To think it’s incredibly sad that there’s still such a huge stigma against mental health issues?

[Theboredpanda]

TW: mention of suicidal thoughts

I suffer from depression but it comes in waves of around 3 days to 2 weeks. In-between I’m completely normal, happy, positive, full of energy. I can be fine for months on end, 7-8 months even. But if something triggers me at the wrong time, it can have a catastrophic effect on my MH. My world comes crashing down around me, I can’t stop crying, sometimes can’t get out of bed, often feel suicidal, can’t bring myself to talk to anyone. I’ve been on meds for years which have helped enormously in that these episodes are far less frequent, but they still happen. I have to take time off work occasionally and ask my co-parent if he can have the kids for extra days. My HR dept is aware but none of my colleagues are and I don’t discuss it with friends or family either. They know I suffer from it but no one likes to talk about it. It actually makes me want to scream sometimes. If I’ve had to take time off work I’ll have to come back with a pre-prepared lie for my colleagues about how I had an awful stomach bug because that’s socially acceptable to talk about. (It’s rare I take time off work so physical illness is believable). Some of my friends at work would feel more comfortable talking about the consistency of my made-up diarrhoea than they would about depression. I have to lie to family about why I don’t answer their calls for days too. Usually another lie about being so ill with food poisoning I was bed bound. Because if I told them the truth I’d just get awkward mumbling. I used to tell my kids’ dad the truth as he knows I suffer from depression. However, I’ve had to start lying to him too or he refuses to have the kids, as it’s “not a good enough reason” apparently. It’s very rare I ask him to keep the kids for an extra day or two because of my depression (maybe twice a year) and it’s only because I don’t want them to see me like this. When I used to tell him the truth he’d refuse, telling me to “pull myself together”. If I pushed it he’d start saying “well maybe you shouldn’t have them at all” and threaten to go to court for full custody, saying I was a danger to them (I’m not and never have been). He only did this so I’d back down and take them, which was extremely difficult and meant I’d have to pretend I was physically ill to them too. I’m not trying to sound like a victim, I’m just so unbelievably sick of the way people with MH problems, especially those who do everything in their power to help themselves and try very hard not to be a burden on others, are treated. It’s such BS that the stigma against it no longer exists, which some people seem to believe. We’ve barely moved on at all. People just don’t know how to talk about it. It’s either met with pity, awkwardness or disbelief (eg. People thinking you’re being dramatic or you just need to pull yourself together or “we all get depressed” attitudes 🙄). AIBU to feel so angry & resentful about this? To think we all need to try harder to break down this stigma?

My gran was of the post-war generation.

In her 50s, she went to a shop and had a panic attack. Was housebound for two years after that. She did not even go in her own garden.
The GP visited her at home and give her Valium. It was all "her nerves".

I cant say I see a stigma around it as it is all anyone seems to talk about these days

Are they talking about mild anxiety and depression? Or are they talking about psychosis? Voice hearing? OCD?

You sound like someone who has thought in depth about the situation regarding your mental health and the world around you. You sound very clear minded. However, it's not helping you. I just wanted to let you know that you sound like a very sensible and intelligent woman who deserves more understanding by those around you. It's a huge burden to carry alone but we don't want to burden others so it just goes round in circles...

Agreed

to the point it is verging on glamorising

Exactly. All the talk is about socially acceptable MH issues... not SMI.

Thats good to hear about the NHS. My first psychiatrist at the hospital was horrible. He really treated me poorly and I think he viewed patients as just how much money he was making.
Very dismissive, judgemental and completely up himself.
I did eventually send a letter of complaint but they wouldn't look into it as it had passed (by 2 months ) their time limit.

I'm sorry to hear that @ME215 . He sounds a cad and a bounder.

What's the difference between God and a psychiatrist?

Good doesn't think He's a psychiatrist.

😂 So very true!

You had a distasteful post deleted about tourette's on another thread. Mental health will continue to be discussed because it needs to be. It takes second place behind physical health. You will just have to deal with it. It's called raising awareness.

I've always fancied doing an experiment where you get psychiatrists to assess and diagnose each other, in pairs. The important thing is you tell them not to let on that they're a psychiatrist, claiming the other person thinks they are just having a chat about life.

Would be fascinating to see what they produce...

This is a bit odd. What is it that you imagine would emerge from a conversation in which neither psychiatrist is able to consult patient medical records or ask diagnostic questions of the ‘patient’, who isn’t presenting with any evident psychiatric disorder? I mean, they’re medical doctors either a psych specialism.

It would be like telling two medical doctors to covertly diagnose one another’s illness or injury without being able to see medical records, ask questions about symptoms, or physically examine the ‘patient’.

Interestingly there was an experiment done - in the 60s I think - where they sent a dozen or so people with no psychiatric difficulty or record to various MH hospitals.

They were told to report hearing the weird "Thud", otherwise to act totally normally. They all for diagnosed with various conditions and were kept in hospital for prolonged lengths of time. In a couple of cases the researchers had to come and get them out.

They published the research and there was an outroar from the hospitals who challenged the researchers to repeat the experiment over a month or so. At the end they reported that X amount of people had been identified as sent from the research team.

In reality none had been sent.

Psychiatry can be rather subjective.

Yes, the Rosenhan experiment -- but it's generally considered to have been a fraud these days, with Rosenhan significantly distorting information in his 1973 write-up, fabricating data, misquoting medical records. Most damningly, he seems to have invented six of the eight 'pseudopatients' who purportedly got themselves admitted to psychiatric hospitals by reporting hallucinations. The evidence suggests that only he and one of his graduate students actually did it.