I had a very close friend tell me earlier this week that they feel they never see me anymore. That I’m in class and then that’s it. I didn’t say anything worthwhile in response to that because I knew it was true. I didn’t want to just come out and say everything that was on my mind because, frankly, I was afraid. Even with people I consider my best friends and will likely be friends with the rest of my life, I still suddenly felt a pressure to not say anything because my brain would tell me that it could potentially cause them to not want to be my friend anymore.

I spend a lot of my time telling people that it’s okay to not be okay and that if you need time for yourself then you should most definitely take it. However, taking my own advice can be hard. Sometimes, I’m not okay. Sometimes I get stuck in my own head thinking that I’m not good enough to be around people or that I’m not worthy of their time. Sometimes I spend a lot of time on my own because I feel like that’s all I deserve. Sometimes, I sit and wallow in this pit of self-hatred that I know is not healthy for me.

A few years ago if I got stuck in that pit, I wouldn’t come out for months. Today, I’m proud to say that it doesn’t happen nearly as often, as I know what I can do to prevent falling into that pit in the first place. However, I’m still recovering. I’m still learning how to stop it completely, and with learning, sometimes I slip and I fall. I have bad days. I have days where I have to force myself out of bed and go about my day, especially with a smile on my face. On my bad days, I won’t ever tell you it’s a bad day. I don’t want to admit it to you or even to myself. On a bad day, it feels like the world around me would crumble if I were to tell anyone that I’m depressed and I just really don’t want to be wherever I am or doing whatever I’m doing.

I realized though while giving myself time to recover from a bad day, that by keeping my emotion and feeling bottled up that I myself am feeding into the stigma of mental health by thinking it’s a terrible thing to tell someone that I’m having a bad day. So this is both an apology and a pledge:

To my friends, I need to be a little more open and honest, not just with you but to myself. I’ve excluded myself from plans and from hanging out simply because I don’t feel great, and that’s not fair to you or me. I don’t want to sit and say that I’m okay when I very clearly am not. My mental illness will sometimes get the best of me, but I am going to continue to overcome it. I don’t want you to worry about me because I promise that I am safe and I am getting better every day.

I don’t want to contribute to the stigma by feeling like I should be ashamed of myself or my condition. I want to continue to fight the stigma. Whether you suffer from mental illness or not, sometimes a bad day can consume you and you need some time to figure it out and come out stronger. There’s nothing wrong with that. The bad days will pass and there will be more good in the long run. It’s okay to not be okay because you’re strong enough to get through it.