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If mentally ill, many doors that most people take for granted as available are shut in our faces. Other than incarceration, which has taken on the role of de facto state mental health option, there are milder forms of unhappy restrictions to which mentally ill people are subject. 

The invisible walls of mental illness consist partly of having less liberty than someone without mental illness. For example, few people with psychiatric problems are able to obtain and/or maintain professional employment. Yet, there are some who have moved past that barrier. And most must remain closeted concerning their disability. 

Some people with mental illness do not have college, because the onset of their condition happened before or during their college years. This, by itself, is a substantial roadblock. Those who do in fact have college may have had to fight off symptoms while getting their academic work done. For this, they should get a medal of fortitude. 

Most potential employers will not hire someone openly mentally ill, unless the job is bottom of the barrel and without any significant responsibility. Some will not hire a mentally ill person whatsoever for anything. However, a psychiatric diagnosis doesn't necessarily show up on a background check, and it is often worth it not to volunteer this information. 

Those of us who currently can't show up for a job consistently, including me, are forced to live on the tiny amounts provided by Disability Insurance and SSI. This is a big restriction. Financial restrictions comprise one many of the invisible walls of mental illness. 

People with significant mental illness are often pressured into participating in outpatient institutionalization. This could include one's housing situation, and it could include being forced into a day treatment program. These activities, to me, are depressing. I've gone to many outpatient programs. Some of them do not render the level of hope that you would get if you are in the workforce. (However, such programs are worth doing for many people. They are a better alternative than not having structure, and as a result, relapsing.) 

What I've talked about so far are the socioeconomic walls that we face. To continue in the strictly social vein, most people do not have the same regard for mentally ill people compared to someone they perceive as normal. If you are a man seeking a relationship, you may find that most prospective mates will not go out with you, especially if your disability prevents full-time work. If you are a woman with mental illness, you will have better luck attracting someone, yet you might not get the same level of respect compared to someone without a psychiatric condition. 

In a social situation, such as a party or potluck, a mentally ill person may be somewhat lost. This is partly because of the illness and the medication, and it is not so much because people hold you with a lack of regard. Also, if you are not used to socializing among non-afflicted people, your ability to make conversation and interact could be underdeveloped. 

Imagine being at a party or potluck and someone asking, "What do you do?" A typical question to start conversation, sometimes phrased differently than that. One's response might be, "Well, I take medication and I sit in front of a television." 

Or, in my case, I could say "I'm a freelance author." I very well might not be believed. This is especially so if someone has already identified me as the mentally ill person at the party. In that case, anything I say will not be taken seriously. 

Many people who know me as a mental health consumer presume that is all I am. The concept that I might have a life outside of that is foreign. Even where I go for mental health treatment, staff members do not believe my writing career amounts to anything. If I shove my portfolio in their faces, it doesn’t stop the condescension, and I might be regarded as an "idiot savant," or as "the patient with an unusual talent." And I will still not get much respect.  

The social and societal walls that I face in large part consist of people's fixed perceptions. 

The walls that surround people with mental illness exist in the minds of others and in the mind of oneself. If we believe we can't do anything, it is an additional wall, one that we have internalized. 

Should we give up, then, on scaling these walls? No. Any minority in the history of the U.S. has had barriers to face. At one time, African American people were presumed mentally inferior. At one time, women were presumed mentally inferior. If mentally ill people are to be treated as equals, we have to assert ourselves. 

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