As is expected of a guest speaker, Brent Seal thanked his audience for coming out.
But his thanks were different than most.
As he opened his presentation entitled A Journey of Possibilities, Seal thanked the audience in Salmon Arm Secondary’s gym for just being able to get out of the house.
Because Seal, who was diagnosed with schizophrenia, knows that sometimes it can be an enormous battle to try and participate in the daily routines those without mental illness often take for granted.
“Sometimes it is hard just to show up,” he said in the opener to his presentation. “I know the feeling of pain and isolation and that they can keep you from life.”
Seal was in Salmon Arm to introduce a mental wellness program to high school students, but also to conduct a free session for parents, adults and professionals to share some of his insights and mental health recovery strategies.
The event was sponsored by the Shuswap Local Action Team of the Child and Youth Mental Health and Substance Use Collaborative.
Seal was studying business at Simon Fraser University when he began to suffer from mental illness symptoms. He became increasingly isolated and experienced psychosis. At one point, Seal began to live with delusions and hallucinations and, while visiting Texas with his father, had a full psychotic break.
“In my world, the world was going to end,” he said.
It was at that point that suicide seemed like the best option.
Hospitalized upon his return to B.C., Seal got a name for his illness – schizophrenia.
“People often don’t like labels, but in this case learning that label saved my life,” he told the crowd, noting that with the name of his illness came a way to research and understand his condition and the symptoms associated with it. This gave him a way to regain some control over his life.
“I turned my pain into power and then wanted to turn that power into something positive.”
Insight into his illness and his symptoms is his most powerful tool to prevent relapse.
“By recognizing my symptoms, I can see them and can break out my mental health tool box for ways to control those symptoms before they control me.”
He set out on a journey to wellness which has now taken him to graduate as valedictorian of his class, to the finish line of an 80-kilometre ultra marathon and scaling the peaks of some of the world’s highest mountains. His plan is to conquer Everest in 2017.
Drawing a spectrum on a page, Seal says he moved from struggle to just getting by to thriving and now to a stage where he is sharing his journey in an effort to help others.
Seal began to feel that his struggle needed to be shared in order to reduce the stigma surrounding mental illness, which affects so many people in Canada but is only now becoming acceptable to talk about.
He also wanted people with mental health issues to realize that, as his father pointed out to him, “you can still live a great life.”
