Joel Kaplan and his sister grew up on suburban Long Island. Joel was on the debate team and the first trombone in the orchestra and band in high school. But in his senior year, Joel's mom noticed changes in her son's behavior. "He would come home...

Joel Kaplan and his sister grew up on suburban Long Island. Joel was on the debate team and the first trombone in the orchestra and band in high school. But in his senior year, Joel's mom noticed changes in her son's behavior. "He would come home from school and instead of doing all his activities he would go to his room," Lorraine Kaplan says. "He was bright and able to keep up his grades, but emotionally he was falling a part."

A child psychiatrist believed Joel's problems where just a phase, but his emotional state continued to unravel and Joel was admitted to a hospital. It was the early 1970's and Lorraine had never heard of mental illness. Her son, filled with so much promise, was diagnosed with schizophrenia. The doctor had this advice: "Don't tell anyone because the stigma for this illness is so horrendous that people won't look at you your husband or your daughter in the same way even if he goes into remission," Lorraine says.

So for years, they kept Joel's sickness a secret. And for Lorraine, the silence was just as painful as the illness. "Silence makes you have shame, it makes you embarrassed, it makes you have isolation," Lorraine says.

The statistics are overwhelming. Close to 58 million Americans have some form of mental illness. Yet fewer than one third of adults and half of children receive treatment. Families say part of the reason for not getting treatment is the stigma and the shame.

The National Alliance on Mental Illness, or NAMI, is committed moving mental illness into the mainstream. Walk-a-thons are raising awareness. The hope is for a new openness about mental illness. "People will get help who need help so that people will talk to their friends about it. It's a horrible thing to be living with an illness you can't talk about," says Janet Susin, President of NAMI.

Lorraine joined NAMI years ago and it changed her and her family. She says, "I began to feel a freedom that I had not felt for 10 years and I think it was the best thing that ever happened to my son that suddenly we could talk about what was happening to him without shame and without guilt."

She became an advocate for better laws, housing and treatment. She helped develop this school curriculum called Breaking the Silence used in schools across the country. Susin says, "It tries really to put a human face on mental illness and to say it can happen to anyone and that it's nothing to be ashamed of."

So much has changed and improved in the decades since Joel first struggled and learned to accept his illness. Two years ago he died of a heart attack. Letters from his friends express the respect they felt for Joel and his difficult journey. Lorraine says, "I think we've come a long way – not all the way but we have come a long way and I hope I played a role in that and that our group has played a role in that. I am extraordinarily grateful for that and this work that I do is his legacy."

A legacy that lives on, thanks to Joel and his family.

Click Here to Learn More About the National Alliance on Mental Health