Today is World Mental Health Day.<\/p>\n
This is a day near and dear to my heart.\u00a0 I have struggled with my own mental health most of my life.\u00a0 \u00a0I was formally diagnosed with clinical depression and anxiety in my late 20s.\u00a0 I’ve been on medication ever since.\u00a0 I have tried to quit medication,\u00a0 under medical supervision, twice.\u00a0 Both times my symptoms worsened exponentially within weeks, so neither I nor my doctor see any need to try that again.\u00a0 I’m just one of the lucky ones who need to stay on it.\u00a0 I’ve also been through two stints of therapy.\u00a0 Both were crucial for my health at those times.<\/p>\n
While it’s true that the understanding of mental illness by the general public has improved quite a bit in the last 20 years there can still be a stigma surrounding it.\u00a0 There are still folks who don’t understand why I can’t “just snap out of it” when I’m having a bad day.\u00a0 There are still folks who look down on me for needing medication “just because I’m sad”.\u00a0 \u00a0And it’s even worse for people who have diseases like schizophrenia or other conditions that are harder to hide.<\/p>\n
If you are lucky enough to not have any of these conditions yourself chances are someone you know, maybe even someone you love, does.\u00a0 So today, take the time to educate yourself a little bit on this misunderstood area of medicine.\u00a0 And be kind- you never know what struggles the person\u00a0 you meet next is going through inside their own heads.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Today is World Mental Health Day. This is a day near and dear to my heart.\u00a0 I have struggled with my own mental health most of my life.\u00a0 \u00a0I was formally diagnosed with clinical depression and anxiety in my late 20s.\u00a0 I’ve been on medication ever since.\u00a0 I have tried to quit medication,\u00a0 under medical supervision, twice.\u00a0 Both times my… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2673,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"{title}\n\n{excerpt}\n\n{url}","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[23,19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2671","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-issues","category-myself"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t