they are, though. My nerve pain, dysautonomia, and chronic fatigue from long COVID are all dismissed as being just in my head
Who is going to tell them?
(I have seen a few of these very examples.)
Especially the first one
Where’s the sports ball coach saying “walk it off” to a person with no legs?
Yeah, about that… my Depression-raised dad didn’t even think physical problems were an excuse for slacking or being negative. I think it was the general mood of the 30s when he was a teenager. There was very little public help for people in trouble - basically you could turn to charity or starve. So people were highly motivated to keep going in spite of whatever happened. Bouncing back from problems ASAFP was a survival trait. I always said if my dad saw me get my leg cut off by a chainsaw or something, he would probably run over and say cheerfully, “Oh well, you’ve still got your other leg, just hop!”
If you have a physical illness you go to physical therapy, so if you have a mental illness you should go to mental therapy.
As the closest friend of someone depressed, I have to say such illness isn’t the same as physical illness. Sure all those advices won’t change anything, but that’s just because the person doesn’t have the will to make them happen. People around the depressed person can definitely help, just by spending time with the person, and encouraging the person to accompany them to activities. Biggest danger is insisting too much as you might turn into a burden. Sometimes I think it’s just better not to talk
People act this way because they know how cold and callous the world is. No one cares if you have a mental disorder or psychological difficulties and if you are unable to hold down a job your future will take place living in the street. It is a harsh and brutal reality. Good luck.
I care, and I know a lot of other people do as well.
Caring is something you do not something you feel. What exactly do you do to help them?
Well considering that a lot of people suffering are experiencing economic problems in my country or problems with their environment; like not being able to receive health care and suffering from treatable physical illness, not being able to get out of sticky situations with abusive people or dynamics, having employment issues, or being homeless/in debt and so forth - I can’t exactly give them a place to live or give them money because I really have none to give.
In those cases, what can I personally do for them? Of course I can listen, I can give solicited advice, and I can point them to the resources they have access to.
I advocate for those resources to be more accessible for all. Health-allowing, I want to volunteer my time and become more politically active.
Oh I’m sorry i misread your response. You’re saying you don’t do anything to help them but you want to seem like you do. That you’re a fake ass poser, pretending to care in some virtue signaling fraud so others will think favorably of you even though you haven’t actually done anything to deserve it. Now I understand. Like I said at the start of this waste of time of a conversation, the vast majority of people don’t care.
You’re saying you don’t do anything to help them but you want to seem like you do.
I am not doing well. It’s not an excuse and it doesn’t make me lesser. I am working to be healthy. You are free to perceive reality however you wish, I choose to believe the world is a friendly place. If I was healthy, I would be able to do more for myself as well as others.
I have experienced some pretty terrible things. I know very well that life can be unkind, but I still persevere and I’m working towards healing. Thanks for your feedback, not everybody is the saint you expect them to be, but it doesn’t make them lesser or bad.
So you are saying that you go to homeless camps and explain to them what resources are available to them and personally assist them with applying for those resources?
Considering that I have volunteered my time to help and feed the homeless when I was healthy, and have volunteered a significant amount of time in my life, I’d be willing to if I had an organization alongside me.
Why do you feel the need to purity test me?
None of this has anything to do with our conversation and I have no tests for you. I hope you the best and good luck.
Hope probably requires action too, otherwise nothing backs it up and grounds it into reality.
Thanks for chatting, sorry it wasn’t worthwhile for you - it was worth it for me.
I’ll keep working on myself, and when I am the shining beacon that even you could stand beside, maybe we could have another chat about caring and action.
The medication stigma is based on basically magic thinking: That medicine is alien, external, unnatural while the human body is pure and natural. Therefore any difference between medicated and unmedicated is artificial and caused by the medicine.
No, the body is fucking dropping terror chemicals in my bloodstream. It is changing my personality from easygoing and outgoing to snippy and reclusive. The body is malfunctioning and changing my personality for the worse.
The medicine is reducing the amount and effectiveness of the body’s excess of terror chemicals. It restores normality.
For me, I have a stigma to medication because the side effects are terrifying. I almost died from SSRIs, I got very ill and also suicidal. On benzos, I got paradoxically anxious and angry after cessation/when I wasn’t taking them (I am not an angry person). I took them as prescribed - always.
I only got more and more unstable after taking various psychiatric drugs, and everyone in my family who has taken psychiatric drugs was not better off for it. Seems like suicidal ideation is a common reaction for those in my family. Perhaps there is a genetic cause for it, like how we metabolize drugs.
I don’t know a single person in my life who has had a good experience, but if you or someone you know has had a good experience, I’m happy for you. It’s just unfair to say it’s magical thinking when there are real life reasons why people are hesitant.
hugs you
I know this doesn’t change what your body is doing to you, but I hope it at least makes you feel loved.
Thanks, friend! I’m all in all in a consistent good place and living a very active functional life, but it’s 30% medication, 30% being stubbornly careful of what I let into my head, and 40% luck.
“Don’t you think that eating healthy food every days is changing you from who you really are?”
munches on bacon flavored doritos judgingly
theres also the possibility that life today is truly a terrible situation for many, and your body refuses to lie to itself.
and its way better than it usually has been.
But no one thinks the same about statins, for example
It’s not medication, it’s medication that addresses mental illness
Nah, I ran into it going on thyroid hormones too. My parents had a couple church friends that were absolutely adamant that I needed to take the ‘natural’ desiccated pig thyroid instead of the ‘unnatural’ synthetic thyroid hormones. Their faith said that their god doesn’t make mistakes, that either he wants you to have this condition, or he’s provided a perfect natural remedy, so synthetic medicines existing is hubris.
It’s more common with mental health meds, but it’s not like there’s a law saying it’s the only meds people can be shitty about.
If you say ‘mental illness’ 3 times in the mirror, someone with a Live Laugh Love t-shirt will appear behind you and ask if you’ve tried going outside.
Haha brilliant 😄
And now the cropping is fixed, so the comments deriding the cropping don’t make sense anymore.
The confusion it will cause…
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ok, but in america this IS how physical diseases are treated
Me: Doc, I’m in constant pain, my lower back is killing me, my hips are killing me, and random parts of my body go numb or twitch and randomly hurt for no rhyme or reason.
Doc: You need to lose weight and see a therapist, this is most likely depression and anxiety.
Therapist: Yes, you have depression and anxiety, but the 7 years of therapy you’ve had shows it’s not just anxiety or depression causing this, advocate for yourself.
Friend: Have you tried yoga?
In the four european countries I’ve lived in as a physically disabled person unable to work, this is exactly how I’ve been treated as well.
Good advice is to look at what America does, and do the opposite.
Source: American citizen
I’ll be honest, going outside does help. The problem is when you don’t have a compelling enough reason to (in my personal experience. This might not be everybody’s experience)
You can go buy beer or something.
Mental illness and alcohol is not something I want to mix
Yeah at least i know getting drunk makes me more depressed not less
If it made you less depressed, you can easily become an alcoholic
I’m an alcoholic, definitely makes me more depressed.
Then why do you drink? Sorry that this question is so blunt, lol
I’m sober for 9 months.
When I did drink it was to escape, which is the real reason most alcoholics become alcoholics
It’s not comparable. Whenever I see these posts, it always feels as if the author is suggesting that mental illness is just like a flu, you just get it accidentally and can’t help it and you just need to rest to get over it.
But that is completely wrong. Unless you have developed schizophrenia or bipolar etc, that’s a whole different kettle of fish which will likely require medication for the rest of your life. You need to help yourself out of depression and anxiety etc. You can’t wait around for it to disappear, you need to see a therapist, take your ass outside and force yourself into uncomfortable situations.
You’ll have days you can’t do anything and that’s completely okay. But I feel like the ‘nurturing’ of mental health can do some harm.
See Soteria Houses. Schizophrenia or psychosis is not always a permanent state that requires medication for the rest of the patient’s life. Soteria Houses achieve remission in individuals with little to no psychiatric medication. They use antipsychotics for stabilization, in controlled doses, and usually (to the best of my knowledge) only for a few months - though every case is different.
Okay, see ‘likely’.
I feel you might be missing the joke, from my interpretation of it you are in agreement.
My read is that it is implying that mental illness are real diseases, but they’re treated like you should just get over them, which would be ridiculous if you were bleeding out, but since they aren’t usually visible people will just tell you that you should just be better.
1, 4, and 6 is how my mom is about flu, cold, medicine.
When you’re sick you need to rest and let your body do its thing. You can eat food containing the resources your body needs to potentially speed up recovery. But ultimately you need rest.
Not according to mom.
You have to work your flu out. If you’re lying in bed feeling like shit you’re just being lazy. You’ll stay sick longer if you don’t work, so out of bed you go. Come on, it’s like you’re not even trying to get better!
And of course the medicine your doctor gives you is just poison, because doctors don’t know anything and just want to keep their career. Here, have these homeopathic pills instead.
