No one here seems interested in the grimy parts of mental health. Everyone wants to talk about mental illness as quiet introverts drinking tea and nervously stuttering over words. No one ever talks about symptoms like paranoia or hallucinations or hypersexuality or compulsions or homelessness or drug addiction or delusions or psychosis or violent urges. Every time a clearly mentally ill person commits a crime, and someone says, “Hey, maybe this is a sign that we need to improve mental health awareness in this country,” everyone goes to screaming: “This isn’t about mental illness! Mentally ill people aren’t violent!”
But yes, sometimes mentally ill people are violent. Sometimes we are bad people. And even those mentally ill people are in need of advocacy, maybe even more so.
When you post “Protect people with mental illnesses at all costs,” do you mean all of us, or just the cute ones?
I get sick of tumblr’s version of self care, which 90% of the time threads into this beautifully: go pet a fuzzy cute animal! pile up your favorite blankets from childhood and watch disney movies! take a nap! play a game from this list of cute soothings games!
More realistically: go take a shower because it’s been three days. Wash the dishes that have been in the sink since last Friday that you can smell as soon as you open your door because rotting food stinks. Pick all your clothes off the floor because that’s where your entire wardrobe is and you’ve already cried today because you tripped over a sweater and realized the cat puked on it. Call someone who can give you enough courage to pay that bill you’ve been ignoring. Put away the crackers because that’s all you’ve eaten for two days straight. Apologize to the friends who are worried sick about you, and if you can’t at least let them know you are ok and need space.
One of the most empowering types of self-care is responsibility, but tumblr just wants to sit in a closet strung with fairy lights and read their favorite fic.
“Cute” self-care for “cute” mental issues. That’s not reality.
Tag: mental illness
“Coping mechanism” is not synonymous with “okay thing to do”. Cruel or violent behaviour still has a victim, regardless of why you’re doing it, and “but I’m mentally ill uwu” is not an excuse. You think it matters to your victim whether you were screeching at them because you were ill or because you were angry? If you’re doing horrible things because of your poor health, go get treatment so that you stop doing horrible things – the longer you leave it the more things are going to be crushing your conscience when you recover.
~ Vaporeon
Sociopathic tendencies, excessive eating, denial, living in a fantasy/escaping from reality, extreme depression, self harming are all coping mechanisms. Doesn’t make em healthy.
Really, I don’t understand the idea that if you’re mentally ill it’s okay to hurt other people.
If you have the flu, it’s not okay to cough in someone’s face and give them the flu. Just because you’re ill or hurt doesn’t mean it’s okay to make other people hurt.
A lot of people are understanding in that your mental illness is a contributor in how you act, but it doesn’t mean that it is okay to engage in or continue with said behavior. To be perfectly honest, people aren’t ableist if they decide to start cutting you off if you manipulate them, abuse them, etc. regardless of your mental illness because it isn’t healthy for you and it isn’t healthy for them either.
Things aren’t, and can’t always be about you and to think that things are or that you deserve a special pass for treating people badly is selfish and abusive.
It’s especially worse if you’re aware of your behavior and you actively use it to get away with things, and then pull the mental illness card to escape the consequences. I have seen a lot of people do this, and it is disgusting and entitled, as well as doing absolutely nothing to help mentally ill people who already aren’t taken seriously. If you hurt someone unknowingly, that’s okay, apologize and explain. But if you do it with complete knowledge of what you’re doing and the consequences, then I’m sorry, but you’re an asshole and I don’t care how many mental illnesses you have at whatever degrees of severity, I will treat you like the asshole you are.
–Sirius
One thing that bugs me about the way some people treat ‘neurotypical’ people is you don’t actually know who’s neurotypical or neuroatypical. A lot of people are very private about their mental disorder(s), illness(es), etc.
When you call someone neurotypical or neuroatypical w/o knowing them, you’re doing it based on how they act which adds to the idea that neuroatypical people will act a certain way, and if they don’t, they’re faking it or misguided.
Not to mention, there are a lot of people with illnesses, disorders, etc who have no idea they have them.
Don’t assume someone is neurotypical based off one thing they say or do, that’s No Good.
I’ve seen people say before like, “personality disorders can’t exist in minors”, but that doesn’t make any sense, they don’t just start existing when someone turns 18. Someone using that argument was like…”personality disorders are indistinguishable from normal teenage issues” like what????
it’s basically pretty damn hard to diagnose personality disorders in kids for a whole host of reasons, so it’s usually put of until I think… twenty? to actually diagnose them. There maybe be something akin to ‘may X personality disorder’ but that’s usually more of a placeholder than an actual diagnosis. And teenager behaviour, even entirely un-disordered one, can be a factor in obscuring an existing personality disorder because a lot of symptoms (like being overly emotional, self centeredness, anxiety, impulse as fuck behaviour) are normal for being a teenager because teenager brains go through some tough shit.
There’s one, described by Million, as ‘passive aggressive’ (or negativistic) personality disorder. Allow me to quote the sympthoms as listed in the DSM-IV:
passive resistance to routine social or occupational tasks, complaints of being misunderstood, sullen argumentativeness, criticism and scorn of authority, envy and resentment of the relatively fortunate, exaggerated complaints of personal misfortune, and alternation between hostility and contrition.
(taken from this paper about it) and that’s…. do tell me doesn’t sound a ton like a teenager.
The main reason why PDs aren’t supposed to be diagnosed in young people is because children and adolescents are going through massive physical and psychological changes as they develop. Having maladaptive personality traits before adulthood is not a reliable indicator of whether or not you will have maladaptive personality traits as an adult.
Also, like biologyweeps said, a lot of traits that are maladaptive (or indicative of deep-seated mental difficulties) in adults are perfectly normal parts of development for children and adolescence. Narcissism and lack of impulse control are pretty much universal in early childhood; we acquire the ability to acknowledge and respond to other people’s needs as we progress towards puberty. Self-regulation skills are also honed during this period. And of course, mood swings and struggles with identity are very common during adolescence, for both biological and cultural reasons; this doesn’t mean that they shouldn’t be taken seriously, but it does mean that care has to be taken to avoid needlessly pathologising developmental phases.
This doesn’t mean that PDs magically pop into existence on your eighteenth birthday. An adult with a PD has probably had it, or at least its precursors, since childhood. It’s just more difficult to distinguish young people who will grow up to have PDs from young people who will grow up without them.
tl;dr children and adolescents are undergoing a lot of major, rapid changes as they develop, so it’s a lot harder to identify whether or not they have a personality disorder. Some things that are red flags in adults are not red flags in children and adolescents.
no offense but this is literally the most neurotypical thing i have ever seen
Uhhhh… no.
This is what they teach you in therapy to deal with BPD and general depression.
When I got out of the hospital after hurting myself a second time, I got put into intensive outpatient program for people being released from mental hospitals as a way to monitor and help transition them into getting them efficient long-term care.
This is something they stressed, especially for people with general depression. When you want to stay at home and hide in your bed, forcing yourself to do the opposite is what is helpful. For me, who struggles with self harm- “I want to really slice my arm up. The opposite would be to put lotion on my skin (or whatever would be better, like drawing on my skin) the opposite is the better decision.” It doesn’t always work because of course mental health isn’t that easy, but this is part of what’s called mindfulness (they say this all the time in therapy)Being mindful of these is what puts you on the path to recovery. If you’re mindful, you are able to live in that moment and try your best to remember these better options.
I swear to god, I don’t get why some people on this website straight up reject good recovery help like this because either they a)have never been in therapy so don’t understand in context how to use these coping tactics. Or b)want to insist that all therapists and psych doctors are neurotypical and have zero idea what they are talking about. (Just so ya know, they teach this in DBT, the therapy used to help BPD. The psychologist who came up with DBT actually had BPD, so….a neurotypical women didn’t come up with this.)
I have clinical OCD and for me, exposure therapy–a version of “do the opposite”–has been fundamental. I’ve had huge improvement in the last year, but I’m 100% clear that if I hadn’t done my best to follow this protocol I’d be fucked. I have a lot of empathy for that moment when you’re just too tired to fight and you check the stove or you wash your hands or go back to the office at midnight to make sure the door is locked. But the kind of therapeutic approach outlined above has been crucial for me.
It’s hard to do. I’ve weathered panic attacks trying to follow this protocol. But I’ve gotten remarkable results. I was afraid to touch the surfaces in my house, okay? I was afraid to touch my own feet, afraid to touch my parrot–deliberately exposing myself to “contamination” has helped me heal. I can’t speak for people with other issues, but this has helped my anxiety and OCD.
I feel that tumblr, in an effort to be accepting of mental illness, has become anti-recovery. Having a mental illness does not make you a bad person. There is nothing morally wrong with having a mental illness anymore than more than there’s something morally wrong with having the flu. However, if you’re “ill” physically or mentally, something is wrong in the sense that you are unwell and to alleviate that you should try to get better. While there is not “cure” for mental illness, there are ways to get better.
There was a post on tumblr where someone with ADHD posted about how much you can get done when you focus and was attacked for posting about being “nuerotypical” – when she was posting about the relief she got from being on an medication to treat her illness.
I saw another post going around tumblr that said something along the line of “you control your thoughts, why not choose to have happy thoughts” which again was shot down as “nuerotypical” but while you don’t have control over what thoughts come into your mind, you absolutely can and should choose to have happy thoughts. In DBT we call this “positive self talk”.
I’m in DBT to help treat PTSD stemming from child abuse. The abuse and abandonment I experienced destroyed my self esteem and created a lot of anxiety over upsetting other people. DBT has taught me to recognize when my thoughts are distorting realty ‘no one likes you’ and answer back ‘plenty of people like you, you don’t need everyone to like you, especially if the relationship doesn’t make you happy’, to respond to the thought ‘I’m so worthless’ with ‘you’re really great and have accomplished something’
And it’s not easy to challenge your thoughts, it’s a skill that’s learned and it’s hard to force yourself to think something that doesn’t seem authentic or even seems wrong to think – it’s hard to be encouraging towards yourself when you hate yourself – but you force yourself to be aware of your thoughts and push back when you fall into unhealthy patterns
That isn’t “so neurotypical” that’s recovery.
Not shaming mental illness doesn’t mean shaming RECOVERY.
Pro-Recovery isn’t anti-disability.
Do not shame healthy behaviors as “neurotypical”.
Learning healthy behaviors and taking steps to treat mental illness and disorders including taking medication if that’s what works for you is important. You shouldn’t be ashamed if you have mental illness, but you shouldn’t say ‘well I’m not neurotypical therefor I can’t do anything to get better’ – while there is no cure for mental illness, there is a lot you can do to get better, to function better, to manage your mental illness and be safer, happier, and healthier for it.
Holy shit, no.
Person On Tumblr: Nobody ever fakes illnesses and also self-diagnosis is perfectly safe and fine always and never hurts anyone uwu
My Mom: I get several patients a week who self diagnosed with shit they don’t have and then fake symptoms and then get pissy when I say that they are healthy and don’t need treatment. And then they find one shmuck who appeases them and then they sue because one doctor out of twenty agreed with their bullshit. And it’s so bad that I have considered quitting. Many of the other doctors at our hospital /have/ quit. This is one of the absolute worst things you can do to a doctor as well as being pretentious and obnoxious as shit.
Why Mental Illness Doesn’t Excuse Abusive Behavior
Back during a time when my mental illness was at its worst, I was extremely emotionally, verbally, and physically abusive to my now husband, then boyfriend. Behaviors I would exhibit (and am not proud of):
- Slapping him
- Name calling
- Throwing furniture
- Guilt tripping him
- Shaming him
- Becoming extremely possessive over him, checking his messages, emails, and becoming irrationally upset when he would communicate with any female
- Become extremely resentful when he would spend more time with his family than me
- Text or call him at inappropriate times and would become suspicious angry when he wouldn’t respond ASAP
- Blame him for all of my shortcomings (if he wasn’t so _____, I wouldn’t behave this way!)
That’s just a SHORT list of the things I put him through, not even taking into consideration the eating disorder part of my mental health.
And to make it perfectly clear, there was nothing my husband ever did to warrant or justify any of my behavior. That man has never hit me, yelled at me, manipulated me, shamed me, called me names, become jealous, kept me from spending time with other people, etc. He’s treated me like a queen for the last 11 years, and it wasn’t until I did some deep recovery work that I realized 100% of my behaviors had all to do with me and nothing to do with him. I’m surprised he stuck with me, and although I am eternally grateful that he did, it took a long time for me to not only make amends to him, but to change my behaviors in order to finally come to a place of sanity within my relationship.
Here’s the thing:
Even though a large part of my behavior had to do with mental illness, my husband deserved 0% of it. Regardless if you are sick or not, your behaviors affect other people. If your illness “makes” you abusive, you are still abusive. If my husband decided to press charges for me slapping him in the face, telling authorities, “BUT I HAVE A MENTAL ILLNESS!” would not absolve me of the fact that I physically assaulted another human being.
People are hurt all the time due to the shitty things people do because of their illnesses, and they can’t just tell themselves, “Well, they are sick, so I have to deal with it.” or “I can’t let it affect me because I have to understand they are sick.” Like, no. People do not have to do that. They are not obligated to support and/or stay with you if they cannot deal or cope with how you act within your illness.
People are not obligated to be punching bags just because you are sick, especially if you do nothing to change or manage your behaviors.
T.H.I.S.
Why Mental Illness Doesn’t Excuse Abusive Behavior
Back during a time when my mental illness was at its worst, I was extremely emotionally, verbally, and physically abusive to my now husband, then boyfriend. Behaviors I would exhibit (and am not proud of):
- Slapping him
- Name calling
- Throwing furniture
- Guilt tripping him
- Shaming him
- Becoming extremely possessive over him, checking his messages, emails, and becoming irrationally upset when he would communicate with any female
- Become extremely resentful when he would spend more time with his family than me
- Text or call him at inappropriate times and would become suspicious angry when he wouldn’t respond ASAP
- Blame him for all of my shortcomings (if he wasn’t so _____, I wouldn’t behave this way!)
That’s just a SHORT list of the things I put him through, not even taking into consideration the eating disorder part of my mental health.
And to make it perfectly clear, there was nothing my husband ever did to warrant or justify any of my behavior. That man has never hit me, yelled at me, manipulated me, shamed me, called me names, become jealous, kept me from spending time with other people, etc. He’s treated me like a queen for the last 11 years, and it wasn’t until I did some deep recovery work that I realized 100% of my behaviors had all to do with me and nothing to do with him. I’m surprised he stuck with me, and although I am eternally grateful that he did, it took a long time for me to not only make amends to him, but to change my behaviors in order to finally come to a place of sanity within my relationship.
Here’s the thing:
Even though a large part of my behavior had to do with mental illness, my husband deserved 0% of it. Regardless if you are sick or not, your behaviors affect other people. If your illness “makes” you abusive, you are still abusive. If my husband decided to press charges for me slapping him in the face, telling authorities, “BUT I HAVE A MENTAL ILLNESS!” would not absolve me of the fact that I physically assaulted another human being.
People are hurt all the time due to the shitty things people do because of their illnesses, and they can’t just tell themselves, “Well, they are sick, so I have to deal with it.” or “I can’t let it affect me because I have to understand they are sick.” Like, no. People do not have to do that. They are not obligated to support and/or stay with you if they cannot deal or cope with how you act within your illness.
People are not obligated to be punching bags just because you are sick, especially if you do nothing to change or manage your behaviors.
Hey! Did you know?
Having clinical anxiety doesn’t mean you have to live your whole life in a corner like tumblr tells you. There are all sorts of therapy options including at home exposure therapy. You can also obtain medication to help regulate anxiety long term from your primary care physician.
It’s not easy but you can improve your quality of life.
PiraticOctopus 