Breaking Mental Health Stigma: Family Trauma, Suicide Loss, and Healing Together

Award-winning journalist and author Meg Kissinger joins Giving Voice to Depression to share the extraordinary and heartbreaking story behind her memoir “While You Were Out.”

In her conversation with Terry McGuire and Carly McCollow, Meg opens up about growing up in a large family marked by bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, and depression—as well as two sibling deaths by suicide. She explores how decades of silence and stigma shaped her family’s story and how finally speaking out broke the cycle of shame and secrecy.

Meg’s dual perspective—as a journalist who investigated the U.S. mental health system and as a sister who lived it firsthand—offers a rare, honest look at mental illness, discrimination, resilience, and recovery. Her story reminds us that talking openly about mental health saves lives—and that empathy and truth can heal generations.

Primary Topics Covered:

• The power of storytelling in breaking mental health stigma
• How silence and secrecy isolate families living with mental illness
• Understanding the difference between stigma and discrimination
• The lasting effects of losing loved ones to suicide
• What it’s like to grow up with bipolar disorder and depression in the family
• The importance of honesty in family and community mental health conversations
• How to respond when someone shares suicidal thoughts
• Why it’s okay to ask for help—and how courage can begin with one conversation

Timestamps:

00:00 – Introduction and welcome from Terry and Carly
 01:24 – Introducing journalist and author Meg Kissinger
 02:21 – Mental illness in Meg’s family: depression, bipolar disorder, and suicide
 03:27 – Why stigma is actually discrimination — and how language shapes understanding
 04:42 – Growing up in silence: how mental illness was hidden in the 1960s
 06:25 – Balancing humor, love, and loss in a family marked by mental illness
 07:29 – Losing her sister Nancy to suicide and the painful secrecy that followed
 09:24 – Talking about her brother’s struggles and what she’d say differently now
 10:55 – Learning to sit with discomfort and listen with compassion
 11:50 – Writing While You Were Out and gaining her siblings’ trust to tell the truth
12:41 – The goal: showing her family’s full humanity and helping others feel less alone
13:36 – Why families must talk about their mental health history
14:48 – Advice for those who struggle to speak about mental illness or trauma
15:34 – Lessons from her brother Jake on living openly and unapologetically
16:21 – Asking for help: humility, courage, and connection
17:39 – Reflections from Terry and Carly on authenticity and generational healing
19:34 – Breaking silence one story—and one generation—at a time
22:26 – How to truly listen to someone in emotional pain (“Heard, Helped, or Hugged”)
25:56 – Final reflections: showing up with love, empathy, and presence

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