To think that accepting you have mental health issues is one of the hardest thing to do??

[Cheeseoncake]

Just that. Had been well for 2 1/2 years. Thought I was done. Came off meds. Bam! Back on the anxiety/depression wheel. I really don’t know how to accept this is me, but I know achieving acceptance is probably half recovery done. Just so so hard.

That's a very interesting question tbh. In one sense, there's a relief that comes with acceptance. In another, nobody really wanta to accept they're mentally ill due to the prejudices etc.

Also, feel your pain. Get well soon x

I’m sorry that you’re struggling. I don’t know if it helps to think about it as: you’re someone with depression and anxiety (at least for now) but that isn’t all that you are and it doesn’t define you. And you know the treatment that works for you so you can take it again and the impact on your life will be minimal. Look after yourself

Interesting question, I think for me, the overriding feeling is relief, especially when you get a diagnosis or start on medication. It's a relief to know that there is treatment that can help and that life isn't meant to be this hard, it's just the way my brain works.

Interesting point. I think it’s the relapse that has been such a shock, makes me feel I’m going to battle this forever. Before, I could think it had just been a one-off thing

Thank you. It’s just such a horrible thing, it makes you believe this time the same won’t work etc..

Yep because mental health still has a massive stigma attached and somehow we are supposed to just power through or some shit. Your life will be much nicer when you get where I am I've accepted that this is a life long condition and if I want to maintain any quality of life I need to respect that and take my meds every day for the rest of my life

Thank you. Honestly I wish I never came off. Lesson learnt I guess!!!

X Here is a massive hug X it's hard but you just need to focus on you and how you feel. forget everything and everyone else they don't have to live it. You do what you need to do to live your best life because you absolutely deserve to be happy and fulfilled without your own head sabotaging you X

I find it really hard - Ive stopped taking my ADs and my anti-anxiety tablets. I've done that before & had to start taking them again when I spiralled downwards, which is where I'm going now. I wouldn't dream of stopping the meds I take for 2 serious physical health conditions; I think of mental health as different somehow. I think @Poppysmom22 has the right attitude.

@MissMarplesNiece please please don't let yourself get to the bottom before you get help you are ill and you need medicine, if you broke your leg you wouldn't just hobble around trying to wish it better this is exactly the same part of your brain is broken and the medicine is how you make it so it works for you X here is a super big hug for you too X

My 20 yo DD has just gone back on anti depressants after a two year hiatus. She probably needed to go back on them 8 months, if not a year, ago but did not want to accept the need for them.

It was a huge deal to accept she has to take them again. She's a student on her year abroad so this means dealing with a Dr and pharmacist abroad, no drinking and minding her physical health for her mental health. She went through this at 16, 17 and 18 and I feel for her but depression without help is worse misery.

I am so sorry for you all in this situation but will say what I say to my girl: this is not necessarily forever but it is for your good for the here and now. And if that turns out to be for longer term than you'd hoped then thank goodness for this medicine.

I'd love to believe there is no longer a stigma wrt mental health but I think we're a long way from that. You wouldn't consider cutting back on asthma medicine if you could feel a wheeze. So this is you attending to that wheeze.

I do thing mental health is so much more difficult to accept because it's actually in your head so it clouds your perspective, plus the social stigma that still exists is very unhelpful.
My friends husband will not accept help for his depression and gave up job and hasn't left house in two years. Doesn't believe in medication. Wife and dc are suffering badly.

This is so so sad it's very hard for men to acknowledge mental illness. Social programming is so so strong for men and it's just awful that they can't say how they feel because grrrrr men manliness grrrr

In my experience it's the hardest and the best thing you can come to terms with.

Once you accept you are 'ill', you can start looking at how you can live with it.

Best wishes for the future.

That's exactly it. Accepting it's an illness and not a weakness or a failure.

In todays world l think the " stigma" has just about vanished.. it's more spoken about now.. social media / television/ celebrities etc.
I had my first nervous breakdown 50 years ago age 14 ( bullied at school) second one age 28 ( husband affair daughter only age 2.. split up/ Got drug raped by 4 men / father died).. age 37 had my first stint in psychiatric hospital.. had counselling on and off ever scince.. been on various anti depressants / diazepam.
Just going through counselling again at the moment with the best one I've ever had and in the process of going to have EMDR.
I am not ashamed to say l have MH problems it comes as natural when l tell people about my physical disabilities...so l just accept l have MH problems as well as my other physical problems.. take the help that is offered by professionals and family and friends.
It's just part of me.. sending love n hugs.

It's such a hard question and has many different facets im sure with each different mental illness.

I've suffered from anxiety and depression for the last decade and it's affected me so badly that most of my 20s and early 30s have been in my house. From early on I accepted I had this anxiety.

However, a large part of my problems are health anxiety and I get a wide range of symptoms. I know I have health anxiety but as soon as those symptoms come do I accept I have health anxiety and get o. With it? No I spiral out of control so have I really accepted that I have health anxiety? Am I only able to say I've accepted it when I can overcome it and function like a normal person?

Is accepting you've got a mental illness accepting tablets that alter the chemicals in your brain? For years my GP, family, friends, many counsellors, hospital doctors/ nurses / ambulance drivers etc told me fighting the illness without medication was the best thing. I listened to them for a decade and only when I got to my worst did I accept the tablets and sought them out myself from the GP after earlier in the year a mental health nurse said she didn't think i was bad enough for them.

After starting them everyone tells me it's for the best and find out a lot of people who had previously told me it was best not to take tablets have in that time taken them themselves (?) And its really helped them. Which has made me so mad at everyone as the tablets have somewhat helped me although I'm gonna ask for my dose to be upped as I've felt more balanced than I have for a long time but still struggling somewhat. I feel like my own head and those around me have somewhat conspired and cost me a decade.

Being on the tablets a few months I don't think there's anything wrong with taking them and would advise people to take them if they're struggling and in a sense I get that could be hard for people and another sign of accepting you have a mental illness.