Grace advocates to reduce stigma about women and girl's mental health and chronic conditions.
A passionate advocate, Grace’s mission is to shatter the stigma surrounding mental illness and chronic conditions such as Polycystic Ovary Syndrome (PCOS), a hormonal condition that can cause severe pain and has no cure.
She is pursuing that mission while serving on the Queensland Family and Child Commission Youth Advisory Council and was previously on the Headspace Youth National Reference Group.
Diagnosed with PCOS, anxiety, and depression at the age of 14, Grace’s journey reveals the challenges of identifying PCOS in children. She openly discusses her personal health struggles, saying that when she looks back over her life, she recognises she has been experiencing PCOS since she was eight.
“I had my first period when I was eight years old, and with PCOS, it’s not looked for in children. Many times I was at the children’s hospital when I was younger with stomach pain and cramps, but because I was a child, my symptoms weren’t thought to be PCOS,” Grace says.
“It can be very traumatic to not receive the support you need, to constantly have to repeat yourself to different doctors and assert your needs. Women’s feelings and experiences need to be validated; trust that women know their own bodies and feelings.”
About one in 10 women of reproductive age around the world experience PCOS. Symptoms can include irregular and heavy periods, reduced fertility, anxiety and depression. Grace says the condition is similar to endometriosis and women with PCOS tend to develop endometriosis later in life.
“PCOS means you have many small, underdeveloped eggs on your ovaries, much like a cyst, which can cause chronic pain and hormonal difficulties.”
Grace doesn’t know if the PCOS is related to her experience of depression and anxiety. However, she recalls that when she saw a doctor about her PCOS as a teenager, she ended up breaking down in the doctor’s office.
“At the time I was feeling quite suicidal. I had been living with these thoughts for a long time, again, since the age of eight, and had never opened up about them. I ended up telling the GP and they referred me to a psychologist and it was a great experience. I got diagnosed and I got medication. I saw a psychologist for seven years and I ended up studying psychology because of it and I’m currently completing a Master of Suicidology.”
The experience of living with depression and anxiety revealed to Grace the assumptions people can make about mental illness. As a young woman who is working, has a psychology degree, and is doing well for herself, people have sometimes asked Grace if she really lives with depression and anxiety.
“Assumptions and stereotypes can be really dangerous; they can stop people from seeking support,” she says.
“Anyone can experience mental ill health, no matter how successful or happy they may appear on the outside.”
“Part of my advocacy work is trying to highlight that people are the experts in their own experiences. We are experts in our own lives, our own conditions, and we deserve to be treated as such.”
One of the main aspects Grace hopes to see come out of the Women and Girls’ Health Strategy is that women and girls are taken seriously when they seek help and support for their health. She’s heard many stories of women seeking support, only to be told they’re just anxious and they’ll be fine, and it turns out there was something very wrong.
“That’s a big one for me,” Grace says.
“Particularly from the mental health and wellbeing point of view, it can be very traumatic to not receive the support you need, to constantly have to repeat yourself to different doctors and assert your needs. Women’s feelings and experiences need to be validated; trust that women know their own bodies and feelings.
“I’d like to see women and girls always being taken seriously when they say something isn’t right with their mental or physical health.”