HAYLEY TURNER

Master Level Clinician- HealthWest’s Transition Age Team

My name is Hayley Turner. I am 29 years old and a Master Level Clinician/Therapist at HealthWest. I work on the Transition Age Team, and I love helping people. I identify as a demisexual lesbian, and as non-binary and also gender queer. I also use they/them/theirs pronouns.

Some very specific things happened to me as a child and throughout my life that fueled my passion to work in the mental health field. Due to the trauma I experienced as a child, I developed a few diagnoses, which I tried to deny as a teen, and as a young adult. I remember not being able to control my emotions and not understanding why, attempting to kill myself over and over and over…and not understanding where it was coming from…because I couldn’t remember. In order to protect myself, my brain made me forget.

When I was 14, I started to remember. I was abused by 2 different men, not in my immediate family. I started self-harming, daily, and continued to self-harm into my early 20’s. I experienced suicidal thoughts, daily. I have attempted to kill myself over 12 times since I was 14. I was petrified of psychiatrists, as I was always told I would be labeled as crazy and locked away.

At 19-20 I found social work and I was taught how the mental health system truly operates. When I was 21 a good friend dragged me out of bed, fed me breakfast, and escorted me to my first appointment with a psychiatrist. And for the first time, I was labeled as some things that I didn’t want. (Around 14 I was also putting two and two together about my sexuality). But this, in part, saved my life. I was medicated appropriately for the first time, and my self-harming and suicidal thoughts gradually decreased. I could laugh again, really laugh. It had been so long since I hadn’t acted fake or tried to hide how broken and empty I felt.

Stories such as mine are far too common, and so is abuse in general. Every single client I have worked with has experienced some form of trauma, and sexual abuse is one of the main that has been spoken to me. I believe that everyone has something that they struggle with, or have gone through.

I am very fortunate that my team cares for and accepts me and UNDERSTANDS me. My supervisor has helped me grow so much with my diagnoses and as a person in general. My spouse also works for our agency, and I would be lost without them. They understand my mental health, all too well, and we are great supporters to one another. My family is also in a place where they understand why I acted or behaved the way that I did, and why I acted on dangerous impulses.