Sometimes I find it easy to lump people into categories or attach labels and then to make assumptions about them. I suspect we all do. However, over the years I’ve been working at the Well Community, I have come to realize how terribly unfair, unjust and unkind labels can be.
A member told me that after he received a diagnosis for the mental health disorder he experiences, his family started acting like the full measure of his being was his label. “I am no longer Doug*,” he remarked, “I am ‘the one with bipolar.’” He went on to say that he hates being treated like he is just a sick person. “When my mother was sick with cancer, we never said she was cancer. Why then do they think I am bipolar? I am not my illness.”
I can attest to that. Doug is an individual. His personality is unique. His hopes and aspirations are his own. His needs for community, acceptance and spiritual connection are real and personal. No label can define who Doug is. No category can describe the depth of his being. No diagnosis can limit the richness of his life.
At the Well Community, each member is encouraged to shed the preconceptions others have heaped on them and to just be themselves. No labels, no stigma. Just unique individuals, made in the image of God, with dignity and worth.
Alice
*name changed