Mental Health Stigma

                  As Mental Health Awareness Month nears a close, I would like to address mental health stigma. This month has seen more positive attention placed on mental health. One month is not enough. Mental health needs positive attention focused on it throughout the year. I think increasing positive attention requires decreasing stigma. As someone who has lived with mental illness most of my life, I have experienced stigma. It hurts. It negatively impacts healing.  I have felt the sting. Stigma has caused me to deny my mental illness at times, especially in the work setting where I feared my depression would be met with mockery and a lack of understanding.

                  The Mayo Clinic states, “Stigma is when someone views you in a negative way because you have a distinguishing characteristic or personality trait that’s thought to be or actually is, a disadvantage (a negative stereotype).” Mental health stigma is when a person is looked at negatively because of his/her/their mental health.  Stigma leads to discrimination, which can be painful.

                  There are several results of stigma. These include a person not seeking treatment, a lack of understanding of what mental illness (and mental health) is, and bullying among other things. These are painful.  Not seeking treatment can lead to a worsening of symptoms. Mental illnesses are just that, illnesses. They require treatment. There is no going it alone.  Whether it is therapy, medication, or non-traditional treatments such as esketamine and TMS, treatment is necessary.  Our mental health will not heal itself. Unfortunately, too often stigma interferes with getting help.

                  We see stigma when mental illnesses are used as adjectives. I’m sure you have heard things like, “She’s so OCD. She keeps everything so clean,” or “He’s so schizophrenic.”  Mental illnesses are not adjectives. Being neat is not OCD. Being sad is not depression. Having different moods is not bipolar disorder. These mental illnesses are much more complicated than their use as adjectives would have people believe.  

                  I have major depressive disorder. This does not mean I am just sad. I experience happiness at times. What I live with is a mood disorder that makes it difficult for me feel good about myself and the world around me. I can experience sadness separate from my depression.  Sadness and depression are separate things. I can be sad that my favorite basketball team lost a game. That loss does not depress me. Depression consumes me and affects how I carry out my daily life. Sadness is an emotion that a person experiences in relation to an event. Sometimes depression is stigmatized as someone dressed all in black and crying. I don’t wear black any more than I wear other colors. My mood colors how I view myself. It results in a draining feeling coming over me.

Many times, I have heard, “How can you be depressed when you have so much to be happy about?” Again, here is stigma. Depression and happiness are not opposite emotions. Happiness is an emotion. Depression is an illness. Depression affects every aspect of my life. It colors my view of myself and the world around me. Happiness is something I feel when I something good happens like watching my niece get a hit in one of her games or when my nephew makes a joke. These things don’t erase my depression. They just allow me to feel the emotion of happiness.

So, how do we cope withstigma? First, as I stated earlier, we need treatment. We need to seek out help or allow ourselves to be helped. This requires seeing mental health professionals. When we recognize that mental illnesses require health care, we are better able to receive the care we need. We are also talking back to that stigma that denies mental illness is an illness. 

We need to remember we that we are not our mental illness. I am not depressed. I have depression. There is a difference. Again, depression is not an adjective. People are not bipolar. They are not schizophrenic. People have bipolar disorder. People have schizophrenia. We need to resist the tendency to use mental health disorders as adjectives. There is enough of that around us. If we ensure that we are not using them as adjectives other people will notice. 

As difficult as it is, we need to try not to isolate. When we keep to ourselves and push others away, we are not allowing them to see that we live with an illness that can be treated. I understand how hard it is not to isolate.  There are times when I isolate. I have been afraid to let others see my depression and anxiety. I have lied about my illness, blamed it on a physical ailment. Stigma caused me to be afraid. I didn’t want my boss to know I struggled with my mental health. I feared it would affect my employment. But the truth is people can work with mental illness. Sure, there are times when we need time off, when we need care. That doesn’t mean we can’t be productive employees. If we can reduce the stigma surrounding mental health, more people can be successfully employed. 

Reducing stigma requires awareness. Recently, I participated in NAMI Walks. People came together to raise awareness about mental illness. There was a sense of community and desire to help people. I have found that being involved with NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness) has given me opportunities to connect with others who understand what I live with. It has given me the opportunity to share my story and hear the stories of others. The awareness NAMI generates is healing. NAMI works to tear down the stigma through awareness. Awareness means saying, “This is mental illness. People live with it. People succeed with it.” 

By its nature mental illness is difficult to live with, but we need to remember that we are more than our illness. Stigma be damned. My hope is that through this blog and other writing, I can reduce stigma. I want people to be able to live without the negativity of mental illness. I want to live without that negativity. I want young people to discover that even if they are struggling with depression, anxiety, or another mental illness, they can live full lives. There is help out there. Sometimes we have to look harder for it, but help is out there. If we make mental health awareness a yearlong effort, we can reduce stigma and make a difference in many lives.