My name is Kaila DeRienzo (she/her).

I am a Communications Specialist on the communications team at the É«ÖÐÉ« corporate office. I’ve been at É«ÖÐÉ« for 4 years.

My personal lived experience story is this: I was officially diagnosed with Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD), Panic Disorder, and OCD when I was 22 years old, however, I had been experiencing symptoms years before I decided to seek professional help.

I often wonder how different my late teenage years would have been had mental health been part of conversations in school, online, at home, in the community, etc.

I experienced my first panic attack at age 18. I thought my throat was closing and that I was struggling to breathe. My parents took me to the emergency room, where my oxygen and vitals were fine and I was told I could leave whenever I was "relaxed." While the doctors and nurses asked me and my parents about everything medically during my visit, nowhere in the conversation did a possible panic attack come up as a cause for my symptoms. I later realized that it was, and I continued having experiences like that for four more years until I sought help from a psychiatrist. I now fully embrace the fact that I have to take medication daily in order to live a normal life — just as anyone else with any other condition would.

What I have learned along the way is that having open and honest conversations about mental health can save lives, and we need to be able to recognize the signs and symptoms in others who may be struggling but are too afraid to seek help themselves. My local NAMI chapter offers free weekly peer-to-peer therapy, and attending those sessions has been a great reminder that we’re never really alone in our struggles.

What I hope to do for and share with others is that I want to be living proof that you can live a successful and happy life even with a mental health diagnosis.

In tough times, I always try to remember, "Tough times don't last. Tough people do."

If I were going to say one thing to someone going through what I’ve been through is that there are great mental health providers out there who are able to get you to a better place. It’s not an overnight fix. Trust the process. Progress isn't always linear, but it's progress nonetheless.

Thank you for sharing your journey, Kaila! We are so glad to have you as part of #TeamÉ«ÖÐÉ«!

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