Trigger Warning: Whilst this post is more focused around peoples reactions to mental illness, it still touches upon subjects such as depression, body dysmorphia and suicide.
Yesterday was #timetotalk day, organised by Time To Change – an anti stigma campaign run by many leading mental health charities providing an online platform for people to openly discuss their issues and hosting a number of resources and videos for people to get the help they need. I wasn’t able to spend too much time reading my social feeds, but what I saw was really inspiring stuff. It was particularly interesting because mental illness was something I was reflecting on quite a bit as 2013 drew to a close.
As wonderful as I think social media can be, it can sometimes be our worst enemy. These days it feels like Millenials are under more pressure than ever to portray themselves in certain ways, and whilst it’s lovely to see great holiday snaps or baby photos, we’re obsessed with making our lives look perfect and it’s almost at the point where it comes across as one-upmanship as people try to project themselves as bastions of success, wealth, beauty and/or popularity and this can be damaging in a few ways. There’s no need to list them all – we all know about FOMO (fear of missing out) and many more, but I want to touch upon this idea of people setting unrealistic standards of perfection for themselves and others..
The idea of touching up selfies to conceal imperfections is something that could almost take up an entire own post. However, it’s not limited to that. Posts, written or visual, done to establish yourself as the life of the party at all the top clubs and bars with VIP access, and this constant popularity contest puts unnecessary pressure to constantly maintain this image. What if the reality is you’re in a really bad place behind the scenes? If you’re weighed down with sadness, loneliness or anything that could be helped with love and support from ones close to you… there’s a chance they’ll have no idea that your life is anything but rosy because all they’re seeing is someone with everything they could ever want and wouldn’t even consider the fact that it wasn’t the case.
However, this year I noticed a big change.
I noticed a significant number of people opening up about their struggles with anxiety, depression and more. And their strength blew me away.
I have a few friends who have always been very open to me around their experiences. It’s something that always made me feel very humbled – knowing they trust me and care enough to be so open about a subject many will find uncomfortable was a touching moment that strengthened our friendship. However, in 2014 a number of friends and acquaintances did something pretty incredible – they completely opened up on social media to expose what could be perceived as their vulnerability.
It’s hard to explain how I felt reading these posts. It wasn’t nice knowing people I liked and cared about were suffering, but when you’re bombarded with self promotion on social media, there was something comforting about seeing people I had held as shining examples of success, high achievement and confidence being, well, human. It reminded me that we’re all a bit fucked up in our own way and helped me come to terms with my own demons, and I’m sure it did similar things for others.
What also stuck me was just how common anxiety and depression was amongst my network, and Christ knows how many friends and acquaintances had been suffering in silence.
The stigma around mental illness is definitely changing. I’m not going to claim to be an expert here, and I’m hoping any naivety I’m displaying in this post is nothing more than innocent naivety rather than dumfounded ignorance, but it definitely feels like it is. Sadly, part of this can be attributed to high profile tragedies such as Robin Williams and Gary Speed, but hopefully as more people feel able to get the help they need, stories such as those will become much more rare.
Social media can really manifest a lot of negatives – bullying, low self-esteem, body dysmorphia alongside all the aforementioned things discussed, but #TimeToTalk was an incredibly powerful way of helping combat this, spread awareness of mental health and give people the confidence to be open about themselves and get the help they need. I know every time I’ve spoken to friends about these topics I’ve felt that little bit closer and having more online communities where people can be open, if they’re not ready to talk to people they know, can only be a good thing.
I’m sure there are many more blogs that have tackled this subject in a more succinct manner than I have. However, I wanted to attempt to write about it as it’s quite close to my heart. Hopefully what I’ve written makes sense and maybe people can relate to it or have found it comforting in any way.
I guess the point of this post is: people use social media and the internet to show how great they are, but I find that it’s when we’re at our most vulnerable, and most human, we show how strong we are. I feel so much closer, so much more admiration, for people who show these faults than anything else.
It’s a big band World out there and whilst all generations have had to suffer through bad times, ours is no different. I don’t think I’m qualified to say whether we are in fact more at risk but I’ve seen increasing articles about depression and other mental health issues, especially in men, becoming more common. Particularly conditions like body dysmorphia, an illness that’s not only very un-masculine but one that could easily be misunderstood as just being a bit vain….it’s worth people knowing more about this, and it’s great to see that we’re all becoming a bit more open about helping one another out.
Some useful links, though I’m sure there are billions more so feel free to share in the comments:
mills2k 
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