Justine Youl
Founder, MENTAL Street Talk
I know what it feels like when no one's talking about it.
Six years ago, someone I loved held me by my ankles over the edge of a 21st floor balcony.
He told me if I made a sound, he'd let go.
I didn't die that day. But the woman I was did.
I was told my PTSD was so severe I'd probably never work again.
They were wrong.
Today I build technology that's changing workplace safety. I employ people. I laugh. A lot.
I taught myself an entire industry from scratch, with no background in it, because I needed something that was mine.
Somewhere in the middle of rebuilding, I moved to Bali. It's where I live now, with my partner and our three kids, and where I got sober.
Getting sober was hard. But it was the best decision I've ever made.
I lost two brothers to suicide within one year. I've fought my own battles with alcohol addiction and I'm now in recovery, sober, and proud of it. I've also survived a domestic violence relationship.
I'm not sharing this for sympathy. I'm sharing it because every single person I stop on the street has a story too. Mental health doesn't discriminate and neither does MENTAL Street Talk.
I started this series because I needed these conversations to exist. Raw, unscripted, on the street. Asking the questions most people are too afraid to ask out loud.
Why I do this?
Because every conversation started is one less person carrying it alone. That's it. That's the whole mission.