‘I thought seeing the ad slogans on vans was a sign someone was trying to kill me’

WHEN Brian Scott began to believe that advertising signs on vans meant someone was out to kill him, he knew that it was time to get help.

Brian, 46, from Dundee, described it as “terrifying”.

But what the Whitfield man didn’t realise at the time was he that he was suffering from paranoid schizophrenia and his visual hallucinations were symptomatic of his illness.

Brian (pictured right) spoke to the Tele — along with others at mental health charity Hearing Voices Network (HaVeN) — in a bid to break down the barriers and stigma t hat surround mental illness.

He said: “It was terrifying and I didn’t really understand what was happening to me.

“All I knew was that if I walked down the street and saw advertising slogans on the side of vans, I believed it was a sign that someone wanted to kill me.”

This week, HaVen is holding a Voices Seen photographic exhibition i n Dundee University’s Dalhousie Building.

Brian is one of the photographers featured and today he told the Tele how the charity, and the work he has done for the exhibition, has helped him.

Now, he hopes it will help others. Brian said: “Just getting out and about has helped. If you stay in all the time, the walls close around you and you feel worse than ever.

“I’ve had a lot of support from the charity and thanks to them, people are becoming more accepting of mental illness.

“If people like me tell our stories, I hope it breaks down stigma and barriers more than ever.”

Rona Foy, 38, from Ardler, is a volunteer trustee with the charity.

She too has been involved with the exhibition and spoke candidly about her own mental illness.

She said: “Although I never actually heard voices, I used to have some really bad thoughts.

“I used to think I wanted to hurt myself and while I never attempted suicide, I would have suicidal thoughts.”

She said she believes that the major trigger for her condition — eventually diagnosed as anxiety and depression — was the murder of her best friend at school in Dundee in 1994. Paul Stronner was only 15 when he was killed in an apparently motiveless attack by 17-year-old Stuart Swan, who was later detained without limit of time.

Rona added: “Paul was my best friend and after he was killed, I really suffered.”

After joining HaVeN, she went on to become a volunteer in the kitchen before becoming a trustee, offering peer support to others.

She said: “I have experienced these types of mental health issues, which puts me in a unique position to listen to others.

“When you suffer from mental health you feel ashamed — we want to end that stigma.”

Audrey Donald, 53, from Lochee, has been involved with HaVeN since its i nception about 16 years ago.

She said: “It was after I moved out of my granny’s house, when I was in my twenties, that I began hearing voices of people who weren’t there. It was so scary.

“I was diagnosed with schizophrenia — which is now controlled with medication — but I want to talk about it to help others. The Voices Seen project has helped me loads.”

The exhibition finishes on Friday.