“A renaissance happened after I was diagnosed. All the doors I thought were closed actually became open to me.”
Lisa is the first voice in our new Stories of Hope series, sharing the real voices and stories of people living with schizophrenia and psychosis spectrum disorders, and the caregivers who support them.
Watch Lisa’s full story via the link in our bio.
We’re grateful to Lisa for sharing her time and talent with S&PAA, and for sharing her story with us as well.
This is what recovery looks like for Lisa. Share it with someone who needs to hear it.
#StoriesOfHope #MentalHealthAwarenessMonth #Schizophrenia #Psychosis #MentalHealthAdvocacy
Today, we celebrate every version of motherhood, and every mother in our community.
Your strength, compassion, and love make a difference each and every day.
Happy Mother’s Day 🤍
At S&PAA, we believe trust and healing in mental health are not built through ideological certainty or one-dimensional narratives. It is built through honesty, humility, dialogue, and the courage to hold difficult realities at the same time. We find this true for both people and organizations.
That’s why we're especially grateful for this reflection from S&PAA Board Member Lauren Kennedy West. It resonates so deeply when Lauren reminds us that healing is not invincibility, and that people deserve space for complexity, nuance, autonomy, support, uncertainty, and hope to exist together.
Or as Lauren puts it:
“I need support and I still belong to myself.”
“I need humility and my experience still matters.”
“I can believe in recovery and still be honest about illness.”
Not either/or.
This AND this.
Lauren, we're proud you're a part of our leadership at S&PAA: Powered by science. Built by inclusive dialogue. We believe this is what a new model of trust in mental health can look like.
Powered by science. Built by inclusive dialogue. We believe that’s what a new model of trust in mental health can look like.
Check out her most recent video here:
https://youtu.be/AD6h2iuysrY?si=ulUSoVysBx6DdULW
#MentalHealthAwarenessMonth #PsychosisAwareness #LivedExperience #mentalhealthmatter
Mental Health Awareness Month calls for more than awareness alone. It calls for humility, reflection, and an honest reckoning with the complexity of mental health systems, policy, care, autonomy, safety, stigma, research, lived experience, and public responsibility.
At S&PAA, we recognize that many of the most important questions in serious mental illness care remain deeply contested — ethically, clinically, socially, and politically. Reasonable people with lived experience, family experience, clinical expertise, disability justice perspectives, research backgrounds, and community advocacy often arrive at different conclusions about how dignity, autonomy, safety, and support are best upheld.
We believe one of our primary responsibilities as an organization is to serve as thoughtful stewards of these tensions and the difficult conversations that surround them. Rather than simplifying or avoiding unresolved questions, we believe meaningful progress requires creating space for ongoing dialogue across perspectives — including perspectives that challenge one another — with seriousness, compassion, intellectual honesty, and respect for the humanity of everyone involved.
As part of that commitment, we have developed a range of policy and position statements that reflect our organizational perspectives on key issues affecting people living with serious mental illness and their communities. Readers interested in learning more about our positions can find them here: /policy-positions/
This month — and beyond — we remain committed to listening, learning, and working toward systems that better support people living with serious mental illness and the many communities connected to their care and well-being.
#MentalHealthAwarenessMonth
#MentalHealthAwareness
#MentalHealthMatters
#EndTheStigma#MentalHealthAwarenessMonth
#MentalHealthAwareness
#MentalHealthMatters
#EndTheStigma
May 3 - 9 is Tardive Dyskinesia Awareness Week.
Awareness matters. Early recognition, support, and compassionate conversations can make a meaningful difference for individuals and caregivers alike.
Swipe to learn more.
#TDAwarenessWeek #TardiveDyskinesia #Schizophrenia #Psychosis #MentalHealthAwarenessMonth
Schizophrenia and psychosis spectrum disorder care often feels like a series of isolated circuits—support, treatment, and services that should work together but don’t. Many of you live this reality.
Today, the Schizophrenia & Psychosis Action Alliance is announcing a major step to wire the system to work as one.
We’re launching the Schizophrenia Center of Excellence and a Founding Steering Committee, bringing together leaders across clinical care, research, policy, financing, and lived and caregiving experience to help shape this work from the start.
We know coordinated care works. The Center of Excellence is designed to do exactly that—connecting care, treatment, and support into a system they functions as a whole, not a series of handoffs.
Link in bio to read the full announcement.
#CareIntegration #MentalHealthSystems #PublicHealth #Schizophrenia
🌟 Volunteer Appreciation Month Spotlight 🌟
This April, we’re shining a bright light on the extraordinary volunteers who power S&PAA every single day.
Our community is beautifully diverse — people with lived experience of schizophrenia and psychosis, dedicated caregivers, fierce advocates, groundbreaking researchers, innovative thinkers, and so many more across the spectrum. The response to our Volunteer Interest Form has been nothing short of overwhelming and deeply moving. The passion, enthusiasm, and fierce commitment to creating real, meaningful change for those facing schizophrenia and psychosis-related challenges is truly inspiring.
Here’s our highlight reel of some of the most powerful and heartfelt quotes from our volunteer interest form!
If these words resonate with you, we invite you to join this movement. Fill out our Volunteer Interest Form by visiting /volunteer/
We’re currently strengthening our infrastructure so we can thoughtfully welcome even more volunteers into high-impact roles aligned with our strategic priorities. Stay close and stay tuned as there’s so much more ahead!
To every volunteer who has already stepped forward: thank you. Your time, energy, and heart are making a profound difference in our community.
Together, we’re stronger. 💚💚💚
#VolunteerAppreciationMonth #SchizophreniaAwareness #PsychosisSupport #LivedExperience #MentalHealthMatters #CommunityImpact
Tomorrow kicks off #MentalHealthAwarenessMonth!
We’re carrying forward the progress we’ve made in recent weeks, from the launch of the National Mental Illness Justice Center to Advocacy Day on Capitol Hill, and continuing to make space for voices that have gone unheard for far too long.
Throughout May, we’ll be sharing real stories from individuals living with schizophrenia and psychosis spectrum disorders, and the caregivers who support them.
And thanks to a generous donor, every gift made through May 31 will be matched dollar for dollar! Donate via the link in our bio.
Stay tuned as we share these stories and important updates on our work to expand access to care, strengthen advocacy, and support individuals and families.
Together, we are creating real hope!
#Schizophrenia #Psychosis #MentalHealthAdvocacy SMI EndTheStigma
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved new data for Caplyta (lumateperone) showing a reduced risk of relapse in people living with schizophrenia, a meaningful step forward in addressing one of the most destabilizing aspects of this illness.
Relapse prevention isn’t just a clinical metric—it’s about preserving stability, protecting progress, and reducing the cascading impacts on families, housing, employment, and overall quality of life.
As we think about what it takes to sustain recovery, this moment also underscores the importance of treatment continuity. Long-acting injectables (LAIs) remain a critical tool to help reduce gaps in adherence and supporting consistent therapeutic coverage over time.
Innovation in oral treatments and expanded evidence for relapse prevention are welcome advances. Paired with broader use of LAIs where appropriate, they move us closer to a system that prioritizes stability, continuity, and real-world outcomes for people living with schizophrenia.
Link in bio.
#Schizophrenia
#MentalHealth
#RelapsePrevention
#ContinuityOfCare
#LongActingInjectables
In Washington, D.C. spring is perennial construction season; but this April, the most groundbreaking work happened on Capitol Hill–not by workers in hard hats, but by the people closest to what happens when untreated serious mental illness meets an unprepared justice system. The work on the S&PAA National Mental Illness Justice Center has officially begun.
On Thursday, a powerful convening of judges, legal professionals, clinicians, researchers, policymakers, advocates, family members, and people with lived experience joined S&PAA and Treatment Advocacy Center to begin building a national hub that will give communities what they need when serious mental illness intersects with the legal system–a hub of free and low cost legal services, education, local resources, policy reform guidance, and practical technical assistance, all in one place.
The need is stark. Across the United States, justice systems have become the default responders to untreated mental illness. For too many families, arrest comes before treatment, not because they didn't fight for care, but because the systems meant to help weren't equipped to respond.
Our working session, Navigating the Justice System for Our Community, was designed to change that trajectory. From a candid panel on justice and injustice to two intensive breakout sessions and a full action planning session, the day produced something tangible: a working framework with which to move forward.
Every person in the room left as a Founding Advocate of the Justice Center and a member of the Justice Center Champion Collective, a growing body of committed voices who will help carry this work forward.
#MentalHealthJustice #SchizophreniaAwareness #SeriousMentalIllness #CriminalJusticeReform #MentalHealthAdvocacy #SPAA #TAC
Impatient for progress. Undeterred by chaos, complexity, or complacency.
That’s the energy behind today’s Capitol Hill Day hosted by The Schizophrenia and Psychosis Action Network (SPAN). As the urgency intensifies into a visible crisis in our families, in our neighborhoods, and on our streets, our forces continue to scale. We have more people, more resources, and growing influence with legislators.
More than 100 advocates are here in D.C. and kicked off 50+ meetings across congressional offices bringing lived experience directly into federal policymaking. This is SPAN’s annual Capitol Hill Day, but the stakes feel different this year.
Our insistence on parity—in resources, in attention, and in outcomes—for families dealing with serious mental illness has organized momentum and the drumbeat of marching foot soldiers staring straight ahead.
It rained steadily this morning as our groups took that march to the Hill, but it only clarified the moment—relentless, driving, and unwilling to wait.
Impatient for progress.
#MentalHealthPolicy #CapitolHill #Advocacy #Psychosis #Schizophrenia #SPAN #SPAA #JusticeCenter
Yesterday, S&PAA brought the voice of our community to the Medicare Drug Price Negotiation Program roundtable, helping represent the needs of people living with schizophrenia and other psychosis spectrum disorders in an important national policy discussion.
We reinforced what we shared last week: coverage is not the same as access. Even when a drug is covered or a price is set, insurers still retain full authority to impose prior authorization, step therapy, and cost-sharing requirements that can place treatment functionally out of reach.
CMS itself designated antipsychotics as a protected class because this patient population faces uniquely dangerous risks when access is disrupted. People living with schizophrenia and other psychosis spectrum disorders need treatment options, not barriers that stand in the way of treatment, survival, and recovery. The negotiation process should not undermine those protections.
#Schizophrenia #Psychosis #SPAA #TreatmentAccess
