Don’t Talk About Your Mental Illness Online…Right?
“Careful who you mention it to, as you don’t want to be known for it.”
I never used to talk about my mental illness. It was on my mind almost every minute of the day, how could it not be? And yet, it remained absent from my conversations. After a lot of work and courage, I managed to mention it to a few friends, and I started opening to therapists. It was still few and far between, but I was trying to open up more. But then someone close to me gave me this warning:
Careful who you mention it to, as you don’t want to be known for it.
It’s good advice. It’s well-intentioned. Right?
Here’s the thing, even if advice is given with good intentions, that does not make it good advice. But I didn’t know that yet. And so I continued to hide this large part of myself. Because even though my mental illness was not the most important thing about me, it was a large chunk of who I was. My depression started at the age of fifteen; when you’re trying to work out your identity and grow into the adult you’ll become.
But I couldn’t, as I wrapped around the finger of a personality disorder. And now that I am becoming who I am, I can see that a large part of that person is due to my mental illness. It made me a fighter; it made me…
