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 Every year I challenge myself to read certain number of books - usually 40 per year. This fiction/nonfiction reading includes picture books, graphic novels, ebooks and audiobooks, among other professional development books, and religious books. Most of the time I'm able to finish all 40+ books, other times I only read up to 30, sometimes less. Last year I only read 32, without counting PD and religious reading. For this year's challenge I decided to include everything I read, even if it's a collection of articles, a book of recipes or instructions manual. Why? I want to make sure that students understand that reading is reading. That, when they are reading the subtitles of a Japanese movie, or the instructions on a video game, it counts!

Life inside my mind edited by Jessica Burkhart it's my first finished book of the year. 

An emotional rollercoaster! Reading through this pages opened up a broader perspective of what mental illness can do to someone, no matter their background. I've yet a lot to learn, but it is a start for me. I have experience mental illness through someone closed to me. There have been many times when I don't understand, and get angry because this person does not have the drive to get up and move. I do pray that God can reach deep down to show the light and the way out of "darkness." I think he does through people around them who love them and are there no matter what, of course, therapy and medication.  Thanks to these authors that shared their stories, I know it's not easy to talk about mental illness, but it is so necessary. Even though this is just a window to the mental illness world, it is definitely a beginning, a must read!

I will be posting more books, fiction and non fiction, about this topic to help readers navigate through mental illness, whether it is a direct or indirect personal experience.

Buzzing Rise above the noise graphic novel by Samuel Sattin and illustrated by Rye Hickman is my second book of year.
Wow! It cannot be more graphic than this (at least for me)! Buzzing provides a visual of what OCD can do to a person, in this case a teenager. Also, shows how the people around them play an important role on the success to "rise above the noise." While we/me sometimes joke with the OCD episodes of some who is obsessively cleaning the house, or keeping an overly organize desk at the office, we cannot be more wrong to joke about it. That is ignorance of a bigger problem. OCD is not just about "cleaning" or being "organized." As I am reading more about mental illness, I am also becoming more aware of signs that make me stop and rethink my words or comments before they out loud, leave my mind.