My name is Miranda Card and I’m excited to join the HealthyPlace team as a writer for "Relationships and Mental Illness." Many of my experiences with mental illness stem from a lifelong struggle with chronic illness, a disease known as Behcet’s. Only now, at 24, am I beginning to understand the trauma of my diagnosis. I am only now beginning to acknowledge that my illness has symptoms beyond the physical; it has ravaged my relationship with food and birthed disordered eating; it inspires anxiety that affects my decisions in life; the depression that comes with my medication often wreaks havoc on my relationships. Discussing these things in writing never occurred to me before because these “mental symptoms” have always been a source of shame and denial. But someone told me recently to write about what scares you, so here I am.

My name is Hannah O’Grady, and I am ecstatic to say that I am the new author for Relationships and Mental Illness here at HealthyPlace. Mental health has played an important role in my life, both personally and professionally. I am eager to combine my passion for writing, relationships, and mental health for my readers, and I look forward to engaging with those who read this site.

My name is Jonathan Berg, and I am excited to be able to share my story with you and to join the Relationships and Mental Illness team here at HealthyPlace. I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder type II when I was 14. From the start, I hid it from everyone, including my closest friends and my parents. I was afraid that people would think I was crazy. I am sad to say that this fear lasted for more than 20 years.

I am at an impasse, with my writing and with my feelings.  Of course, these issues are related. Last month, I began writing here about mending my relationship with my ex-boyfriend Bob, and we've been getting along very well in the meantime.  We've reached a point of sharing that is different than at any time in our past:  I've been able to share my feelings - past and present - with Bob and he has admitted a level of honesty I never expected from him.  I was very happy, until I sought to write a long piece about our relationship for my personal blog and I couldn't come up with a way to tackle the topic.  That's when I knew that I had some negative reactions mixed in with my warm fuzzies.

Lots of people take the last week of the year to reflect on the past and to look ahead to a new year where things are going to be different, dammit.   Those of you who have bipolar depression with a soupcon of borderline personality disorder – like me – might even spend a day alone fixating on what they did wrong this year. And, if you’re anything like me, relationships probably take up the majority of your obsession time.

Welcome. I'm Tracey Lloyd. I've been diagnosed bipolar for 3 years, struggled with undiagnosed depression for 10 years and was a sensitive crybaby at birth. In the midst of emotional upheaval and medication changes, I completed college, business school and even a few 5K runs. I began thinking seriously about writing two years ago after a two-week stay at a psych hospital made me question life. I started blogging seriously after getting catcalled by guys in a passing car and being just outraged enough to share.