n.d.)Workman Arts. Retrieved from https:// 

www.workmanarts.com/mission-and-objectives/ 

[2] 2015 Report card: Child & youth mental health. 

(2015). Children’s Mental Health Ontario. Retrieved 22 

September 2016, from http://www.kidsmentalhealth. 

ca/documents/cmho-report-card-2015-english.pdf 

[3] Davies, C., Knuiman, M., & Rosenberg, M. (2015). 

The art of being mentally healthy: a study to quantify 

the relationship between recreational arts engagement 

and mental well-being in the general population. 

BMC Public Health, 16(1). http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/ 

s12889-015-2672-7 

[4] Mental illness and addictions: Facts and statistics. 

(n.d.). CAMH: Centre for Addiction and Mental Health. 

Retrieved from http://www.camh.ca/en/hospital/ 

about_camh/newsroom/for_reporters/Pages/addictionmentalhealthstatistics.aspx 

60 61

FICTION 

Fly 

By Kira Lynn 


“Fly” 

by Kira Lynn 

“A brief description of institutionalized life.” 


“Moving” 

“He” 


by Jerico Espinas (York University) 

Honourary Mentions 

by Aingeshaan Kubendran (Western University) 

“The Heebie-Jeebies” 

by Rania Mansour (University of Toronto, St.George) 

Preface: I still get anxious when someone asks 

me how I feel. I always forget that I’m in control. 

I always forget that I’m not just a sum of 

my circumstances; circumstances that led me 

into a dark, dank hole. I refuse to let myself 

wander back, but sometimes I know there’s no 

use in refusing these thoughts a home. They 

will linger there, in my mind, until I can come 

up with an eviction notice worthy of its presence. 

It seemed so insignificant as it struggled 

against a seemingly unmovable force. It was 

small and fragile, both of body and of mind; it 

could not see that its attempts to break free 

were all in vein. I smiled. Yes, we were all in 

here, stuck inside this box with its concrete 

walls and its tempting glass windows. Those 

windows offered a glimpse of the world outside, 

a world that was moving although we 

were crystallized in here long ago. It was all 

an illusion, I had to convince myself; noth-ing 

could forget me, not while I stayed here desperately 

clinging onto the fragmented memories, 

cemented by my obsession to recite 

them in my mind. I remembered, so they 

would have to remember too. 

Its short wings would beat ineffectually 

against the ledge as it moved drunkenly 

around in semi-circles. It teetered around, 

uncertain of where to direct itself. I felt like 

I knew the feeling; the feeling like the world 

was being spun out from under your feet, the 

world sent aflutter just when you thought you 

had a grasp on the unceasing moving images. 

They told me it was only temporary as if I 

were to find solace in their words but nothing 

seemed to quell that uneasy feeling inside. 

Besides anchoring myself to a window. 

They refused to let me out, but only 

for a brief moment to smoke, so I looked out 

the windows longingly. When I looked out 

the window, I became still while custodians 

and doctors walked by, and the trees began 

to shed their dying leaves to grow new ones. 

The small apple tree outside my window 

would bear fruit and the fruit would fall to 

be assimilated into the ground. I studied and 

took a mental note, but still it left me feeling 

empty and disillusioned. 

62 63

Minds Matter Magazine Volume Fly Kira II Lynn Issue I Arts & Media 

When I went to the activity room, I 

realized I wasn’t the only one empty and 

disillusioned. One woman peered through 

a crack in the white plaster wall in hopes of 

communicating with her long lost brother, 

someone from the outside she lost years ago. 

At night, I could hear the woman cry as she 

rocked herself against the wall, begging to be 

let out; the woman became so fixated on that 

one spot. The more I watched the woman 

the more I began to draw parallels to myself. 

I was drawn to the windows, reprieves from 

the dank hallways and the smelly bathrooms 

no one would bother to clean. I didn’t want 

to be reminded of the sticky floors in the dining 

hall where they served nothing but cold 

lunches and lukewarm suppers. I didn’t want 

to be reminded of the cold and hard metal 

chairs in my group session. I would rather 

look blankly into the world that had forgotten 

me than subject myself to the conditions I 

found myself in. 

“I want to go home,” I choked, poking 

the fly with a dry fingertip. The fly stumbled 

back. 

I wanted to go back to the warmth 

of my blankets that would accompany me 

well into my sleep-ins. I wanted to go back 

to mypancake brunches and the sweet dewy 

grass freshly mowed every Sunday. It was 

these small snippets of a life past lived that 

would accompany me into the night and 

make me yearn for a life I was more suited 

for. My roommate would look me in the eye, 

as though she knew, as though she understood. 

I didn’t know that the moment I would 

step through the large wooden doors, into 

the brightly lit triage room, I would have to 

give up so much. 

“What home would there be to go back 

to?” It inquired between the flutter of its 

wings, as it made a move against the window 

frame. 

“Perhaps there is nothing to go back 

to,” I admitted the fly. “The more I stay here, 

the more I am truly losing my mind.” 

The door swung open. I anxiously 

snapped around, fearful it was my roommate. 

My roommate was by no means a vicious 

person but the woman was rather talkative 

and I did not appreciate it, especially when 

I was trying to get some rest. My roommate 

was lonely and so it was appropriate to entertain 

her late night rambles. My roommate 

was abandoned by her family long ago; it was 

depressing. The more I thought about it, the 

more I realized my roommate wasn’t the only 

one. No one wanted to drive through the 

rusted gates that made an awful crying noise, 

like the pitiful screech of a desperate child, as 

they opened. No one wanted to be pat down 

at the door by a security guard that had little 

inclination of what his job truly implied. No 

one wanted to be reminded of the people 

they left behind. 


Thankfully it wasn’t my chatty roommate 

but the floor’s nurse. She was a young 

and fresh face in a long line of old and tired 

ones. The nurse tried to connect but in an attempt 

to connect, she found herself ignoring 

the conditions around her. The nurse tuned 

out the screams and the slaps, the shit throwing, 

the insults. I knew that it would break the 

nurse; it very well broke me. 

“It’s time for your afternoon medications.” 

She handed me the small Dixie cup 

filled with water and a clear tray of medication. 

“I tried to find you in the activity room. 

ou’re not painting today?” 

“Not today, Leena. I don’t feel very creative.” 

I shoveled the pills into her mouth; the 

cup of water had barely enough to slip them 

out of my mouth and into my throat. 

“Well, that’s fine. No one feels creative 

every day.” 

“Bless you, Leena but I don’t want to 

hear how I’m still like everyone else today. I 

don’t feel myself. In fact, I don’t remember 

what it was like to be myself.” 

The nurse smiled, as was customary. 

They learned to validate feelings rather than 

correct them; it would only agitate them. 

“There’s no worse feeling than not 

knowing who you are.” 

“No, I think there’s worse.” 

“Being alone?” The fly asked. 

I pinched the fly by the wings, watching 

it squirm against thumb and forefinger. 

Never had I been able to grab a fly, no matter 

how hard I tried. It was like it had given in to 

me long ago. Or maybe it had given in to the 

walls. 


“Well, that’s not nice.” The nurse 

snapped. 

I looked up to find that the nurse had 

unlocked the window and pushed it open 

slightly. I unleashed the fly by the crack of 

the window. The air seemed to revitalize the 

small creature and it tumbled off the ledge. 

I couldn’t see if it managed to fly out on its 

own or not as it fell down the side of the 

building, covered in dying shrubbery. 

“It’s best to leave it be, where it belongs. 

It would be cruel otherwise.” And the 

nurse locked the window. 

Kira Lynn 


Fiction 

Kira Lynn is an undergraduate student at the 

University of Toronto Scarborough studying 

psychology and human biology. Kira says that 

her personal experience with mental illness has 

shaped the way they interact with the world 

through writing. 

64 65


Moving 

By Jerico Espinas 

“Moving” is a story that attempts to discuss issues of loss through immigrant experiences. Foremost, I wanted 

to explore how many first and second generation children are connected to their culture through their parents, 

and how many are left missing a core part of their identity when their parents pass away. Coping with a loved 

one’s death is already difficult enough, especially given the struggles and sacrifices that many immigrant families 

go through; losing one’s culture as well can greatly magnify that loss. 

Critically, I also wanted to explore how memory is affected by trauma. Seeking to make sense of our loved one’s 

life, we sometimes try to fit our moments with them into a meaningful narrative. We connect in order to deal 

with our loss, and so associations are made between ceremonies, people, and objects in an imperfect attempt 

to find meaning. 

The soft sound of rustling paper is enough 

to wake me up, nudging me from my early-morning 

daze. I open my eyes and see Lily’s 

back, her hair a tangle that barely covers the 

small hills of her spine, the long arches of 

her ribs. The old alarm is already on its side, 

turned off mere moments before ringing. 

Odd, how our bodies do that sometimes. Acting 

pre-emptively. Anticipating. 

I sit up and place my hand on her back, 

stroking her hair, telling her I’m awake. 

“There’s too much here,” declares 


Lily. She’s flipping through a notebook, pen 

in hand. When we visited her mother’s old 

place last week or so, she wrote an inventory 

of all the boxes and bags that were still lying 

around, readying for next week’s move. She 

circles some words, draws lines connecting 

others. Trying to sort out a life. “We can’t 

possibly take it all, there’s so much stuff.” 

“Well, good morning to you, too,” I 

say, edging beside her on the bed, placing my 

cheek on her shoulder. Outside, the sun has 

only just started to peak between the glass 

towers of the city, the blinds letting in a slurry 

of light. I hazard a glance and her notes are 

almost indecipherable, an item’s uses and 

memories mixing together with where she’ll 

put them, footnotes pointing to countless 

pages, entire rooms erased by thick red lines. 

I sigh slowly, wanting to console, to have 

my breath land like a warm blanket over her 

shoulders. 

But it falls like a weight instead. 

She closes her book, a thumb between 

the pages. She turns to look at me, leaning 

in until our faces are only inches apart. She 

pauses, and then apologizes for waking me 

up. Another beat. 

Then she says, “Good morning, Janette,” 

bowing slowly, eyes half-closed, foreheads 

just touching, like the greeting of some 

old and solemn religion. 

Lily was always so careful, picking her 

words, actions, moments deliberately, as if 

every decision had to serve a purpose. Which 

was good. Beautiful, even. But ever since her 

mother moved back to China, she has sometimes 

been overcautious. Not a frenetic kind 

of paranoia, creating impossible connections 

between events, thinking the world itself is 

hostile. Rather, there’s an awareness of her 

acts’ importance, of the permanence of their 

effects. And how few of them she might get, 

at least in this lifetime. 

I tell her it’s alright as I move my hand 

beneath her hair, feeling her warm skin, travelling 

slowly up her back. I reach her neck and 

stroke the border of hair and skin, hoping to 

soothe and reassure like some lover at the 

hospice. With my other hand, I open her 

notebook and touch our thumbs together, 

making the ridges of our fingerprints contiguous. 

Little children’s kisses, I’d told her once, 

recalling the games that kids play by slapping 

their palms and entwining their fingers, divining 

careers and marriages and children, back 

when love was thought of in terms of friendships 

and intimacy in terms of goodnight 

embraces. 


Lily is silent, and I am so bad at this. 

“We could give some of it away,” says 

Lily, breaking the contact and patting my 

hand, as if this suggestion is meant to console 

me. “We could donate what we don’t need 

to a local thrift shop. Shoes, clothes, books…” 

Already she’s revising her notes. 

“God knows we have enough spoons,” I 

offer with an exaggerated eye roll, remembering 

the lesson she gave me on the difference 

between Chinese and Western soup spoons. 

Hers a duck, with its thick neck and flat body, 

mine an egg, its yolk trailing lightly behind. 

Joined in purpose only, their histories starkly 

divergent, we managed to find room for both 

in the kitchen. 

This connects; Lily smirks, laughs just a 

66 

67

Moving 

Jerico Espinas 


little, her cheek on mine, and somehow that’s 

enough. She finishes her thought on the 

page, which still has something to do with 

cutlery, and she closes her book. 

Her stomach growls, already anticipating 

breakfast. 

*** 

A fact of our relationship – and perhaps 

of all relationships – is that we’ve never 

revealed ourselves in any coherent fashion. 

I’ve never told her my personal history in 

detailed, chronological order (my dad’s abandonment, 

my coming out, my mom’s death, 

etc.); she’s never listed her fears and dreams 

from most to least ridiculous. I sometimes 

think that it’d be so convenient, to just sit and 

talk, our selves in hand, then rise a lifetime 

later understanding everything. But we still 

want to know each other, and so we try with 

the little that we’ve revealed. 

This I do know: her mother’s battle 

with dementia has been hard on her, physically 

and spiritually. It was clear enough from 

her silence at the hospital after her mother’s 

first accident, at the nursing home when her 

mother slipped into the haze of childhood, at 

the airport when an unfamiliar family escorted 

her mother back home. The whole ordeal 

lasted a year, and at times her silence was a 

deep valley, dark and indiscernible. Lily, who 

was so careful, was simply at a loss; nothing 

was ever enough, and so nothing was ever 

done. 

But these I don’t: how she is coping, 

how I can help, how she expects me to. For 

these, I have only pieces. 

I remember one evening, soon after 

the diagnosis. Lily was praying at an altar in 

her childhood house, eyes shut, hands together, 

a few sticks of incense smoking beside 

a picture of her and her mother. (I later recognized 

it as the family photo we sent to her 

mother’s relatives in China.) I knelt beside 

her, bowed my head, respected her silence. 

Created, I hope, a kind of solemnity for her 

impromptu ceremony, mourning the loss of 

her living mother. Even incense eventually 

becomes air, she said later, after her sticks 

were just ash and embers. But for a moment 

longer, there is still the memory, the ethereal 

touch of smoke; something that hangs there, 

that connects, that lingers. 


And I recall the morning we picked up 

her mother’s relatives at the airport. A severe 

man in charge of the small familial congregation, 

who I later found out was Lily’s uncle, 

looked right at her and spoke in her mother’s 

lilting tongue. Lily held onto my arm, her 

hand placed on the crook of my elbow. She 

gave it a slight squeeze, enough to crease 

the fabric of my jacket. A pause and then she 

spoke, tumbling the words, her vocal chords 

contorting around crude, child-drawn characters. 

Still clumsy despite the practice on the 

ride over. Her uncle made a small sound, like 

a petal 

breaking stagnant waters, then proceeded to 

speak in simple English for the rest of the trip. 

Then there are some smaller fragments from 

that time. The bright red envelopes that she 

used as condolence letters, which she filled 

with her mother’s tattered coins and metal 

buttons. Her mother’s dog-eared recipe book. 

The noisy late-night rummaging, and later the 

haphazard collection of artifacts that resembled 

her mother’s childhood. The English 

copy of Chinese nursery rhymes, annotated 

without her mother’s interpretations. 

And, of course, she asked me to help 

clean her mother’s house. 

*** 

I finish putting the last of the boxes into 

the moving truck, wedging them between a 

stack of old magazines and a bag of stuffed 

animals. 

The chore was surprisingly simple. A 

few of her relatives, who opted to stay in 

town for a few more weeks before heading 

back to China, said that they would visit 

before we cleaned the place up. To reminisce 

and to scavenge, like any other family. They 

seem to have done a good job. 

Lily cleans the floors and walls and 

glass as I go, clad in green rubber gloves and 

a face mask. She’s in the kitchen by the time 

I get back, mopping up the tiles, removing 

the odd set of footprints from the floor. An 

old radio scratches out Top 40 hits, but she’s 

moving to her own rhythm. 

“Anything else?” I ask between strokes. 

She looks up to acknowledge me. She 

leans the mop of the counter, removes her 

mask, takes off her right glove then left glove, 

walks over to the dining table for her notebook. 

She makes more notes, crossing out 

columns in bold lines. 

“If you that was the fifth box from the 

kitchen,” she says, flipping a few pages, “then 

I think you can take a break.” 

“And you?” I ask, placing my hands on 

her shoulder. She’s been tense this entire 

time, as if waiting for a box to disappear, a 

bag to break open, or any other sort of mild 

disaster. 

“I’m almost done,” she says, moving 

back to the kitchen. “I just want to finish 

this.” 


I put up my hands in mock surrender 

as I follow her into the kitchen. I tug on the 

fridge door, hoping miraculously for a cold 

drink. Instead, I’m met with the musty smell 

of old food, staring at a pile of congealed 

take-out and stale vegetables. 

“Gross,” I say, grabbing a nearby garbage 

bag and dumping them in, careful not to 

dirty the floors. In go the rice noodles, the 

68 69

Moving 



short ribs, the bok choy. “I ‘carrot’ believe 

they left this mess,” I say, jabbing Lily’s back 

with the end of the wilting vegetable. 

She rolls her eyes, but then gives me 

a strange look. She takes the carrot before I 

put it in the bag, examining as carefully as she 

would an artifact. 

She stops what she’s doing. 

“That’s funny,” she says, after a beat. 

I return the look, raising an eyebrow. 

“Yeah, I’m a real comedian, Lil,” I say, making 

for the carrot. 

“No, not that,” she says. She’s no longer 

looking at the carrot, but she’s turning it 

around in her palms, feeling its soft contours. 

“I just remembered something, that’s all.” 

A pause, longer than normal, and then 

she says, “It must have been when we finally 

left.” She’s thinking aloud now, her voice soft 

and private but enough to let me listen. “I 

must have been in kindergarten; I was still so 

young.” 

She stops, leans on the kitchen counter. 

I turn off the radio. I sit beside her, bowing 

my head, respecting her sudden confession. 

“Our boxes were crammed in the 

back seats,” she says, looking up and craning 

her neck, as if trying to peer over wall. 

“I was sitting in the middle, and they were 

high enough, or I was small enough, that you 

couldn’t see outside.” She stops and looks 

down again, her head to the side, exposing 

her ear. “But I could tell it was snowing,” she 

says. “I could tell from the soft puffing noise 

that the flakes made on the glass.” 

“We left in the evening, when everyone 

had returned from work,” she says. “My 

mother must have wanted to make it an occasion. 

There were gifts on the passenger seat: 

food and clothes and envelopes.” 


She stops talking at me and closes her 

eyes, and I have to concentrate to hear. “I 

think I was sleeping, or at least pretending to 

be. It was a lot for a child like me to take in.” 

I feel like I’m on the outside looking in, not 

listening to her words but the sounds that 

linger. 

“It must have been only an hour into 

the journey. My mother suddenly stopped 

the car in the middle of some icy country 

road. The city and the airport are so far away 

that it’s silent; even the energy from the party 

had died down, leaving only a kind of tired 

calmness in the car. There’s no one for miles, 

with nothing but the snow outside. Everything 

was perfectly still for a moment.” 

I try to imagine it, driving in the eye of 

some soft, confetti storm. The road stretch 

ing for a lifetime in both directions, the night 

closing in, expecting your heart to be buoyed 

by excitement. 

“Then my mother started hitting the 

side of her head,” she says, suddenly slapping 

an ear with the open palm of her hand. As if 

she’s pushing water from her ears, or getting 

rid of some persistent buzzing. 

She stops and smiles, filling up her 

cheeks. “’The carrots!’” Lily says, gripping the 

vegetable, shaking her head, her shoulders 

trembling. “She was yelling at the passenger 

seat, talking to no one. ‘I forgot the carrots!’ 

And then she cried, for just a moment, before 

moving on.” 

Lily opens her eyes. Imperceptibly, her 

face has changed, as if she has just walked 

some long, immeasurable distance. 

She sits down on the floor and turns 

away from me. 

Already she leans back and her head 

tilts slightly to the side, making her body fit 

with mine. Lovely, how our bodies do that. 

Trusting me, anticipating me. 

I sit behind and embrace her, our arms 

overlapping, our ears rubbing together, her 

wet cheek on mine. 

It’s been a while, us touching like this. 

*** 

I know why I love her. 

We are both a mother’s daughter, 

raised defiantly, against expectations. And I 

think there’s a kind of solidarity in that, despite 

everything between us. 

At the very least, there’s this shared 

understanding, this common intuition, like we 

both experience the same tender, aching loss. 

It shows up, now and then, and always 

like this. 

*** 

We sit for a while, our bodies congruent, 

swaying together, to some old and common 

beat. 

This will last for just a moment. She’ll 

whisper something, and I’ll whisper back, and 

one of us will laugh. We’ll rise together, and 

when we do this, too, will become air. 

But first, we let it linger. 



Fiction 

Jerico Espinas completed his undergraduate 

from the University of Toronto, where he studied 

global health and bioethics, and is now 

attending Osgoode Hall Law School. Jerico 

has held leadership positions in a number of 

different global health initiatives, including 

serving as the secretary-general of the Ontario 

Model World Health Organization, and 

chief editor of Juxtaposition Global Health 

Magazine. 

70 71

Tales of 

Anxiety 

By Marcela Bregieiro Fernandes Costa 

Illustration by Alice Shen 

My poem “Tales of Anxiety” relates my acute crisis of anxiety and OCD, that happened in June 

of 2014, which led to my final diagnosis and the beginning of my pharmaceutical therapy. I was 

in bed for two weeks, something that never happened to me because of a physical ailment, but 

never really processed what it meant to be a mentally ill person. Just now, two years later, I’ve 

reflected on my illness and this poem is the result. 

Clonazepam, she said, for the acute crisis 

and citalopram for the long term 

the long term? 

I didn’t know my brain had plans for the long term 

I didn’t know my brain at all 

I always thought of my brain as the flagship of my body 

bearer of my existence, home of my soul 

my trusted friend and advisor 

but now it rebelled against me 

What had I done? 

I couldn’t be a mere slave to neurotransmitters, axons 

introns and extrons in my dna 

it couldn’t just be a wicked heritage 

from my anxious mother, my depressed sister 

my bipolar uncle. I had to be guilty 

Guilty. 

The word that haunted me all these years. 

The crime I didn’t know I committed 

but there had to be something 

for the sentence I paid was perpetual 

and I would never complete my time. 

Buried in a pile of guilt I tried 

to dig myself up slowly over the years 

and watching other win the race 

and as time went by there was so much left to dig 

and others who were never in my hole 

judged and pointed and laughed 

“but I am so much younger and have done so much more?” 

or maybe the laughter was all in my head 

And everyone said, but you’re so smart 

so pretty; and none of that mattered 

when the future was so uncertain and I, so ill-fitted for it. 

But I am making my peace with the rocks and dirt over me 

with my shovel and my dirty nails 

I have a family, flawed as it may be 

I have friends, 

though some remained in the now distant concept of home, 

and I have myself, 

with all my faults I still have integrity 

and the voice inside me saying 

that the familiar sight of myself in the mirror 

is more comforting than any perfection. 

and the digging became my badge of honor 

and I shook hands with my past monsters 

anxiety, ocd, guilt, fear, self-hatred 

I introduced myself, and forgave them 

and carried on 

living. 

72 73

International Creative Writing Contest 

Special Focus: Mental Health 

“AS UTSC’s creative writing anthology, Scarborough Fair aims to promote equity through creative 

works. The publication is now in its 48th year and recently launched an international creative 

writing contest in partnership with Minds Matter Magazine. The contest aimed to create 

a platform for mental health by sharing the success stories and struggles of writers. Mental 

health issues are misunderstood in society, and as writers, it is our duty to voice the unheard, 

to write their words into realization. Our writing contest with a special focus on mental health 

was a major success, receiving more than 800 submissions from 18 nations.” 

- John Dias, Editor-in-Chief, 2015-2016 

For all contest results, you can check out: Scarborough Fair Winners 

Trigger 

Warning 

By Leanne Simpson 

My undergraduate experience is bubble-wrapped; 

it fits me snug in all the right 

places, including extra time on assignments, 

note taking, and exclusions from morning 

classes. I’ve really only heard of the harshness 

associated with the University of Toronto 

from second-hand sources. For my own 

part, I was probably busy writing my exams 

with plushy headphones on, in a sound-proof 

room. One time, my professor even brought 

me a cookie because I was anxious. If I had a 

cookie for every anxiety attack I’ve had at U 

of T, I would probably outweigh our school 

mascot—a giant trash panda named Rex the 

Raccoon. I like to use the term “trash panda” 

to give Rex the exoticism he so rightly deserves. 

I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder 

when I was seventeen, attempted suicide 

for the first time at eighteen, was seriously 

hospitalized for the second by the time I was 

twenty and had dropped out of school twice 

by twenty-one. I’ve been on so many medications 

that I’ve lost count; I’ve dropped weight 

and gained weight and fought it off just long 

enough to remember what it felt like to be 

one person instead of a spectrum, alternately 

smiling and waving and crying, depending on 

where the sunlight hit. 

I don’t talk about it much. I also don’t 

talk much in class either, because my meds 

tend to give me “drunk mouth” in the mornings. 

My psychiatrist recently took me off 

Lamotrigine (it was turning me purple) and 

put me on Epival (so now I’m losing my hair), 

and when I later complained that my 10:30 

am class attendance was suffering as a result, 

he beamed and said, “I’ve got something for 

that!” I’m now taking daily narcolepsy medication 

and questioning the entire psychiatric 

field. 

It was one of the most glamorous days 

of the year in our ever-growing English department—the 

Humanities Conference. The 

conference is a celebration of all things liber 

al arts—narrative analysis, creative writing, 

overuse of the word “pedagogy,” and the 

chance of financial compensation for said 

academic pursuits. The conference featured 

academic and creative presentations from U 

of T students, and a keynote speaker, whom I 

conveniently missed. The theme was “Crossing 

Borders,” and it felt appropriate for the 

74 75

Trigger Warning 

Leanne Simpson 


occasion. For me to even be here, voluntarily 

speaking in front of a crowd, was kind of a 

big deal. Because sadly, my disability accommodations 

do not include crowd control at 

school-wide events, and I was reading my 

story with no safety net. 

I find academia intimidating for a number 

of reasons. People throw around big 

words that I’m afraid of, criticize people for 

having the wrong ideas—or worse, no ideas 

—and operate on a system of hierarchies that 

I don’t understand. I enjoy a lot of the reading 

I do for my still-in-progress English degree, 

but I never particularly identify with anyone 

from “the canon.” Mental illness has only 

recently been taken off the no-fly list of literature, 

and most of the autobiographical stories 

I see are told in retrospect, in a gentle (albeit 

patronizing) voice that assures you that you 

will get through this. As a result, I often don’t 

get through these books. 

I arrived at the conference fashionably 

late, and slipped into the room between 

panels, shoving a few bottles of getaway juice 

into my purse. The only seats left were in the 

front row, a place I usually avoid like bookto-movie 

adaptations and flavoured Cheetos. 

The projector screen heralded the title “Mental 

Illness and the Dramatic Monologue,” 

which sounded like the name of a lecture 

that I had skipped the previous term. My 

inner mental health advocate was extremely 

pleased to see some representation of mental 

l health issues, but a bigger part of me hoped 

the talk wasn’t about bipolar. There’s something 

so alienating about understanding yourself 

one way, and seeing yourself presented 

in another. My health has been so fluid that I 

long for my identity to stay static, to ensure 

that one part of me is real. 

The presenter was a graduate student 

with the kind of purple hair my mom 

forbade me from taking on in Grade Ten. 

He addressed us confidently, drawing vague 

parallels between therapy and soliloquies and 

artistry as treatment, and I silently wondered 

if I should try yoga again, even though last 

time, I had walked out. The ambient sounds 

of the studio had overwhelmed me and infiltrated 

my lungs until I was certain that there 

was no room left to breathe. Somewhere in 

the differentiation between mental health 

and physical health, an idea emerged that we, 

the sick, could do more for ourselves—and 

for some reason, yoga seems to be the Nike 

swish of mindfulness. 

The screen faded to black. The purple-haired 

presenter suddenly wheeled towards 

the back wall. I became aware of an 

immeasurable frequency in the air. Something 

different. Something sharp. His breath 

became ragged as he ran his hands over his 

knees in a jerky, repetitive motion, turning 

around to face us with hunched shoulders 

and blank eyes. He was transformed; his 

natural ease gone, replaced with something I 

couldn’t put my finger on. I felt it too, unfurling 

around my heart—not quite danger, but 

perhaps the sensation of being hunted. 

I glanced around the room to see if 

anyone else had felt the change. Eyes were 

riveted to the purple-haired man, the listless 

veil of intellectualism swept aside for something 

more impassioned, more savage, more 

suited for primetime TV. From a worn-down 

office chair, he performed the one-sided conversation 

of a patient with his doctor, the 

occasional shudder escaping his body as he 

crammed jellybeans into his mouth by the 

fistful. The blue ones gave him nausea; the 

purple, nightmares. The yellow, I don’t remember 

what they did, but I knew I had tried 

them. My voice, emerging from his lips like a 

hackneyed puppet. 

He stood up, fingers twitching and eyes 

wild, marching along the length of the front 

row, addressing each of us in turn. 

“Do you feel sad?” 

Fingers scraped against the plastic of my 

chair, teeth clenched. 

“Do you feel guilty? 

My breath was shards of glass in my throat. 

“Do you feel worthless?” 

He was standing in front of me now, 

dark eyes scraping over mine like scalpel on 

stone, waiting for the resounding “yes” that 

would confirm all of the medically-supported 

reasons why I would never be safe here in 

this rigid room of academics. It didn’t matter 

what rainbow assortment of pills I took—I 

would never be enough on my own. My victories 

felt hollow, felt fixed, felt like something 

handed to me as a consolation prize for my 

sanity. I hadn’t told my professors yet, but I 

had just been awarded the top scholarship 

in my incoming Master’s class. I hadn’t told 

them because it was just another thing that I 

could give up on. 

Vacant and graceless, I sat in the 

straight-backed chair and awaited my 

sentence. 

“Are you afraid of the dark?” 

The first sob escaped my body like the 

soft hissing of a balloon, followed by another, 

a racking, guttural sound that shook my lungs. 

My professors helped me out of the conference 

room, away from the curious stares 

flung in my direction. My shaky words, barely 

audible above the wreck: That’s my life. 

That’s what I am. 

I spend my nights reliving the tenth 

floor of Rouge Valley Hospital, a place where 

I hovered somewhere in between sick and 

well—the patients thought I was a narc, and 

the nurses thought that I was faking. There’s 

no faking when there’s a cut in your wrist 

the length of a paperback novel. Sometimes 

stories do fit the mold. There’s a scene on the 

cutting room floor, shot the night before the 

conference. It was a scene where I crawled 

into my parents’ room at 1 am, sobbing hysterically 

over the small capsule I held in my 

hand—a flat, chalky, pill I had been staring at 

for hours but couldn’t take, a pill that looked 

like the sterile walls of the psych ward, the 

distorted faces seething against the glass of 

the emergency unit door, the overwhelming 

fear that I was exactly where I belonged. 

That’s the real nightmare. 

The presenter finished his dramatization 

before coming to check on me, his face 

streaked with black paint. 

“Are you okay?” 

“Why is your face all black?” I asked, 

feeling numb. 

76 77

Trigger Warning 

He explained that it symbolized the 

scars that depression leaves on the mind and 

body, then asked for my email so we could 

talk about it more in-depth. I politely declined. 

I learned later that he was an exchange 

student studying medicine who desperately 

wanted to dip his toe in the humanities pool 

before pursuing psychiatry at a post-doctoral 

level. And that’s the thing—most doctors 

I’ve had were not treating me from a place of 

experience. It’s textbook authority on something 

that can’t always be learned. Mental 

illness is a sickness, but it can short-circuit 

the emotions, and people often get confused 

about the root. They make assumptions. 

I knew better than most how damaging these 

unfounded, negative representations of men 

tal illness could be. I’ve seen it in the way a 

boy starts to look at me differently, halfway 

through our date. I’ve felt that imperceptible 

coldness that comes with asking for workplace 

accommodations. People are afraid 

of what they don’t know, and what they do 

know is often wrong. Anxious people don’t 

need jellybeans and doctor’s office props to 

demonstrate who they are. They just need a 

chance to speak for themselves. 

I returned to the conference room with 

my head down, back tight, tears closing off 

my face like caution tape. I stepped carefully 

around my original chair and settled in another 

for the question period. 

“Did you ever consider the ethical considerations 

of this project?” 

It was an old classmate, shooting daggers 

at the purple-haired presenter. 


“What do you mean by ethical considerations?” 

he answered, blinking. 

After an earthquake, there are always 

stories of survival—people crawling out from 

the smallest cracks in the soil to live again, 

to tell their stories and grow stronger for the 

next time the ground is snatched from beneath 

their feet. My moods aren’t something 

I can predict (let alone control), but what I 

can do is plant as many roots as I can, so I can 

always find a way back to myself. 

After having a massive anxiety attack in 

a public place for very obvious personal reasons, 

I can honestly tell you that I was not the 

one who was embarrassed. One by one, my 

classmates crawled out of the darkest parts 

of themselves, cheeks blackened but taut, to 

fire off questions about the appropriation of 

mental illness and the importance of trigger 

warnings. I could not speak, not until the purple-haired 

man had retreated to his corner, 

but when I did, the only words I needed were 

thank you. 


Leanne Simpson is a creative nonfiction writer 

from Scarborough, Ontario. She graduated 

from UTSC’s creative writing program before 

receiving an Ontario Graduate Scholarship 

to pursue her masters of professional communication. 

She also teaches creative writing 

at Ryerson University and plays competitive 

dodgeball. Leanne’s stories about living with 

mental illness are featured as a weekly column 

for Michael Landsberg’s mental health initiative, 

SickNotWeak. 

How to 

Grieve 

Addiction 

By Julia Dasbach 

To tell you that I’m dying 

would be a lie. Instead, I’ll map 

your way over what’s left. 

1) Align your ear with my naval and listen, 

listen close for rise: Denial, a nail in stone, 

Isolation, a fallen ocean, the small intestines closing in. 

2) Hold hard to the ribs: the heart’s cage rattle 

against your fingers, Anger floating in the bones, 

and guilt, a stone again, the colour of spent rainwater. 

3) Make a deal with god: the one I’ve warned you 

hangs from my uvula, throwing stones and bargaining 

for his pendulum sway to turn from noose to tire swing. 

4) Skip the quiet and Depression. Scream. Scream until 

you’re hoarse. Until my eyes sink into stone and bottomless 

white. Until you stop searching for a soul. 

5) Accept lack. There is no Acceptance. Take 

my skull in your hands the way you would 

a stone. 


Julia Dasbach 

Julia Kolchinsky Dasbach holds an MFA in Poetry from the University of Oregon and is a Ph.D. student 

in the University of Pennsylvania’s Comparative Literature program. Her poetry has appeared 

in Missouri Review, Gulf Coast, TriQuarterly, and Southern Humanities Review. Julia is the author of 

The Bear Who Ate the Stars, winner of Split Lip Magazine’s 2014 Uppercut Chapbook Award. She is 

also the Editor-in-Chief of Construction Magazine 

78 

79


The Star 

that Almost 

Burned Out 

By Kevin Liu 

I had never heard the word “schizophrenia” 

back then—but it didn’t take a genius to realize 

that something wasn’t right. I had woken 

up that morning to find my mother, still 

asleep, repeatedly moving her arms in an umbrella-like 

shape, as if trying to paint a rainbow 

with her hands. I tried to get her to open 

her eyes, to no avail. Tears trickled down her 

face as she continued her arm movements. I 

left the room, calling for my father. 

“Mom’s crying,” I said, finding my dad 

and sister in the living room. My father got up 

and started toward their bedroom, concern 

creeping onto his face. 

Some time passed, and my sister and I 

entertained ourselves by punching the wrong 

answers into a Jeopardy video game, giggling 

as the host scolded us. We could hear shouting 

from upstairs, but tried to drown it out 

with the game. 

Eventually, the noise made us go up to 

my parent’s room. Mom and dad stopped arguing, 

but they were on opposite ends of the 

bedroom. My mother didn’t look right and 

nobody said a word for a while, until my 

mom called me over. I could tell that my father 

was uneasy about me being near her. 

There was a CD player in the room, and 

my mother began playing a song we had all 

heard many times before. It was my parents’ 

honeymoon song. My mom kept turning up 

the volume knob until the music became 

almost deafening. We lived in an apartment, 

and the other residents must have been able 

to hear it. My father told my mom to shut it 

off, but she ignored him. 

When my dad crossed the room and 

switched the music off, another argument 

broke out. My mother sprang up and raced 

around the room, my father and sister chasing 

after her. 

I heard my father shout and then 

everything happened in slow motion: my 

mother clutching a kitchen knife, pointing it 

towards herself; my sister snatching the blade 

to take it away; the blood trickling down her 

palm. Blood was a darker red than I had ever 

imagined. 

My father smacked the knife out of my 

mother’s hands and she started to sob uncontrollably. 

My sister and I both burst into tears. 

My father tried to dial 911, but every time he 

did, my mother would hit the cradle, hanging 

up the call, until my father threw the phone 

in frustration. 

“Why are you being like this?” 

My mother didn’t answer. She sauntered 

back into her bedroom, shutting the door. My 

father sat outside the room, in case my mother 

got any new ideas. He applied some rubbing 

alcohol to my sister’s cut and bandaged 

it. 

“Does it hurt?” he asked. 

“No, no, it doesn’t.” 

I knew that my sister would have said 

that even if the pain had been excruciating. 

Soon after, she went with me into the kitchen 

to hide all the knives. 

“What about these?” I asked my sister, 

pointing at a pile of forks in a drawer. 

She paused, and then nodded. 

A few hours had passed, and my father 

still sat outside the bedroom door. It was 

quiet on the other side, and he occasionally 

opened the door a crack to see if my mother 

was all right. My sister and I ate some leftover 

pizza—my father said he wasn’t hungry, and 

my mother hadn’t eaten since morning. There 

was a knock outside our apartment door. 

“This is the police, open up!” 

I can’t quite remember what I was 

thinking then, but I felt slightly relieved that 

other adults were there. My father answered 

the door, and spoke to the policemen. He 

claimed the call was a mistake—that one of 

the kids had accidentally dialed 9-1-1. The policemen 

eventually accepted his story, though 

I’m sure they were skeptical. 

Time seemed to hold still after the police 

left. My sister sat in the living room, staring 

aimlessly ahead. My mother was in her 

room, and my father went back to his spot by 

the bedroom door. 

“She’ll be okay,” he told us, but his 

voice wavered. My mother was beginning to 

talk to herself from inside her room. 

It was almost midnight when my mother 

left the bedroom, waking up my father as 

she strolled into the hallway. 

He asked where she was going. 

“To the bathroom.” 

The bathroom was right next to her 

bedroom, and my dad figured that nothing 

could happen. But a long time passed and 

then there was a sudden clattering noise and 

a thud. My father burst into the bathroom, 

shouting in agony. My sister ran after him. 

The stench of bleach filled the air. I ran out 

into the hall of the apartment and started 

banging on my neighbour’s door. Two men 

answered. They saw a ten year-old kid with 

tears streaming down his face, begging for 

help. 

80 

81

Burned Out 

Kevin Liu 


“We need help.” 

The two men followed me and found 

my father holding my mother’s limp body. 

One of the men instantly took out his cellphone 

and dialed for an ambulance. He told 

the operator that my mother was bleeding, 

and that the scent of bleach was overpowering. 

I just stood there. I glanced at my father. 

He was shaking my mother’s body, searching 

for any signs of life. 

The police arrived. They were accompanied 

by firefighters and paramedics, who 

carried my mother out into the living room. I 

could hear one of the paramedics. 

“She drank it.” 

My mother was barely conscious. Her 

eyes drooped, and there was blood smeared 

all over her mouth and chin. She held out her 

hand towards me. I think she wanted me to 

hold it, but one of the firefighters ushered 

mysister and me into our mom’s bedroom. 

“Your mother’s going to be fine,” he 

told us when he brought us into the room. 

“We’ll make sure she gets better.” 

We both nodded, sniffing back tears as 

the firefighter gave us a reassuring smile. 

said. 

“Mom’s going to be okay,” my sister 

“Yeah,” I replied. 

She pulled a large health book off the 

bookshelf. 

“What are you doing?” I asked. 

“I’m figuring out how to help her.” 

I could hear the sound of a door closing, 

and I saw an ambulance take my mother 

away. My father started repeatedly banging 

his head against the wall. 

“Stop!” my sister begged. 

Through his tears, my father managed 

to tell us that he was going to drive us to our 

cousin’s house, and that we would stay there 

for the night. He was going to the hospital. He 

said that my mother was going to be fine and 

that she loved us, and that he loved us. 

I thought that both my parents would 

disappear forever. 

When I saw my mom again, she was 

in the I.C.U., tubes and machinery snaking in 

and out of her. Her eyes remained shut. 

“She can’t speak, but she can hear 

you,” the doctor told us. “She should be fine.” 

Only two people were allowed to enter 

the room at a time and speak to her; my relatives 

were all sitting outside. When my dad 

asked me if I had anything to say to my mom, 

nothing came to mind. I just looked at her. 

There were so many tubes. 

My mom eventually recovered. Physically, 

at least. Mental recovery was a different 

story. She was kept in the hospital ward along 

with other schizophrenic patients, and had 

to take pills. She had hallucinations when her 

illness was at its worst. She would look out 

the window of her hospital room, and see 

water everywhere, a flood. She would hear 

voices telling her that her children were 

about to die, and that she had to save them. 

She was caught in a war-torn area and had to 

evacuate, and Bill Clinton and George Bush 

were on their way to save her. 

After a few weeks, I visited my mother 

again. She was moved to the common area, 

where the recovered patients were waiting to 

be discharged. When I saw her, I remember 

thinking that she looked like my mom again. 

We moved to Toronto shortly after, and 

my mother seemed completely back to normal 

for a year or so, until she stopped taking 

her medication. One day when her bedroom 

door was closed, and I heard her laughing. 

When I opened the door, she was just sitting 

on the bed, laughing to herself. When she 

saw me, she stopped. 

“Why were you laughing?” 

“Nothing,” she shook her head. “It’s 

nothing.” 

I tried to ignore it, tried to tell myself 

that it was normal. But when my sister came 

home from school, I told her about the incident. 

“We need to tell dad.” 

My father didn’t get off work until late 

at night, but was quick to act when he came 

home. 

“She stopped taking her medicine,” he 

told us. “Where is it?” 

We had no idea our mom was taking 

meds, no one had told us, and It it turned out 

that she had started hiding her medication. 

The effects were unsettling—at some moments 

she seemed fine, and then she would 

just let out a burst of laughter. Fortunately, 

my father stood by her and convinced her to 

take her meds again. Today, my mom takes 

her medicine regularly. 

The doctors and nurses focused on my 

mother’s recovery after she was admitted 

into the intensive care unit. Day-by-day my 

mother slowly regained her health. When 

she was brought out of the I.C.U and into the 

beds with the other patients, she joked with 

us and told us not to worry as she offered us 

some of her hospital food. There was a 

collective feeling of relief, and my father had 

never looked happier. My sister and I visited 

my mom every day after class, curious as to 

what my mother was having for lunch that 

day. 

There are still days where I feel incredibly 

fortunate. My family’s life gradually went 

back to normal. Today, my sister is pursuing 

a specialist in psychology and mental health 

at the University of Toronto. I’ve never asked 

her, but I think the events of our childhood 

likely set her on that career path. The scar on 

her hand has faded over the years, but the 

memory is as fresh as it’s ever been. 

Kevin Liu 

Kevin Liu is currently in his second year of studies 

at the University of Toronto, pursuing majors 

in english and computer sciences as well as a 

minor in creative writing. His piece “The Star 

That Almost Burned Out” is about his mother 

who was diagnosed with schizophrenia in 2006. 

82 83

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Note: We are not a service provider. If you are in crisis, here are some recommended resources: 

UTSC Wellness Centre, Good2Talk, call 911, your nearest emergency department for assistance, 

Ontario Mental Health Helpline. 

Theme Advisor: Dr. Andrea Charise 

Fall 2015 Volume II Issue I: Arts & Media 

A community platform focusing on student perspectives so we can all think, talk, and take action on matters 

related to mental health. 

This issue is available at: MindsMatterMagazine.com 

Made possible by the financial support of: 

#MindMyArt Adjudicators: Fiction - Leanne Simpson (Recent Alumna), Andrew Westoll (English), Nancy Johnston 

(Writing Centre); Poetry - Joshua P’ng (Recent Alumnus), Andrew Dubois (English); Still Art - Kristina Zaja 

(Student), Sean Lee (Recent Alumnus), Marla Hlady (Arts, Culture, Media), Will Kwan (Arts, Culture, Media); 

Music - Christina Beharry (Recent Alumna), Lynn Tucker (Interm. Chair of Arts, Culture, Media). 

Advisory Board: Liza Arnason, Toni De Mello, Jessica Dere, Jeffrey Dvorkin, Roger Francis, Andrew Hercules, 

Nancy Johnston, Katie Kilroy-Marac, Maureen Murney, Perry Sheppard 

Special Thanks: Andrew Arifuzzaman, Marah Ayad, Debbie Belinski, Don Campbell, Vishakha Chakravarti, Mark 

Church, Kevin Connery, George Cree, Gerald Cupchik, Kristina Doyle, John Dias, Pat Dixon, Andrew Echevarria, 

Chris Garbutt, Manny Gitterman, Gray Graffam, Rick Halpern, Kevin Healey, Tomeo Ho, Antu Hossain, Eva 

Huang, Sarah King, Elsa Kiosses, Danielle Klein, Kira Laurin, Samer Lazkani, David Lucatch, Brian MacKinnon, 

Josh Miller, Jenkin Mok, Josh Oliver, Jessica Orellana, Moshiur Rahman, Simone Robinson, Nilab Safi, Susan 

Schellenberg, Samantha Seon, Kosan Shafaque, Gaurav Sharma, Serena Soleimani, Taamannae Taabassum, 

Lynn Tucker, Kimberly Tull, Andrew Westoll, Andrew Young, Muzhen Zhang, Hema Zbogar. 

Wanna send a letter to the editor? Contact our editor here 

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