Welcome to the Reality Check podcast. Psychosis is Real, so is Recovery.

On this episode, Ashley Weiss and Serena Chaudhry speak with Cecilia McGough, the Founder and Executive Director of Students with Psychosis.

Cecilia is a New York City-based mental health activist, nonprofit executive director at SWP, VASTS mentor at NASA Langley, keynote speaker, co-author, consultant, and former pulsar astronomer. Although being autistic and having schizophrenia, she refuses to let her diagnoses define her. McGough is the founder and executive director of the global nonprofit Students With Psychosis, a 501(c)(3) organization empowering students and advocates worldwide through community building, service, and collaboration.

Join us as we learn more about her journey and truly inspirational achievements.

Subscribe for more episodes of Reality Check, where we uncover the truth behind mental health, one story at a time.

For more information about Clear Answers to Louisiana Mental Health (CALM) and their Early Intervention Psychosis Program (EPIC NOLA), visit the website: www.calmnola.org

Podcast produced by Red Rock Branding – www.redrockbranding.com

Welcome to Reality Check. is Wednesday afternoon for us. Hi, Serena. We are really, really excited to have Cecilia McGow with us, founder of Students with Psychosis. I think that you were one of our first, like, we're kind of starstruck by psychosis influencers. And that like just...

Hi Ashley.

Mm-hmm.

finding out what you did and at the same time, sort of thinking about things that would help our students like go through these phases of life and their education and realizing that groups like you guys who are out there doing this was just like such a cool moment years ago. so it's when we got really excited and here we are with you on a podcast. So it's very, very.

Great to talk to you again about what you do.

Yeah,

we've had a... Yeah, I feel we're really lucky. We've had ⁓ several moments with you over the past year, right? We got to hang out at the conference in Berlin. You came to In My Mind in New Orleans this fall and here we are now. So for those who were not with us in either of those spaces, will you just start by telling our listeners a little about...

It's great to be here. Thank you so much for having me.

who you are and how you came to do the awesome advocacy work that you're doing.

Yeah, absolutely. So hello everyone. My name is Cecilia Miguel and I'm the founder and executive director of the nonprofit Students with Psychosis. So the work that we do there, we empower students and advocates worldwide through community building, service and collaboration. My why on why I went into advocacy is I'm actually someone living with schizophrenia. So it's something that's near and dear to my heart and I was officially diagnosed when I was a student at Penn State.

Right. Take us, I guess, a little bit through, I guess, your journey and kind of taking your own experience to this level and what your kind of mission is with, ultimate mission is with students with psychosis.

So big picture like vision when it comes to helping students living with psychosis really is talking about helping students meeting their goals because so often when someone is diagnosed with schizophrenia or experiencing psychosis symptoms, they're in college. It's during that age range. So it's helping with getting the resources to the students earlier on in their journey. Also,

or want to make sure that we're supporting the students because students are in school for a reason. They have different hopes or dreams that oftentimes come with having to also complete their major or get a degree. And unfortunately, when you're a student and you're in college and you're living with psychosis, sometimes not even the university knows what type of accommodations are out there or you haven't met another person living with psychosis.

So with SWP, students with psychosis, we connect students with students who are going through something similar, experiencing psychosis symptoms, also sharing different accommodations that they might find helpful. Also, when you're talking about representation of people, so more of a large picture, how we help with tackling the stigma around schizophrenia psychosis, when you think about better representation of people living with schizophrenia,

And psychosis, you want to see more leaders. You want to see more people living with psychosis in all the different fields. So not just in the mental health space. That's what I also love about my work is when I work with students, I work with students that are in the mental health field, but also students that are studying chemical engineering or students that are studying art and such. my personal, where my more my background is in astrophysics. So I love seeing the representation

in all the different fields with the students that I work with.

Yeah, because really if we're talking about breaking down stigma, it's right, it's it's enhancing understanding across these silos that we work in, live in and breathe in, unfortunately. So can you tell us a little bit about what the work looks like with students with psychosis on the different campuses and some of the lessons learned that you've had with SWP?

Yeah, so with SWP we have our virtual programming so we connect students all across the globe with one of my favorite programs that we have is we have a live chat that students get to connect twice a day every single day, weekends, holidays and such. So it's helping to tackle the loneliness issue when it comes to, I mean, even people who don't have psychosis struggle with loneliness, but that's particularly something that our students struggle with. So every single day.

from noon to 1 p.m. Eastern Standard Time, midnight to 1 a.m. Eastern Standard Time, we have a live chat where students can check in. We have also had different virtual meetings such as creative meetings, peer support groups, discussion groups and such. But then when it comes to being on campuses, those are more of outreach events such as having like a guest speaker speaking in the classroom or holding more of like a social.

at the university where students get to connect and meet other students or advocates living with psychosis. Something that I also really like about our work is when we go into the classroom, we're not just talking to students living with psychosis, but also future mental health care professionals who are studying to become mental health care professionals. So they're learning from our students, from the lived experience perspective. that's hopefully will have a trickle down effect later on when they're ⁓

Mm-mm.

in a more of a practitioner setting.

Yeah, I love that. you guys, I guess, what is your perspective on doing your work in high schools? And are you guys doing any work in high schools?

I love that question, especially for me, I've started having more pronounced symptoms in high school. So this is a relevant topic for high school students as well. Unfortunately, with SWP, we're 18 years old and up. But when it comes to some outreach, we've had some outreach events in high school, like we've had interns go to high school and give like presentations and such, or we've had more outreach events that are open to the general public.

And we ask if someone is under the age of 18, that they have a guardian, a parent, and such accompany them to the public outreach event. But when it comes to our students enrolled and in our different programs and such, it's 18 and up.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, I think the beauty of being in a classroom or on a campus is not only inspiring young people to, well, destigmatizing, inspiring young people to potentially go into healthcare, but really empowering other young people to identify symptoms in friends and or, you know, other students and be able to help guide them in the direction of getting support for what's going on.

I agree and also having the conversation about psychosis in a more relaxed setting or with fellow peers can be a little less intimidating. I remember when we first started out at Penn State, we had quite a few people come to one of our outreach events or in started coming to different events and they would start off by saying something like, I think my roommate is experiencing some of these symptoms or

Mm-hmm.

I have a friend or or a sibling. And then later on, when they've built that trust with them, they're like, I'm actually the roommate, or I'm actually the sibling, and such. So I love how we can create spaces like that, which are a little less intimidating, especially since there's so much stigma around the diagnosis. Sometimes you get pushback from parents as well when it comes to seeking care. I know that was in my case where I wanted to go to the doctor, I wanted to get

Yeah. Ready?

you

medical help, but I got a lot of pushback from my parents and I was worried about it showing up on like an insurance bill or something. So again, like even though we definitely don't take the place of a medical care professional and such, and we definitely encourage someone who's experiencing these symptoms to go seek professional help, but we also help with starting that conversation in less intimidating way.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, I love that. What would you suggest, I guess with Calm, we do a lot of psychosis awareness, early detection work, and also we have a lot of people with lived experience who are involved with that. And our desire is that ultimately we could

help someone long before there was ever serious enough symptoms that they'd have to go to the hospital. What would the ideal framework be for us to take calm and sort of send that message? What could we say, what could we do that you think could help decrease the number of young people that

have to go through getting so sick that they end up going to the hospital. That happens to so many of our young people where I just feel like there has to be some way to avoid that.

But I absolutely agree that we are when it comes to when someone's first experiencing or reaching out for for help, it's oftentimes in a place of crisis and

oftentimes going to like a mental health stay and such. I know that was the case for me when I first opened up about my schizophrenia symptoms. I went to the on campus mental health space and such, and they had me write down a form on the form. And that was the first time I ever wrote down on a form that I was hallucinating and such. And they brought me back to like a room and they talked to me and such. And they were like, okay, the next stop is they were going to take me to the ER.

And they brought, luckily in this case, they had like a taxi come and get me and such. So it was not like as dramatic and such, but we can do better than that. know, if it's, if we're, when someone first talks about schizophrenia or first talks about seeing things that aren't there or believing things that aren't true and such, or like it's, we need to make sure that we're having those conversations in a way that we aren't overreacting.

because it can get in the way of someone wanting to reach out for help again. And so to go back to the big question that you're asking, just normalizing the conversation around talking about hallucinations or delusions or other types of psychosis symptoms, I really hope that there's a day where we can talk about hallucinations as openly as someone talking about they had a bad dream.

Mm-hmm.

Mmm.

Mm-hmm.

Because if someone starts talking about they had a really rough nightmare and such, you're not going to you know, ship them off and put them in. Right. You know, you might, if it's something that's also like getting in the way of their quality of health, and like their quality of life and affecting their health, like say they're struggling with falling asleep and such, or you can see that they're really distressed by these nightmares, then yeah, you're going to maybe take it a little bit more seriously, and have like additional steps and all that.

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Send him to the ER. Yeah.

But I really hope that we could normalize that conversation around talking about hallucination again, not having that overreaction.

Mm-hmm. Yeah, the overreaction is so significant. And I'll see that in trainees or in my psychiatry residents or in students. It's really like kind of not, I think it comes from fear of

Yeah.

of the unknown, also, you know, not feeling comfortable with going further past the, have a hallucination. It's like, you have to feel comfortable kind of going further and feeling normalized in the conversation to understand like that this is not an acute situation.

And I don't think that they feel prepared or with, with that like skill, it's almost a skill set. don't even like thinking about it like that because it seems like more of a human skill set that should come naturally. But, but, but, you know, from the education side of like preparing people to see this as like a spectrum, like I could have nightmares every single night that wake me up. That could lead to such severe insomnia that I had to go to the hospital.

Wait.

in the same way that I could have like an occasional that makes me upset, but it's not like, I can still go to work. I can still do my day to day. And the same thing with hallucinations. I have plenty of patients that have hallucinations on the regular and they're raising kids and working in whatever.

Right, doing life.

Yeah. But I think you speak to this need for us on a human level, just to

with the uncomfortable, right? To be able to show up as a compassionate human when someone's sharing something that's difficult for them, right? Or that's challenging for them, and to embrace, to create the space and just really listen and then walk with them to take these next steps.

But we're talking, so we're talking about hallucinations, which are symptoms, you know, that ⁓ people are more familiar with. But I want to think about, I want to ask you in your own personal experience or your work on college campuses, what are some of the other symptoms, perhaps the ones that present earlier or the changes in behavior that you would want?

teachers, professors, other students to be able to recognize is maybe something's changing for this human and I should ask them, I should check in, I should see if they need help.

That's a great question because in my experience, whether it's from personal life experience or from hearing from our community members who are students, oftentimes professors or roommates or RAs and such, residential assistants, might see these symptoms earlier on than before anyone goes and reaches out for help or especially if like a student is

Hmm.

moved away from home and at university and such. So it might even be for the family members might know that something's going on. So it's great to have those conversations to professors, fellow students, could be roommates, RAs and such. Something that I would say to look for is if a student is struggling to get to class. if there is a, when you're seeing like like tardies or

Mm-hmm.

their ⁓ absences and such. And it's from a student that maybe you didn't see that earlier on in the semester. So you're seeing them not coming to class as often. Or also when it comes to turning into in assignments and such. Of course, this isn't an indicator right away that schizophrenia or psychosis. This could be a whole plethora of different mental health conditions and such. what it definitely wouldn't hurt to check in.

Mm-hmm.

and see if that person is struggling and such. So that's what I would put out there. I would also suggest that if someone is, with self-care, ⁓ so you see that they're coming to class and,

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Of course, if it's an 8am class, like let them come in their PJs for goodness sakes. I am not a morning person. Like I will be right there with them in my PJs, you know. So of course, you know, and it's okay to like go to class and not you don't have to, you know, it's not a fashion show or whatnot. But if you're seeing someone who is like struggling with some basic self care and such, that's something that you might want to reach out to them.

Hahaha

Okay.

Right, right.

Thank

but also in a respectful way as well. Because if someone's struggling with self care, that can be embarrassing. Also making it in a way that is not a barrier. I know for me, I've had different chapters in my life where I've struggled with isolation and some part of my isolation has been struggling with self care and I'm too embarrassed to go outside or like I haven't taken a shower so I don't want to go outside and be around people or

Mm-hmm.

My hair is, you know, like all befuddled and such and or like I'm struggling with ⁓ executive function and tasks like doing laundry. So I'm struggling with getting my laundry done and such and I'm self-conscious or my outfits are becoming very creative with whatever's left in the, with what's ever left. So those are just some indicators that I would from other personal lived experience or hearing from community members. If you're seeing students turning in assignments.

Hahaha

not on time or not training them at all or struggling with coming to class or with personal self-care and such. Those are some, at least some things to check in on and see if they're doing okay.

Yeah, when you were talking, I was just thinking about change. You know, that there's a shift or like a drift. And the only way to know that is if you know, if you're familiar, you know, and familiar with the person to notice a drift away from their usual.

Mm-hmm.

I think like every time I show up to the office with like full on makeup, my team thinks something's wrong. Like I'm going somewhere because it's not my, it's not my usual, you know, but,

Yeah

Yeah.

that's where, you know, teachers and people have this opportunity around people that they see every day over the years, you know, and, can note, take note, not out of judgment. It's just like, it's just something different.

And kind of what's this about? Not just saying, do you have auditory or visual hallucinations? Are you suicidal or homicidal? Which are like the main questions that unfortunately a lot of people ask when it comes to assessing for psychosis. And it's just terrible.

Mm-hmm.

It is and you know what this got me thinking about there should be a validated assessment that is like created by peers, right? People with lived experience about what to ask for when you're assessing for psychosis, right? We have all this like lingo that we use in our assessments that I think in and of itself is they're off putting right and they're very jargony and very just

Mm-hmm.

diagnostic oriented, which they're supposed to be, but language matters and how we approach these conversations and how we try to engage people and get them to trust us to talk about something that's really, really scary and confusing. We need to be more mindful with our language. Write that down on your list of things.

Okay, yeah.

I agree, language

definitely matters. And I think that it's also important to have, I know I'm going to probably sound like I keep repeating this, but lived experience is so important as well, because you could have these different assessments, or you can talk about schizophrenia, talk about psychosis and symptoms and such. But especially if you see a fellow peer from your same university speaking up about that they're going through something similar.

Mm-hmm.

At least from my personal experience, it becomes less scary. It becomes more normalized and such when you're seeing fellow peers speaking up and also saying that they have schizophrenia or having a diagnosis that includes psychosis and such. So it's important that we have more people speaking up about schizophrenia, about psychosis. But I also want to say that we shouldn't have roads tinted sunglasses about this because

when you open up about your schizophrenia, it does sometimes have consequences and such. So I would never pressure someone to open up about their diagnosis if they aren't ready. Also, it's something that I definitely talk about a lot with the students that we work with. It doesn't have to be all or nothing. Like when you're open up about your diagnosis, it doesn't mean like, I'm going to now post it all on the internet and social media.

Mm-hmm.

You

Right. Right.

And I want to introduce myself each time I'm like, hi, like, hi, I'm Cecilia. I have schizophrenia. You know, like it doesn't

have to be all or nothing. You can, if you're open about your diagnosis, it can still mean maybe with your group of friends or maybe in the classroom, maybe you're not open on the internet about it because people can be concerned about their digital footprint and such. So I just wanted to bring that topic to light as well. When we're talking about lived experience and the importance of storytelling and such.

you

It's not all or nothing when it comes to being open about it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's such a good point and something we talk about often at our ⁓ clinic. mean, we talk about it a lot in the context of dating, right? And, or, you know, people are, yeah, I think it's easy in a moment of sort of excitement and nervousness to fall into that all or nothing. And like, I'm meeting someone, I like them, they need to know everything about me. And then you, right? Like on the first date, within the first five minutes, identify yourself as someone.

with schizophrenia, which isn't wrong or bad, but just helping people to be thoughtful and giving themselves grace in how they want to, you know, show up and share who they are.

Yeah. And just like, you know, to share meaningful things, you have to trust someone. you know, it's what I'll always, you know, there's so people are, young people are, you know, asking about dating and when I should say this. And when I'm like, well, when are you, when do you feel comfortable telling them about like your childhood? It's like, once you trust someone, then you can, you don't want to tell them.

Right.

Mm-hmm.

really a whole lot of anything until you trust them. So it really, it's not so much about telling them about schizophrenia, but just like trusting another individual to get close to. I was thinking, Cecilia, that having people with lived

Right.

May.

tell our stories, like, and that's how I approach.

you know, that's how I'm with my patients is just wanting to hear their story and their words that it's really been helpful. They, that has helped me with talking to other patients and, know, and using these like real world or just like words, you know, I remember very vividly, I was like, we were talking about ideas of reference and,

I was like, do you feel like in my office, like that green book over there, like means something? And they were like, are you reading my mind? Like, no, I'm not reading your mind. But, and they're like, has someone else, has that happened to someone else? I'm like, yeah, it happens here all the time where things are taking on meaning. And they were like, ⁓ I was like, yeah, so that's this, you know, it wasn't, it wasn't sort of this textbook way of assessing for ideas of reference, just like sort of giving.

real world examples and using language that's, and that just comes from learning from my patients, you know, and teaching me better ways of, of, of talking to people so that it like feels more comfortable and, just like a more of a narrative, you know, and not a symptom checklist. so that's just one of the, I think my personal, one of the personal values.

the value that I've had of, know, luckily the people I've been able to be around that have shared their lived experience with me has just made me such a better, made me feel so much better about as a clinician, you know, not that I'm the greatest clinician, but it's made me feel more confident.

You're pretty up there. You're pretty up there.

So

tell us, Cecilia, what's on the horizon for students with psychosis?

Yeah, so with SWP we've been really busy behind the scenes. We have a new app that's launching, so I'm super excited about that. It's been, I've ever been on the side of like developing an app. takes, you know, it takes definitely some time, lots of love and such. Of course, also having a lot of different like accommodating features in it, getting the feedback from our community and such. So I'm so excited about the app being launched soon. So excited about that.

very

Mm-hmm

Yes.

That's awesome.

Also, we're shifting into also having a service project with SWP. So we talked about earlier about how we connect students with other students that are going through similar experiences, having more of the peer support setting and having a creative meetings or the live chats and such, or in the classroom talking about schizophrenia, psychosis. But also we want to take another step further where we have service projects where we are showing and showcasing leaders within

local communities who are doing service projects. And I love that idea because when you think of someone with schizophrenia, think of someone with psychosis, do you think of leaders? Do you think of leadership? And so by having a student doing something that they are passionate about in their community, a service project, I really love how that is also taking our advocacy into different in different situations. It's not just within like the mental health field or just on campus.

It's also highlighting the leadership aspect of someone living with psychosis.

Yeah, think that's wonderful.

Yeah, and you gave us a taste of that in my mind when you presented the award.

Mm-hmm.

Yes. my goodness. That was such an

amazing event, by the way. That was my first time in New Orleans and it did not disappoint. I had alligator for the first time. I know I keep bringing that up, but it was just like, I had to eat the alligator. Sorry for vegetarians that are on the call. But it was such a beautiful joke aside and such, ⁓ it was such a beautiful and meaningful event. And I loved how it had so much creativity. You got to showcase.

Thank

No.

It's

all the beautiful artwork and also the music there was amazing. You got to hear lived experience testimonies as well. So it was just such a meaningful event. And I'm so glad you got to meet our VP of partnerships, Davey Yu, who received a Live Your Possible Award there for his amazing advocacy and such. So again, thank you so much for having SWP at the event.

It was great. People are still talking about it and we have ⁓ his flowers, the origami flowers are all over our office. So I'll do some story pictures with them. Everybody loves them. They're beautiful reminder.

Yes. Which is so cool. He gifted.

Yeah.

Yeah, it was a great example of leadership and right like

Amazing.

honoring advocacy and leadership. So we were excited to have you there. right, as we move to a close, is there anything else either of you want to share or

Yeah, for sure.

I could go on all night. So Cecilia, any final words of wisdom that you want to share?

You

Again, thank you so much for all the advocacy work that you all do at Calm. The work that you're doing is super meaningful. I remember the first time seeing your work on Instagram. has such a distinctive, like artistic, like in such a, I know empowering can be kind of like a buzzword and such, but just a very not scary, but also inspiring approach that you take when it comes to Calm. I love how

It made me as a person living with schizophrenia want to learn more. So I just want to say that what you're doing, you're doing a great job when it comes to your marketing. And also you both are like some of the coolest people out there when it comes to like, it's just like, honestly, like, you have this warmth. ⁓ When I met you, whether it was in Berlin or earlier this year, or actually when we were in Chicago and such, it just feels like we're

been friends forever and such. So thank you so much for creating a space that is warm and receptive for someone living with schizophrenia. So often people who have psychosis or schizophrenia feel unseen or unheard. So thank you for having a space where we feel heard and seen.

Oh, well, that was sweet. Thank you. Well, I hope we meet again somewhere else in the world in 2026. All right. Take good care. Bye.

That really, really means a lot. think I'm going to start crying. yeah. Thank you very much.

⁓ Yes, definitely.

I love to plan. All right, bye.

right, see you. Bye.

Thank you.