VOICES of RECOVERY- VT Speaker Roster

In Recovery
Abby Bassett Abby Bassett
Abby was diagnosed with schizophrenia and depression in the ’90s. She struggled to remain employed and battled her illness until five years ago when it go easier, “when I started sharing my story and tried to improve things for other people with mental illness.”
Ann Heather Ann Heather
Ann is glad that the outreach mental health workers on Church St. were there for her “like a lifeline”. She adds, “When I used to be in crisis, they helped me see what was happening and hooked me up with the help I needed.” Ann has been diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder and Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome. A very articulate person, she is ready to speak out and is now writing about her experiences – especially about the stereotypes, unsympathetic attitudes, lack of understanding, and stigma. She wants to encourage and give hope to others. After presenting to a graduate class, the professor wrote: “Anne was magnificent, could not have done a better job!”
Gail Schwartz Gail Schwartz
Gail is a multimedia performance artist and videographer. She has been diagnosed with an anxiety disorder and depression. She questions “the current paradigm of relating to ’shadow experiences’” and wonders whether the term “mental illness” is useful to for her. She wants to engage with others to learn about healthy and sustainable ways to address emotional suffering. Gail is currently a freelance teacher – of theater and piano. As a performing artist she is working on an interactive, solo piece called Crazy”. Gail holds an MFA in Interdisciplinary Arts from Goddard College.
Amanda Conley Amanda Conley
Amanda has been labeled with a number of different diagnoses since her entry into the mental health system at the age of twelve. Currently, her foremost issue involves using food to self-medicate. Eating disorders are about so much more than food, and she struggles to rise above the labels in order to create a healthy sense of self. Sharing her story helps Amanda to see where she has been and better evaluate her future goals.
Bernie Profili Bernie Profili
Bernie was discharged from the Air Force for a mental disorder. In the years soon after that he describes sinking to a world of horrors and disbelief – experiencing increasingly severe mental illness. Today he is successful with help from Vocational Rehabilitation. He is proud to be working for the Red Cross. They know he is ill and always treat him with respect. He smiles and says he is beginning to be able to have things that were out of reach before.
Betsy Pennebaker Betsy Pennebaker
Betsy was diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder in 2003. After seeing a “Readers Digest” article that suggested that people with mental illness are stupid, Betsy decided to become an MHEI speaker in order to help break down false stereotypes and stigma. Betsy received a BA cum laude from Williams College, an MA from UVM, and a second Master’s, with highest honors, from the University of Oxford. She stayed at Oxford for her doctorate, which she completed in 2001. She currently works part-time as a website copywriter and also manages two investment properties. Betsy is a strong proponent of alternative medicine as a complement to conventional treatment for mental illness. She has recently begun studying Traditional Chinese Medicine, and she hopes to work with others with mental illness to “pay forward” the help she has received from caring and talented healers in many disciplines.
Brian Cina Brian Cina
Brian has many roles in relation to mental illness. He struggles with anxiety, depression, and other challenges associated with so-called Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder. He grew up in a home with his grandmother who suffered from a serious mental illness, a mood and thought disorder which he didn’t understand at all as a child. Brian has many friends who struggle with a variety of mental illnesses. He currently is a social worker who provides professional services to clients of the Howard Center for Human Services and Transitional Services for Youth and Families. Despite his struggles, Brian strives to build on his strengths. His recovery has been dramatic and dynamic, including successful activities such as community building, channeling anger energy into positive outlets, using art to heal, and activism.
David Turner David Turner
David likes to tell others about the suffering he went through in the past, while showing – through his enthusiastic style of speaking – how happy he is now. He was depressed, addicted to drugs and homeless. It was Alcoholics Anonymous where he met people who had not given up. He gained hope and a social life there. He lives now on disability income and delights in the simplicity of his lifestyle and in his many friends.
Doris Hargrove Doris Hargrove
Doris has been dealing with mental illness all of her life. She reports struggling – sometimes just to stay alive. In mid 2005, she began successful employment with the Westview Employment Service to build improved job opportunities for others with mental disorders. She works with businesses and job-seekers. That job has given her public speaking experience. Her determination to improve life for herself and for others is strong and she is eager to share her story.
Abby Carvey Abby Carvey
Abby has experienced an amazing recovery journey and can tell her story articulately. She also excels in audience dialogue. Although, in the past, she was repeatedly hospitalized, had psychotic hallucinations and delusions, used street drugs, and experienced dangerous mood swings, she is now well. Her wellness skills include “seeing when fantasy gets in the way of reality and reeling my thoughts in.” She feels that she has retrained her brain using self-help techniques.She graduated from college and is now an aspiring film buff, a creative writer (poetry and a novel), and an inspirational speaker. She hopes to bring about change in stigmatizing attitudes by sharing herself and her sense of humor with her audiences. “The best thing about hearing voices is that you can have a sing-a-long when you like.”
Jane Farnham Jane Farnham
Jane used to hide in her room and binge eat. She felt victimized, tormented, ashamed, resentful, and lonely. Later she became homeless. Jane describes her eating disorder as an addiction and thanks to the miracle of recovery, is substance free, eats healthily, exercises, and has a daily practice of prayer, meditation, and visualization. She is a long-term resident in a communal living environment and enjoys traveling, connecting with friends and family, listening to music and reading. Jane is the MHEI Treasurer, is on the Advisory Council, and is a project coordinator, and a speaker.
Jay Berman Jay Berman
Jay finds joy in helping other people — including both his friends and professionals learning how to treat people with Schizophrenia. He feels thankful to be part of a society where he can live in the community instead of being locked up either in the state hosp or a jail. A lot of traumatic experiences and living on the streets brought on his worst episodes. He knows now that “when I feel like I’m not myself – that other people are putting their thoughts into my head, I am slipping.” He has learned that medication and having positive and hopeful thoughts can keep him from psychosis or suicide. Jay’s many interests and talents — woodworking, art, photography, biking, swimming, and occasional paid work help him “actuate” — to be the person he really is.
Karen Kelley Karen Kelley
Karen was working full time and began to have trouble at work. Taking a leave of absence, she felt fearful, sad, confused, and lonely. She is now sometimes disabled by symptoms of Dissociative Identity Disorder (multiple personalities), and major depression. She likes to tell her story to help others learn about her experiences in recovery and in dealing with stigma.
Neal Muse Neal Muse
Neal is in recovery from alcoholism and two serious types of mental illness – Manic Depression (Bipolar) and Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD). He became independent from his parents when he was a teenager and slowly slid into dependence on alcohol to reduce his mental/emotional symptoms. After “hitting bottom”, he set out to recover and build a new life. He struggled for many years, now receiving ongoing support and services. He has many friends and is a volunteer at the library.
Paige Corologos Paige Corologos
I am a 38 year old homemaker and a mother with Bipolar 1, Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, and Panic syndrome with agoraphobia. I live in Burlington ,VT with my husband and daughter (age 10) and after many years of hospitalizations, ECT, and medicine changes have a fairly stable life. I was diagnosed when I was 28. I can not work and I receive Social Security, which helps my husband’s income, but I do enjoy the martial art of Aikido which I take part in about five times a week. It gives me an outlet for my energies as well as a sense of accomplishment and schedule, without the stress of a job. It has helped me a lot. I like to speak about mental illness, because it would have helped me so much to have been diagnosed earlier (the symptoms where all there from a very young age and my first suicide attempt was at 13). Receiving some kind of help at a young age is crucial to helping soften the later effects of illness or stopping them all together. That didn’t happen for me out of ignorance and fear. Decreasing these can only help the coming generations.
Michael Butler Michael Butler
Michael experienced a traumatic childhood. He recalls horrendous parental abuse and teen-age institutionalization. His early adult years included multiple hospitalizations. At this time, he has lots of friends and mutual support – especially within the community of others who are recovering. “I’m lots better now…. I use medication, keep busy, and can see the difference between what I am thinking and what is really happening.” He says “I want to help people, promote understanding, show how we are all humans like everybody.”
Valarie Austin Valarie Austin
Valarie was diagnosed with Major Depression in 1996 and has a family member with Bi-Polar Disorder. She currently works full-time as a Psychiatric Technician and is a full-time student at the Southern New Hampshire University’s Masters Program in Community Mental Health.
Mary Rodgers Mary Rodgers
I am a survivor of childhood incest in which a made-for-TV movie portrayed the effects of abuse in my family. As a result, I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder and post-traumatic stress. In 2000, I had a severe brain hemorrhage, was in and out of a coma for 3 1/2 months, and had a near death experience. Putting my life together has been a life-long affair of self-discovery. Forgiveness, a lot of therapy, and the near death experience (that rocked me to the core) that brought my healing. I have discovered that my purpose here is to speak and to work with those who are suffering. My story has much to do with forgiveness, hope, and an unyielding faith in God. If there is one thing I have learned, whoever and where ever you are on your journey, you must have a willing spirit to do the necessary work in becoming fully healed. It’s all about choices that we make with what we have been dealt. I am now dedicating my life to work as a healer, and to be a source of inspiration to others who suffer.
Jill Allen Jill Allen, M.Ed.
Jill holds a Master’s degree in disability studies. She has been giving public speeches since early adolescence, talking about her experience with physical disabilities and telling people how to interact with people who have them. In 2003, she was diagnosed with generalized anxiety disorder, and she has been living with the intersection between her physical and mental disbilities.
Family members
Abby Bassett Paul Kelley
Paul is a family member, Karen’s husband (see above). He used to have no idea what he should do to be helpful to his wife. He has learned from her how he can be supportive – sometimes doing what she asks for and sometimes just giving her space to be alone. He gets discouraged and fearful, but Karen has often been very appreciative of his support. Because he sees her in her good times as well as the rough times, he has hope that she will recover fully.
Ann Heather Wanda Cosman
Wanda has a family member diagnosed with schizophrenia. She is available to speak from the perspective of a family member and health professional. She is available to speak from the perspective of a family member and health professional.
Professionals
Joe Lasek, MD Joe Lasek, MD
I am a staff psychiatrist and Associate Medical Director for Mental Health & Substance Abuse Services at a center for mental health and substance abuse services. I am also a Clinical Assistant Professor for the UVM College of Medicine and Adjunct Faculty for the Graduate Program in Community Mental Health for Southern New Hampshire University. I have broad professional interests including the diagnosis and treatment of emotional and mental problems. I am particularly interested in figuring out complex diagnostic questions and applying a broad, integrated approach to recovery that includes medication, psychotherapies, exercise, nutrition, meditation/mindfulness, self-help and education, vocational assistance and other community supports. With that being said, I am a skeptic by nature, and I like to see good quality scientific evidence to support any intervention I recommend. Fortunately, the evidence for an integrated approach to well-being grows every day, and this is why I’m so excited to be working in this field at this time in history.
Sarah Chamberlain Sarah Chamberlain
(Sarah can speak both from a family member perspective or that of a professional clinician.) Sarah’s sister, now 52, has lived with schizophrenia since she was 12. Based on that personal experience, Sarah became a long-time leader for public education with the National Alliance on Mental Illness inVermont (NAMI-VT). She regularly teaches NAMI’s Family to Family Education classes, and recently developed a 1 day workshop called Living with Mental Illness in the Family. She has also worked as a service provider at a HowardCenter group home in Burlington. Sarah enjoys speaking to groups and especially enjoys questions and comments.
Sarah Steingard, MD Sandra Steingard, MD
Dr. Steingard is the Medical Director of the HowardCenter program for mental health and addiction recovery services. She is also a Clinical Associate Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Vermont College of Medicine. She has practiced psychiatry in Vermont for 15 years. Her clinical interests include schizophrenia and related disorders. She is also interested in the current efforts to restructure the system of care for psychiatric services in Vermont.
Joan Knight MAT, MS, CMHC Joan Knight MAT, MS, and CMHC
Joan has been disabled by mental illness and behavioral addictions to varying degrees. Her diagnoses include Bipolar Disorder-Type 2, Attention Deficit Disorder, and she has some symptoms of Borderline Personality Disorder. She couldn’t work for 6 years and struggled to get through each day. Now, in a high degree of recovery, she devotes much of her life to public education with the goal of increasing peoples’ understanding of mental illness and decreasing the harmful shame, stigma, and fear associated with it.
Marlene Williamson Marlene Williamson
Marlene has been a mental health counselor for 20 years, specializing in helping clients get and keep jobs. For people dealing with mental illness, working and feeling like contributing members of society promotes their recovery. She is excited about the successes of the people she serves and is eager to speak about her experience.
Susan Leigh Deppe, MD Susan Leigh Deppe, MD
Dr.Deppe is a psychiatrist in private adult practice in Colchester. She loves to use psychotherapy and psychopharmacology to help people heal and grow. She is an experienced lecturer and public speaker.

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