Marching madly brings hope to some mental health survivors.
Artist Sarafin, who creates a web comic about psychosis, took the lead in pushing the gurney during the Mad Pride Bed Push in Parkdale.
Staff photo/ERIN HATFIELD
Wearing nightgowns and pushing a hospital bed draped with a white sheet decorated with words such as unity, hope, freedom and love, the Mad Pride Bed Push Parade boisterously marched along Queen Street West.
The bed and nightclothes represent psychiatric survivors taking their "madness" to the streets and out of the asylum, which is what organizer Ruth Ruth Stackhouse said Mad Pride week - July 12 to 18 - is all about.
"It has just been a fabulous event and we have had a lot of community support," said Stackhouse, a longtime organizer and one of the driving forces behind Mad Pride week in Toronto.
As she led the group of proud "crazy, mad" folks and their supporters from the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health across Queen Street West to the Parkdale Activity Recreation Centre (PARC) Saturday, July 17, Stackhouse waved to and greeted all they passed.
"I want them (survivors) to feel good and just be happy with themselves and their difference or if they have someone that they love who is different or experiencing mental health issues, to find some good in that," Stackhouse said. "Nothing, nothing is all bad."
Darlene Lucas a Mad Pride organizer and participant said the Mad Pride Bed Push Parade gives her hope.
"We are not alone and we can stand together and support each other through difficult times," Lucas said.
"Coming out here and seeing there are so many people, we are all one in the same. We all deal with physical health and mental health," she said. "Some deal with mental health issues more so than others, but just because you have had some issues with mental health doesn't mean that you should be shut in a closet or institutionalized."
Mad Pride Week is a festival of arts, education and heritage activities that recognize psychiatric survivors, psychiatric consumers, mad folks and others for the purpose of community development, rights awareness and celebration. It culminates annually with the Mad Pride Bed Push.
Peggy Gail DeHal, who has been involved for a number of years with Mad Pride planning, said the whole week is a real collaboration of people and ideas, and a culmination of the work of the whole community.
"The whole process is around developing leadership, about helping people who have been really silenced find a place and a voice to be able to celebrate who they are and their resistance," DeHal said. "People have different feelings and experiences having been in the mental health system, but the one thing they have in common is their ability to survive."
What makes this event so meaningful to De Hal, who works at Parkdale Community Legal Services, is that each year she can see how much people have grown.
"I see people coming out of their shell and acting and taking on responsibility and a lot of my job is spent supporting people and encouraging them to do the things they think are important," DeHal said. "When I look out at the group I am proud of the work they have done."