The following is a transcript of a speech given by Melissa McMahon, the state Labor member for Macalister, in Queensland parliament on Thursday.
I make this statement to the House not because it is easy, but because it is hard. But also perhaps if more statements like this were made more regularly by people with platforms like this, then perhaps for the next person, it will not be so hard. A diagnosis of PTSD and anxiety adjustment disorder is certainly not uncommon after a lifetime of uniformed service. And I admit that I have been comfortable with people believing that this may be the source of my most recent anxiety. But the reality is far harder to understand.A mental illness and its recovery is not a linear process. It is not simply a matter of getting a diagnosis, seeking a treatment and taking steps to recovery. It’s all over the shop.
I was subsequently left in the care of a group of older teenagers. I still vividly remember the first, the second time this occurred to me, but mercifully after that, it is a blur. Most afternoons I was shopped around the neighbourhood to other teenagers and men, often exchanged for a can of soft drink.
Courtesy of our church, I came into the company and under the supervision of the last person on earth who should ever be granted such a position: a child sex offender recently released for a particularly heinous child sex crime. It just happened to coincide with my early teenage years, when I would do just about anything to avoid standing out and drawing attention to myself. I wish I had had the courage to tell my parents, my friends, anyone, any of this at the time. But even on reflection, I was just not strong enough. Few people ever are.
Now a lifetime of being introspective meant that I knew I needed help, and I sought it where I could. My GP, a counsellor, a psychologist, friends and colleagues. I knew what I had to do and I went about it in my usual methodical fashion. My children had found me unresponsive. Paramedics and police were called to my home. I was resuscitated, I was transported.
I know that I’m not my past. My trauma does not define me. Yada yada yada. But I stand here and I decide to make this public.