Fighting The Stigma: discussing LGBT+ identity and mental health

As soon as I admitted that I am a poet at my then-new job within the mental health team at LGBT Health and Wellbeing, people asked me when we would be having some creative writing workshops. I have always felt that one of the most important things about poetry – particularly performance poetry – is the opportunity for connection, and the possibilities for better understanding each other in all our diversity and complexity. My reply was, ‘as soon as I can organise some’ – it seemed like a natural fit.

LGBT Health promotes and facilitates opportunities to improve and equalise the social, emotional, physical and mental health and wellbeing of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people in Scotland. My job is part of a collection of projects related to mental health; LGBT people are three times more likely than the general population to experience mental ill health, so it’s an important area. The organisation facilitates a lot of arts-based work – with the benefits ranging from social opportunities, to developing different kinds of self-expression, to therapeutic exploration, to helping people to speak up about the things that affect them. Creative writing feels like it ticks all of these boxes with the added advantage of opportunities to make an impact on a wider audience if work is shared with the public.

The idea for the Speak Out creative writing project came from my experience of coming up as a poet through Inky Fingers, a grassroots spoken word collective dedicated to creating spaces for new writers to develop and perform. Struggling with anxiety and depression as I tried to work out my place in the world post-graduation, the friendly stage gave me an invaluable place to connect with people, and to see that my words were worth saying. This, alongside supportive writing groups to develop the way that I put those words together, was an important boost to my mental wellbeing at the time.

This eventually came full-circle: plenty of my audience, it turned out, were just as scared and anxious as me and appreciated the solidarity in my confessional poetry. As I started to be more and more out as a queer person in my work, people who were struggling with their sexuality began to tell me how important it is to them to hear someone speaking openly about their queerness. There was even one young woman who told me that hearing an honest, human voice talking about this unapologetically was enough to start to change her homophobic friend’s thinking – which was particularly important to her as she was trying to find a way to come out. This was possibly the proudest moment of my poetry career so far.

The point is, though, that I’m certainly not the only person who can do that: everyone has stories, and with a bit of support, everyone can find a way to capture them and tell them creatively. The project aimed to combine the power of people telling their stories for challenging stigma, with the potential for improving mental wellbeing which comes with writing in its own right. We organised a series of workshops, which fed into a book about LGBT+ identities and mental wellbeing, as well as a performance-based book launch event. The workshops went beyond our expectations; while we made every effort to create a safe and supportive space for LGBT people to learn new skills, the participants’ and workshop leaders’ kindness, respect and honesty turned them into a real community of stories.

In our delight at the way the workshops were going, the book almost seemed like an added bonus – until we began to collect together the submissions. Our main criteria for inclusion was the work’s ability to capture a moment or experience in a way which makes it feel real for the reader – whether in the deft lines of an experienced writer, or the raw, honest words of someone who is just starting to put themselves onto paper. We were spoiled for choice. With work from more established writers such as playwright Jo Clifford and poet Sandra Alland – and even a piece by the late Edwin Morgan – alongside new writers, it reads like a conversation with friends which has been given a makeover of magic and metaphor – full of anecdotes and honesty and excellent storytelling.

The book, entitled Naked Among Thistles, is published by Elephant Juice (an imprint of award-winning local press Stewed Rhubarb). It was launched on 28^th February at the Scottish Storytelling Centre in the company of over a hundred people, with performances from contributors to the book and feature sets from the workshop leaders – Harry Giles, Jo Clifford, Kirsty Logan and Sophia Walker.

Ultimately, creative writing can make us feel less alone; it offers connection just as it celebrates difference. There is power in visibility, particularly when that visibility is human and expressive. Stories, by their unique potential for creating understanding and humanising ‘issues,’ are a great way of fighting the stigma that often comes with an LGBT+ identity and/or mental ill health – so that the stories of the future can be about love and self-determination in a world which nurtures everyone’s wellbeing and diverse identities equally.