Show Notes

What happens when the diagnosis changes, the struggle feels endless, and hope seems impossible to find?

In this episode of Why Not Me?, Tony Mantor sits down with writer and journalist Meg LeDuc to discuss her personal journey through depression, anxiety, psychosis, suicide attempts, self-harm, recovery, and ultimately healing.

Meg shares how years of misdiagnosis, hospitalization, and mental health challenges shaped her life—and how determination, faith, support, and the right treatment helped her rebuild it.

This honest conversation explores what it feels like to live with serious mental illness, the realities of psychosis, the impact of stigma, and why recovery is possible even after the darkest moments.

Whether you're living with mental illness, supporting someone who is, or simply looking to better understand the human experience, this episode offers insight, compassion, and hope.

In This Episode:

• Meg's journey through anxiety, depression, and psychosis
• The challenges of diagnosis and finding effective treatment
• Living with suicide ideation and surviving multiple attempts
• Self-harm, shame, and learning to heal
• The role of faith during recovery
• Relationships and mental illness
• How stigma affects people living with serious mental illness
• The difference between receiving help and choosing healing
• Recovery, resilience, and rebuilding a meaningful life
• Why psychosis is not a life sentence

Memorable Quote

About Meg LaDuke

Meg LaDuc is a Detroit-based freelance journalist, creative writer, and contributor to mental health publications. Drawing from both lived experience and professional reporting, she writes about mental health, disability, recovery, and resilience. She is currently working on a memoir chronicling her journey through serious mental illness and recovery

.

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Show Notes

What happens when the systems designed to help people with serious mental illness become the very barriers preventing care?

In Part 2 of this important conversation, Tony Mantor welcomes Dr. Aaron Meyer and Anne Marie Council for a candid discussion about the failures and possibilities within America's mental health system. Together, they explore why so many individuals spend years cycling through emergency rooms, jails, homelessness, and crisis without ever receiving the long-term treatment they truly need.

The conversation examines the gap between policy and practice, the importance of housing with wraparound support, and why accountability—not simply creating more laws—may be the key to meaningful change.

This episode challenges listeners to rethink assumptions about involuntary treatment, homelessness, public safety, and compassion while offering practical ways communities can advocate for a better behavioral health system.

If you've ever wondered why so many people fall through the cracks, this conversation provides insight, hope, and a call to action.

In This Episode

• Why the "10-year loop" delays treatment for countless people living with serious mental illness
• How emergency rooms and jails have become default mental health providers
• The importance of continuous support instead of one-time stabilization
• Why existing mental health laws are often not fully implemented
• The need for more psychiatric beds and comprehensive treatment options
• How housing combined with wraparound services can change lives
• The role families and caregivers play in advocating for better care
• Why stigma continues to prevent people from receiving help
• The importance of investigative journalism and public accountability
• Practical ways listeners can become advocates for change in their own communities
• Why empathy and person-centered care must become the foundation of mental health policy

Key Takeaway

Serious mental illness is not a moral failing or a criminal issue—it is a healthcare issue. Until communities invest in accessible treatment, supportive housing, and systems that prioritize people over bureaucracy, too many individuals will continue cycling through crisis instead of recovery.

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If this conversation resonated with you, please follow, rate, and share the podcast. Every listener helps expand understanding, reduce stigma, and create meaningful conversations about autism and mental health around the world.

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In this important episode of Why Not Me? Embracing Autism and Mental Health Worldwide, Tony Mantor sits down with Dr. Alan Meyer, psychiatrist and Behavioral Health Officer for the City of San Diego Fire-Rescue Department, and Ann Marie Council, retired Senior Deputy City Attorney and mental health policy advisor, for an in-depth discussion about the challenges facing today's mental health system.

Together, they explore why so many individuals with serious mental illness fall through the cracks, the disconnect between policy and real-world implementation, and how communities can better support those in crisis before tragedy strikes.

The conversation covers assisted outpatient treatment, California's CARE Act, healthcare burnout, homelessness, autism, schizophrenia, and the urgent need for earlier intervention and stronger collaboration between healthcare providers, lawmakers, first responders, and community organizations.

This is the first of a two-part series that shines a light on the people working to create meaningful change in mental healthcare.

In this episode you'll learn:

• Why mental health and physical health must be treated together
• The barriers preventing people from receiving timely care
• How policy often fails frontline healthcare workers
• The role of cities, counties, and states in behavioral health services
• Why assisted outpatient treatment remains difficult to access
• How technology and AI could improve mental health access
• The importance of prevention instead of waiting for crisis
• Why community partnerships are essential for lasting solutions
• How burnout is affecting healthcare professionals and first responders
• What changes could transform the future of mental healthcare

Our Guests

Dr. Alan Meyer

• Psychiatrist at the University of California, San Diego
• Behavioral Health Officer for the City of San Diego Fire-Rescue Department
• Specialist in complex behavioral health and high-utilizer emergency response systems

Ann Marie Council

• Retired Senior Deputy City Attorney for the City of San Diego
• Founding Partner and Mental Health Policy Advisor at Quarter Turn Strategies
• Advocate for legislative reform and improved mental health policy

Key Takeaway

Real change begins when healthcare, government, first responders, and communities stop working in silos and start working together. Early intervention, compassionate care, and practical policy reforms can save lives and restore hope for individuals and families navigating serious mental illness.

If this conversation inspires you, follow the show, leave a review, and share this episode with someone who believes mental health deserves greater understanding and action.

#MentalHealth #Autism #BehavioralHealth #Psychiatry #HealthcarePolicy #EarlyIntervention #SeriousMentalIllness #WhyNotMePodcast #TonyMantor #MentalHealthAwareness #Homelessness #CommunityCare

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We talk with John Rolls about the Gremlin Club’s Sunday open mic in Camarthen and how it grows from a rehearsal night into a welcoming community where people leave their troubles at the door.

We dig into what real inclusion looks like for autism, mental health, and disability when the room treats everyone as equal and still makes space for what people need.
• how the Gremlin Club open mic starts as a Welsh Factor practice night
• why the night becomes about community building over competition
• John stepping in to run it after Elise’s bowel cancer diagnosis
• building confidence for nervous newcomers through crowd support
• making space for autistic singers and people with mental health challenges
• handling disability and access needs while keeping the same respect for everyone
• why the event is not branded as karaoke and how the format keeps it fun
• filming for nostalgia and feedback while choosing not to live stream
• word-of-mouth promotion and small grassroots marketing efforts
If this kind of conversation matters to you, follow the show so you don't miss what comes next.

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We sit with author Jerri Clark as he explains how severe mental illness can create a “gone but not gone” grief that families carry in silence.

We talk about ambiguous loss, why closure often never comes, and how to keep living with love and meaning even when the outcome is out of our control.

• Jerri’s story of losing his son through psychosis, system failures, and suicide
• What ambiguous loss means and why the ambiguity is unfixable
• The guilt families feel when they grieve someone still living
• Naming the losses: relationship, future, safety, predictability
• Coping as a nonlinear process that does not deliver resolution
• Learning to live with grief without letting it become your only identity
• “This is not my fault” as a practical starting point
• Adjust mastery and revising attachment when you cannot control outcomes
• What readers can expect from the book’s “do now” reflections and exercises
• Why community, empathy, and support networks matter for healing

If this kind of conversation matters to you, follow the show so you don't miss what comes next.

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We sit down with former U.S. Representative Patrick Kennedy to get specific about what a real national mental health strategy looks like and why the current system wastes money while people end up isolated, hospitalized, incarcerated, or living on the streets.

We dig into integrated care, schools-based prevention, telehealth, and the rising risks of AI so listeners walk away with practical policy ideas and a clear sense of what needs to change next.

• the need for a national blueprint that links housing, healthcare, and community supports
• aligning financial incentives so integrated care becomes the default
• why siloed budgets drive higher costs in ER use, incarceration, and homelessness
• reducing stigma by integrating mental health into standard medical care
• building mental health literacy through routine screening and early help in schools
• expanding effective therapy access through telehealth and proper reimbursement
• fixing cross-state licensure barriers to match patients with the right clinicians
• rebuilding social connection as a core mental health intervention
• using AI for personalized care while guarding against isolation and lost agency
• preparing for AI-driven job disruption and the mental health impact of lost purpose

If you know someone who has a story to share, tell them to contact us at why notme.world.

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We talk with former U.S. representative Patrick Kennedy about why mental health parity still fails in practice and what it takes to make insurers and employers cover care that actually works.

We keep coming back to one idea: real change happens when we build power and design a system that rewards early help, long-term outcomes, and community support.
• Barriers to full enforcement of the Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act
• Why payers respond to penalties more than long-term value
• How lobbying, regulation and legal appeals weaken consumer protections
• Building political power by organizing families and breaking silos
• The business case for early intervention and recovery supports
• Why supportive housing and community services can beat revolving-door crisis care
• The 90-90-90 by 2033 framework for screening, evidence-based care and recovery
• Lessons from the Community Mental Health Act and the cost of dividing communities
• Moving from over-medicalized solutions to integration, purpose and connection
If you know someone who has a story to share, tell them to contact us at why notme.world.

INTRO/OUTRO Music: T. Wild

Mantor Music BMI

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We sit down with Colorado State Senator Judy Amabile to connect one family’s painful path through serious mental illness to the laws that decide whether people get treatment or get pushed into homelessness and the courts.

We talk honestly about psychosis, stigma, and the hard policy choices behind civil commitment, Medicaid rules, and building enough beds to stop the cycle.
• Her son’s schizoaffective disorder and the road to diagnosis
• Early signs like paranoia and thought broadcasting
• Family anger and confusion turning into empathy
• NAMI Family-to-Family as a bridge to advocacy
• Why mental illness feels like the “no casserole disease”
• The jump from lived experience to writing policy
• Civil commitment and AOT as a contested safety net
• Competency waitlists and why they don’t equal treatment
• The “churn” between jail, hospitals, and the street
• Medicaid changes that allow longer inpatient stays
If you know someone who has a story to share, tell them to contact us at why notme.world.
One last thing, spread the word about why not me.

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