Let's talk about mental health baby

I feel like this post has been a long time coming and I'm finally writing it, largely because of Mike Thalassitis. It sounds silly because I didn't know him, but his death has got me wanting to wade in on the topic of mental health. I think the first important thing is that mental health can be split into two categories; emotional and chemical. And I think a lot of the stigma or lack of understanding of it comes from not seeing that difference.

When someone is suffering from depression or is driven to suicide, the first response is always 'what did they have to be sad about?'. I've always been very careful on my blog when talking about having a positive mental attitude or choosing to be happy, that those things do not in any way cross over with mental health. Depression and anxiety can, of course, happen as a kind of PTSD for those who had terrible childhoods, have been abused, have fought in wars, or have been in bad relationships. That's where I see mental health as an emotional thing; people feel bad because of bad things that happen, and that's the kind that can often be helped (or even fixed) by counselling or talking things through. But I think everyone understands that kind. No one questions someone having depression if they've been raped or having anxiety if they've suffered domestic abuse. It's the people who are good looking, successful, surrounded by people who love them; they're the people that everyone questions.

This is where the chemical side of things kicks in. Depression and sadness are not the same thing. Depression doesn't feel like being sad; it feels like nothing. It's waking up every day and not wanting to see your family or friends because you just can't deal with the conversation. It's knowing that something funny should make you laugh or knowing that something nice should make you happy but the smile or laugh doesn't reach any further than the face you show the world. All of these feelings are not caused by something bad in your life, but by something bad in your brain. The reason I wholeheartedly understand that mental health is often chemical is because I suffered it as a side effect of a medication I was on about 10 years ago; how could a medication cause depression unless it was literally about the way in which your body and brain work?

Even though I have had depression, I don't consider myself someone who has or does suffer with mental health (because when I was off the medication, it went straight away). But I do know plenty of people, plenty of friends, who suffer with keeping the demons away. One of my friends even sadly lost her battle almost 2 years ago. You would look at young, pretty girls with their whole lives ahead of them, with happy family lives and a group of friends who love them and question what they have to be sad about. But if the same kind of person told you they had been diagnosed with diabetes, would you say they've got no reason to not produce insulin? Or if they had asthma, would you question what they've got to struggle to breathe about? And on that same line of thought, would you tell someone with diabetes not to inject their insulin? Or frown upon an asthmatic person for using an inhaler? And yet, there's a stigma that people shouldn't take antidepressants because it makes them weak or dependant or something. Obviously they can cause dependency so you have to be careful, but alcohol can also lead to alcoholism and yet no one has this concern when you're in the pub beer gardens at all hours of the day during summer.

I read a lot on social media about mental health, with people saying that it should be regarded in the same way as physical health but why do we continue to distinguish between the two? Okay, so you can't see mental health, but there are countless invisible physical illnesses too. Diabetes is a malfunction in your pancreas, asthma is a malfunction in your lungs and depression is a malfunction in your brain. They're all the same when you boil it down and it shouldn't be that one is perceived as genuine and serious, while the other is all about 'thinking positive thoughts' and 'going for a run to clear your head'. Check on your friends, be understanding even if you can't fully understand and don't judge people's health by what you see on the surface. You never know what other people are going through; be kind.