The yellow tulip represents happiness and hope. They also remind founder Julia Hansen of her two best friends who she lost to suicide when she was a sophomore in high school. The tulip was one friends favorite flower and yellow was the others favorite color. The Yellow Tulip is also the flower of HOPE. We wish they could have seen that even in the darkest places, hope is always there. We want young adults to be able to break out of this silence and to talk about mental illness, not suffer alone or feel ashamed. We want everyone to know that hope actually does happen. We do this through outreach and advocacy work, and by coming together as a community to talk about mental illness in the same way that we talk about any physical illness. Our mission is simple and clear: come together as a community to smash the stigma that surrounds mental health disorders. We are fiercely dedicated to reminding people that there are ways to get help, people there for them and that circumstances can and will change. Together we plant yellow tulip hope gardens, share our stories, and build community.

Goals: To smash the stigma surrounding mental illness To let people know that they are not alone and to be able to get the help that they need To create YTP communities To organize community conversations around stigma To get helpline magnets in all middle and high schools To let people know that there is hope out there and that things will get better

Summary of relevant work: 

We work with primarily middle and high schools in bringing communities together to plant yellow tulip Hope Gardens around Mental Health Awareness Week and then coming together again in May during Mental Health Awareness Month (in the USA) to celebrate the tulips and to build community. We are building a team of Yellow Tulip Ambassadors at schools across the USA in other countries that are eager to help us normalize the conversation around mental health disorders so no one feels alone and everyone is able to access the help they need. We are challenging perceptions about what mental health "looks" with our I Am More: Facing Stigma exhibit and we are hosting conversations in communities everywhere using our Facing Stigma: Creating Solutions curriculum.

Address: 

The Yellow Tulip Project 239 Foreside Road Falmouth, ME 04105

Email: 
suzanne@theyellowtulipproject.org
Key partners: 

American Foundation for Suicide Prevention Maine Chapter Maine Seeds of Peace  Seeds of Independence Hardy Girls Healthy Women

Funders: 
  • Fox Family Foundation
  • Private individual donors
Seeking collaboration with: 
Other organizations
Experts by experience/service users
Researchers
Policy makers
Country: 
United States of America