Success, Lived Experience and Doing it All in the Open.

For too long, mental health systems have carried an unspoken rule: if you have lived experience, keep it quiet. At best, you can mention it once it’s neatly managed, wrapped up, or translated into a “professionalised” story that doesn’t make anyone uncomfortable.

But here’s the truth: I am a walking, talking embodiment of what it means to live openly with mental health experiences and be successful. Not despite it. Not in secret. But in the open.

The Old Narrative

The story many of us are handed goes something like this: psychosis or hospitalisation marks the end of who you are. You become a “patient,” a case history, someone who might stabilise but will never thrive. At best, you are tolerated. At worst, you are written off.

That narrative was never mine. And it isn’t true for thousands of others either.

The truth is: people with lived experience succeed every day. We raise families, run businesses, teach, create, consult, write, and lead. Some of us do it publicly, some quietly. But we do it.

Breaking the Silence

I decided early on that I wasn’t going to live split in two — a professional mask on one side and a hidden story on the other. I wanted to bring the whole of myself into every room I walk into.

That means:

• I co-design and deliver psychoeducational courses inside the NHS.

• I run my own consultancy, working with organisations who want real change.

• I support communities who are navigating systems that often fail them.

• I carry the lived experience lens and the governance lens.

When I’m in a team meeting, delivering a session, or sitting with a community group, I’m not performing wellness or hiding history. I’m bringing my full self — the whole spectrum of what it means to be human.

Success Without Hiding

Success, for me, isn’t about proving I’m “better” or “normal enough.” Success is about living sovereignly. It’s about showing that lived experience can sit side by side with leadership, integrity, and impact.

I can run a company.

I can contribute at governance level.

I can advocate for dignity and equality.

And I can do all of this while being open about my mental health story.

That’s not the exception. That’s the evidence.

A Paradigm Shift

What does this mean for the system? It means the old paradigm is breaking down. The idea that lived experience automatically equals decline or incapacity is outdated. The belief that credibility only comes through credentials, not through lived truth, is crumbling.

We need a new standard in mental health: one where lived experience isn’t something to be managed away but something to be centred, valued, and integrated into leadership.

Because when lived experience sits at the table, decisions change. Priorities change. Power shifts. And the system can finally start to resemble the people it’s supposed to serve.

Living It, Not Just Talking About It

I’m not afraid. I know how to surrender. I’ve been through enough to know I can walk through whatever comes next. That makes me free — free to lead, free to advocate, free to embody a new story in the open.

So when people ask me what success looks like for someone with lived experience, I don’t give them a definition. I just point to my life:

a consultancy, a voice, a platform, a way of living that refuses to hide.

I’m not the exception. I’m the evidence.