I HAVE recently experienced one of the lowest points in my mental health. I use the past tense because it feels somehow safer, held at a comfortable…
I HAVE recently experienced one of the lowest points in my mental health. I use the past tense because it feels somehow safer, held at a comfortable distance from the version of myself who is writing to you now. The version of me who gets to write columns in a newspaper, as if I have some kind of wisdom to impart.
Minor little details like depression and anxiety should not be enough to qualify someone for social security, says the government of austerity, of foodbanks, of decimated public services, of dehumanising migrants, and queer people, and always, always disabled people – because they’re the ones that cost the most money, and whoever said a National Health Service was a good idea anyway?
From a young age I was made aware that many people found me to be strange, and that led to periods where I felt so depressed, so angry, that I harmed myself. I was comforted, somehow, by the knowledge that, despite what others thought, my feelings must be valid if I could see them on my skin. The hardest part was convincing myself that I needed help; that I shouldn’t just be able to deal with all of this myself. In other words: that it was OK to not be OK. A powerful message – if you can believe it.
There is a popular viewpoint that we are all wonderfully aware of the importance of mental wellbeing nowadays, and maybe that’s true, but that’s not the same as understanding, without judgement, what mental ill health looks like.That’s why I appreciate See Me’s “If it’s OK” campaign, which interrogates the well-known message that “it’s OK not to be OK” by spotlighting people’s experiences of judgement and shame around their mental illness.
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