My name is Sarah E. Hutchinson, I was born in Hudson, NY on November 25th, 1989 to Lynda & Donald Hutchinson. My parents divorced when I was 2 and we went to go live with my Grandmother in Chatham, NY. My Mother remarried when I was about 5 years old. That same year, I had experienced severe hardships, from being sexually abused to severely bullied in school. Despite these huge challenges, I thoroughly enjoyed school and was high honors student. Although, I was doing well in school, my dyslexia became a struggle and my hardships from my past were catching up to me and began to have a negative impact on my performance in school. In addition to my grades slipping, I began to feel unmotivated and started to have a poor self-image due to my past. I was not sleeping or eating for long periods of time, which is when I knew something was not right. At age 15, I was diagnosed as bi-polar and felt like I became misunderstood by doctors and was not getting the proper treatment that I needed. Through my frustration, I began to spend a lot of time doing research in hopes of finding more answers and proper treatment. I was fighting for my life, and by age 25, from my own research I realized that I had depression due to my early childhood traumas. With this discovery, I was able to get the proper treatment that I needed and make a turnaround in my life. I began the survivors club for trauma victims, finished my movie script, and began going to school for my psychology doctorate.

My current goals are to get into film, become a psychology researcher to help build better diagnostics & treatment options and to be the best parent I can for my children. Some of my favorite quotes that I like to share with others are: "Mental Health is About All of Us, Not Just Some of Us" and "A Question that sometimes drives me hazy - am I or the others crazy", Albert Einstein.

The reason that I am walking in Off The Mask is because I enjoy being helpful, but this advocacy is very personal to me. It's also part of what I'm looking into for work. My script Crazy is me putting in my own part to help the stigma of mental health. What I like the most about the quote I wanted to share was that Mental Health is not just about the mentally ill. It's about all of us taking care of our mind as much as we do our bodies. Mental Health is another part of Self Care.