For those of you who have recovered from mental illness, or are currently ill?

Question

Does/did it make the battle harder for you facing many people who do not understand that many forms of mental illness exist, and are just as, if not more so in many cases, damaging a physical illness.


When most people who have never been born with, or pushed into mental illness, react to these illnesses the view those suffering as nothing more than drama queens.

I suffered from clinical depression for around three years. The things I felt during that time were some of the most unnatural body responses I think it possible for any man to feel. My anxiety in public often brought on severe panic attacks, and my massive suicidal periods left me hardly physically able to do anything.

It is sad that much of our society is still ignorant of what exactly mental illness is.

Answer 1

Tat's answer ticks me off, nobody ever talks about enabling paralyzed people or people who are blind! Obviously, they have to learn to do stuff on their own and not get too much help, but geez, my husband is legally blind and he can't drive, so am I enabling him by doing all the driving and once in awhile reading fine print directions to him?

I think the problem is like chronic pain, nobody can see anything is wrong with you. Even for a depressed person (I have bipolar disorder) I can't figure out why when I want very much to do something, or I have to pay bills, why can't I just DO IT???? It's the most bizaare thing. There must be a part of your brain that initiates action, I think, and that malfunctions.

I don't think anyone really thinks I'm a drama queen. I think others are horrified and are afraid I will suicide. I'm pretty eloquent, tho, so maybe I run into less static than others. Also, I'm female, which I'm sure helps. And I was always incredibly ambitious. Plus they have seen my manic side.

So yes, I think they don't get it, and the problem is, THEY THINK THEY KNOW WHAT DEPRESSION IS because they have been sad before. Nobody would ever tell a blind or paralyzed person that they understand, but you should just get over it?? That's a really rambly answer, but time is on your side. People are getting better and better about it, and depression has less stigma than before. Bipolar has more, and schizophrenia the most of all.

What I do now is talk about it with people that seem safe, because a lot of the problem is people cover up their mental illnesses so people think mentally ill folks are all axe murderers.

Answer 2

How true it is but at the same time we do not want to enable the mentally ill or they will only get worse. If the secondary gains of depression are strong enough the individual will never recover. Society may never understand so we must learn to live in it.