Today, I write with a heavy heart. I write with anger. I write with upset. Today, I write about mental illness.
If you log onto Tumblr, Instagram, Facebook or whatever other social media outlet you use, chances are, you will see artsy pictures of people posing, romanticizing mental illness. Whether it shows a beautiful girl with sliced wrists, saying "I bleed for you," or quotes about people wanting to end their own life, it's all the same: the Internet is romanticizing mental illness. The Internet is making mental illness beautiful. The Internet is making mental illness seem like a cool trend. It's upsetting, because social media is constantly beautifying mental illness, when society rarely talks about it. Mental illness is this big, scary demon that we keep locked in a closet, bolted shut. People are told to get over it, to be happy, to just "let it go." Society tells us that mental illness is not an illness, it's just a phase.
I'm here to tell you that mental illness is not romantic, it is not beautiful, it is not a cool trend. I'm here to tell you that mental illness is not a phase, it is a serious condition.
I get frustrated when I log onto social media and I see those posts of beauty in regards to mental illness. Mental illness is not beautiful. Cutting yourself is not pretty. Panic attacks are not aesthetic. It is ugly. Hating yourself is torturous. Cutting yourself is humiliating. Thinking about killing yourself is gut-wrenching. Confessing to your mom that you are not happy and you hate the person you are is awful. Don't try to tell me otherwise.
I get even more frustrated when the question of mental illness, when the discussion of the disorders, is constantly silenced in society. Admitting you have depression is frowned upon. Saying you have an anxiety disorder makes you an outcast. Stating you're bulimic or anorexic makes you a freak. Society does not view these illnesses as problems, but rather as burdens that will eventually go away if they turn their cheek and tell the victim to "just be happy."
It took me a long time to find happiness. Recently, my mom said to me "you worked long and hard to be comfortable with you." And she's right. I hated myself for a long time.There were phases in my life where I didn't want to get out of bed. I was a zombie. I hated myself. I would look in the mirror and tell myself I was worthless. I cried about how badly I didn't want to exist because there wasn't a point to me living—I wasn't worth the life I had been blessed with.
I spent moments curled up on the bathroom floor, hysterical, begging my friend to just sit with me so I wouldn't feel so alone. I had people in my life who would put me down and I kept them in my life because I thought I deserved it. Don't try to tell me that is beautiful. Don't try to tell me it was a phase. I worked long and hard to re-shape how I viewed myself. I fought tooth and nail to become the person I am and to be happy with that person.
This is not a phase. This is not beautiful. This is a problem plaguing our society. Forty million adults in the United States have anxiety disorders. Major depressive disorders affect 14.8 million adults over the age of 18. Ten to 15 percen t of Americans suffer with some type of eating disorder. And you want to tell me this is just a phase?
We need a conversation. We need a talk. We need to accept that mental disorders are real and they are not pretty. We, as a society, need to address this growing concern. We lose millions of people each year to disorders such as depression, anorexia, bulimia, etc. Mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, friends, aunts, uncles, cousins, are all suffering from these monstrous diseases. It's time to break the silence and speak up. This is real. This is ugly. And we need to love these people and care for them just as much as those who have physical illnesses. They deserve that respect.
They deserve the chance to be happy and carefree. The other side is wonderful. It is full of love and laughter and color. The other side, the healthy side, deserves to be romanticized. It deserves to be experienced by everyone.
