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This post could very well be a failure since it deals with mental illness. I’m not going to ask for people to expose their own issues. That would be wrong. Instead, I’m hoping to get opinions and perspectives on talking about such things in public. Here we go.
- What do you think about speaking about mental illness in the open?
- What do you think you can do to help those suffering feel brave about speaking out?
- How do you think modern society looks at mental health?
Legends of Windemere 
1. Definitely needs mentioning to get rid of the stigmas attached.
2. By mentioning my own battle with depression. Sometimes it helps to know one is not alone.
3. People tend to fear what they don’t understand. Some cling to erroneous information they have heard. Others want to discount mental illness under the belief that by avoiding a discussion, one can pretend that all is well.
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Great point about mentioning ones own struggles. It is a challenge though. You don’t want to accidentally shift the conversation to being about you. Had people do that to me without realizing it. Others on purpose.
Avoidance is definitely still a popular tactic. Unfortunately.
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I agree that you don’t want to take over the conversation. I would only bring it up as a solidarity thing.
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I think it is healthy to speak about mental illness in the open. Of course, I’m not an employer, and I still have a belief employers would rather people keep their mental health discussions to themselves.
To help those suffering feel brave about speaking out, there is little I can do but be a good listener. This is only if approached in a mental health discussion.
Modern society looks at mental health with a little more understanding than in years past. I still don’t get the feeling that everyone embraces the idea of open discussions.
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Employers would definitely prefer that. Doesn’t make things easier though. I mean, we spend a good portion of our waking week at work.
Good idea on listening.
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More should listen.
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1 I think that being open about mental illness is the way to improve people’s understanding, and thus, tolerance.
2 This is a hard one. Just by being there, and willing to discuss their difficulty with them.
3 There is an obvious improvement from the way the Victorians looked at it. We no longer lock people away in dreadful institutions, nor use them as a form of amusement. There has been an improvement in this century, too. There were still institution where people were sent. People with learning difficulties, too, in the 90s. There was one not far from where I lived at the time. The people there were treated well, and 3 elderly men came to the local church every Sunday. It has now closed and the people who would once have gone there now live Inthe community.
That’s not to say that there aren’t improvements that can be made. I know two people with mental illness and have known others in the past, and I have observed a much better understanding from people here in the UK.
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For some reason, I think going back to the Victorian era as a comparison isn’t a major flex. Especially since that tends to focus of extreme cases. When we talk about institutions and the like, we’re talking about the hard cases. Not the more common cases of depression and anxiety you see every day. People don’t always acknowledge those as mental illnesses that need help until they reach severe levels. I think is another aspect of how we still have a long way to go. It’s like if the mental illness isn’t extreme, we don’t consider it a problem worth focusing on.
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You have a point, Charles. There is still the feeling that depressed people should ‘pull themselves together.’
But I don’t think there is a stigma to depression, not like there is to something like bipolar, or
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There is a pretty big stigma to depression. Several actually. As you said, many think you can just suck it up and get over it. This denotes the stigma of depression not being a mental illness at all. There’s the belief that depression always comes with suicidal thoughts. There’s the misconception that depression is simply feeling really sad, which minimizes the severity. Anxiety gets similar treatments because the two aren’t seen as crippling as bipolar, schizophrenia, and OCD. Some people use anxiety and depression as synonyms for nervous and sad too, which muddies the perceptions.
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Sorry! Don’t know what happened there. I was about to type the next word and it posted itself. The final. Word was ‘schitzophrenia’
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Speaking about it has to be a good thing, but it’s important to know who your friends are and who your audience is. There are some who would try to use the situation as leverage of some kind. I’ve dealt with too many backstabbers in my life to feel otherwise. I keep my guard up and choose friends carefully these days.
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Great points. Knowing who you can safely talk to is key.
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I’ve had a similar conversation with one of my kids, who is non-binary. It’s very important to them, but not everyone wants to know. They got a lot of “too much information” responses and also a lot of “are you sure” questions. I advised them to think carefully before sharing information that might not be welcomed.
What’s more important, to me, is that they are honest within themself.
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For some reason, I thought you said bipolar instead of non-binary. Does bring up an interesting question. Are the tactics for safely talking about mental illness the same as talking about gender identities?
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Both situations can have repercussions, so I think the details may be different but the decisions are very similar.
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True. I’m a little leery of discussing them at the same time. Too many people say any gender identity beyond ‘man/woman’ is a mental illness.
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