Your Mental Illness is Not a Burden.

No matter what you're dealing with, your mental health/illness is not and should not be seen as a burden on others. This is a public service announcement to those who write off the feelings of those who are really going through it: stop making the situation worse-- be active in the person's life and support them, or get out.

We are fighting with everything in our might to be the best person that we can be, we know that it can be overwhelming understanding something that you're not going through, but you have no authority to dismiss our feelings because you can't handle it. We're not coming to you as our therapist or someone that can solve our problems. We just need your support, sometimes we just need a little TLC (tender love & care).

As a person with mental health problems, you can't help it. This is something that you feel and it won't go away until you address it. The easiest way to spiral into a worse situation is to not have your feelings acknowledged by those who are surrounding you. Those people who make you feel worse about your experiences, unfortunately, are people that you should not be around. The constant love and support from others uplift you and give you a fighting chance to come out on top.

The culprits of this lack of empathy seems so somehow be the ones who are closest to you (friends, family, etc). I know that it is very hard to cut those out of your life who have been there the most. However, when I am saying that they don't need to be in your life, I am saying that they don't need to be apart of your mental health journey. You don't want their views and opinions to undermine the work that you are doing to improve your wellbeing especially if it opposes your views and feelings.

With my own personal experience, I did want to explain my problems to others because I felt like my demons made it more difficult for those who were around me. Especially since we were all struggling through college, I knew that the last thing that people wanted to deal with was my problems.

It is imperative that you create a support system that is willing to put everything down at any point and help you through things. I know that I am more willing to help others even when they don't explicitly ask for help, but I know that something is wrong or off. Being intuitive and proactive is more helpful for a person than just sitting around and waiting for something to happen.

"Social support represents the amount of support that a person perceives and reports receive it. Social support is a phenomenon that involves interactions of people so that when a person offers social interaction, it has an important role in his health. Social support alone is not important, but what is important is the belief in the existence of social support. Social support provides physical and psychological advantages for people faced with stressful physical and psychosocial events, and is considered as a factor reducing the psychological distress when faced with stressful events." Harandi et al. 2017

If you continuously are dealing with a friend or family member that is dealing with depression or anxiety, the smallest things matter during their times of recovery. A simple text message or comment on a post to know that you're thinking about them is enough. These are the first steps to let someone know that you care and that you're willing to help them in their times of need. You also have to be cognisant of their posting habits on different social media platforms.

I wrote this with my own personal experiences in mind. I know that not everyone is able to sever ties with those who have been in their lives for the majority of the time. However, I think that once you sit down and realize the toxicity that these people bring to you, you'll be able to take the next steps of improving your own well being.

Until next time.