What I'm Most Thankful For

Family and friends, of course. But most of all a mother who turned tragedy into compassion, fear into love, and ignorance into understanding.

A portrait of my mother, June Judge (née Brandmill), in the 1950s.

By Michael Judge

With Thanksgiving just around the corner, I’ve been reflecting on what I’m most thankful for. First and foremost, my family and friends, who, over time, have grown together, like a tree that grafts with a neighboring tree, making both stronger.

The thought came to me this past weekend when my dear friend Eloy Barragán debuted his new ballet “Unfinished”—Sin Terminar in Spanish—which was inspired by my family’s experience with mental illness, and the many ways in which my older brothers’ lives were altered forever and left “unfinished” when schizophrenia shattered their lives in young adulthood.

As he wrote last week in a beautiful TFP essay, “Michael’s family story—his two older brothers, Steve and John, suffered terribly from schizophrenia, the latter taking his own life at 21—moved me greatly, as did his family’s perseverance and determination to advocate for the estimated 14 million others in the U.S. w…