Depression and Mental Illnesses: What It's Like to Live With Them And Fighting The Stigma

RIP Pap 

As you open your eyes and the day begins, you lay in bed, worrying about what is going to go wrong today. You lay there, feeling hopeless, feeling unloved and un-valued, wishing that you had never wakened to begin with. As you begin to start your day, depending on what kind of unwarranted mood you are in, anxiety is soon to set in, whether it be making your mind race with overwhelming negative thoughts, or going into a state of anxiousness thinking about things that you want to happen, but have absolutely no control over. On top of that you will probably have a low self-esteem, and a low capacity for pleasure in everyday life This is just the beginning of the day in the life of living with depression and anxiety, at least for me, realizing that others suffer from different symptoms as well. 

While fighting through a total lack of will and motivation to succeed that day, you finally get yourself going to where you need to be. You go to work, or school, or run your errands. Perhaps your illness dies down a bit, as it usually does for me in the middle of the day. For me, the anxiety is usually still there even during work. Working at a financial institution, there's already an emotional tool to be had, helping people with their finances. When you add depression and anxiety into the mix, sometimes it can become hell. You help client after client, you get yelled at and emotionally manipulated call after call after call. I've had days where I literally had a panic attack right at my desk. I remember one day I had enough, I was literally shaking to the point of no control, so I left work early, went home and called my doctor. Stress is a deadly thing, and if you do not find ways to reduce it, especially if you have a mental illness, it can truly take over and ruin your life. 

Nighttime is even worse. Especially when it's time to go to bed. You lie there with your eyes wide-open, trying to go to sleep. But the impending storm of negative thoughts rush to your head. Racing thoughts of things you regret, anxiety of what people are thinking or saying about you, and most of all the thought of not wanting to live anymore. You pray to God, "Please take my life tonight, I don't want to feel this way anymore". If you're lucky you end up crying and/or worrying yourself to sleep. If you are more like me, you end up staying up most of the night, which if you have a full-time job like I do is not very fun. Insomnia pretty much goes hand-and-hand with mental illnesses. Sleeping pills can help, but then you have the chance of being even more unmotivated and groggy in the morning. You try to ease your mind, read a book, listen to music, take a shower before bedtime, but no matter what, when you try to fall asleep it becomes one of the toughest tasks of your daily life. Thus ends just one day in the life of living with my disease, and like Groundhog's Day, this happens pretty much every day one after another.

 While you are probably thinking that I am literally insane, I can tell you that, while the extremes are indeed this bad, there is a lot of times where I have zero symptoms. I work full-time at a bank, I write for a semi-popular hockey website in my free-time, and function just like every other normal human being 90% of the time. However, when the symptoms are there, it is truly Hell. So I decided that I wanted to live a normal life and realized that I needed to get help. So one day at work I literally called my medical doctor one day and had him recommend me to a therapist. I wanted to get help. It is one thing to have an illness, it's another thing to have an illness and do nothing to help yourself. I try to stay busy with work and other hobbies, I talk openly about my illness, I work out and try to eat healthy (When I can), and I take medication (Although I am truly against most pharmaceutical pills, medical marijuana truly does work) 

To give you some background, I grew up a pretty normal kid. I was the only child until about eight-years old, and received a ton of love and attention up until that point. However, I did not have my biological father in my life and on top of that, my best friend and true father figure, my grandfather, passed away when I was just 10. To this day, every therapist that I have talked to and even myself have come to the conclusion that I have never truly gotten over his death. Perhaps the worst experience you will ever have when it comes to living with a mental illness is getting emotionally involved with someone that is emotionally manipulative. Especially if that person is someone that you end up in a relationship with. I have had that experience and damn near ruined my life over it. While it is my fault that I was not getting the proper help, I had let this person know that I was suffering from depression. This person ended up using that knowledge against me to her advantage way too often. It nearly caused me to end my life. One of the biggest problem's in our country right now is the stigma associated with any type of mental illness. It actually disturbs me how truly ignorant some people are when it comes to mental illnesses, especially considering just how much scientific evidence and research has been done on the subject. Yet I still see way too many people either dismissing the notion of mental illnesses or dismiss the seriousness of these diseases. I guess it's understandable, being that it's not a disease or an illness that you can actually see with your own eyes, although when I first saw my new therapist, she told me that she was able to see that I was depressed by my body language and my eyes. That is why I think we as a society need to do more to educate everyone on the subject of mental illness and how serious it truly is. Make no mistake about it, mental illnesses do not just affect the person that has the disease, it affects everyone around them. 

Until the stigma of mental illnesses goes away, the mental health problem in our society will only continue to get worse. As a man, I can tell you that the stigma of mental illnesses is a big reason why I have not gotten the proper help for my problems, have not admitted my problems, and have felt ashamed and weak for my illness that I cannot even control. Surely this is a common occurrence with both men and women when it comes to mental illnesses. As a result, you have a number of other problems created in the world of mental health thanks to the ignorance of the subject in our society. On top of being reluctant to get the proper treatment the stigma of mental illnesses can cause you to be bullied and harassed, having a hard time being accepted by society; including work, school, and by your friends and family, and the inability to have enough confidence that you will be able to succeed in life. All of these will only make the person's illness that much harder to overcome, possibly causing them to have even worse thoughts, possibly even suicidal.


My personal experience with depression and anxiety pretty much covers all of these effects of the stigmas of mental health. As a teenager, despite having suicidal thoughts on a damn near consistent basis, most of my friends and family members (Not all) were accusing me of just seeking attention. This is an all to common response to someone who is threatening suicide or simply saying that something is wrong with them mentally. I can tell you first-hand that this only makes the person feel worse. Imagine being 16-years old, feeling alone and depressed, crying for no reason on a consistent basis, and then telling people how you feel and to have them tell you to toughen up. Or try this one, imagine standing on a high cliff, looking down over 100 feet below into sharp rocks inside of a deep river. Imagine you feel like there is nothing to live for and something in the back of your mind continues to convince you to jump. "Just do it" says the seductive voice in the back of your head. Two things are keeping you from jumping, the fear of impending judgement in the afterlife, and the hope that someone out there will tell you that they love you and care about you. That being said, the thought of no longer having to wake up in complete misery, dreading everything about life, seems so lovely. No longer feeling the emotional pain that you have to deal with everyday would be so blissful, no matter what awaits you on the other side. Alas, your friend, or your cousin, or even a total stranger contacts you, "Don't do it". For now, you continue to live. 

So you battle on. And yes, when you live with depression, or anxiety, or Bipolar disorder, or any other mental illness, every single day of your life is an uphill battle. Hell, life is already stressful enough for the most balanced of minds, on top of that you have a diseased brain that makes you hate other people, life, and yourself even more. With that being said, you have to do what it takes to improve your life, and make life as little of a struggle as possible. 

Where am I at now.....After years of ignoring my symptoms, and using alcohol and drugs to numb my feelings, I finally feel like I am on the right path.  I am still battling with my illnesses, but I strive to better myself every day. I try to talk to people about my problems, I try to improve my physical health, and I take my medication and talk to my therapist. I know that it will never just go away, and I sometimes still resent the fact that I am one of the people unlucky enough to feel this way, but I strive on the hope that tomorrow will be better. I try to eradicate as much negativity as possible out of my life. If you don't learn to enjoy and love parts of this word, of this country, and this planet, then you truly will have nothing to live for, and those feelings are what keeps me alive and still going. Going forward, I would like to network with others that are not only going through similar struggles, but are trying to help spread the word about mental illnesses so that we can help as many people as possible. 

Also, since I have been on the right track with my mental health, I have noticed that I have taken better care of myself physically better as well. I try to eat healthier foods, I'm reading more, and I'm spending more time on my personal relationships. Which in the past, my illness would have started to ruin all of those aspects of my life. My illness and my lack of taking care of myself and my illness has cost me a lot of good things. Which is why I'm doing everything I can to create as many positive things in my life as possible, starting with being a better son, brother,friend and role model. 


Look......I am not a doctor, but having battled with depression and anxiety my entire life, I feel as though I need to share what I think can be beneficial for people going through it as well. 

• Acknowledge that you have an illness, not a problem. Your illness is the same as any other illness on earth. Depression is an illness just as diabetes is an illness. Both can kill you, and both can be treated. You are not a bad or weak person because of your illness and anyone that tells you otherwise is truly an ignorant person that needs to be educated. 

• Get help, but get the proper help, and most importantly help that you are comfortable with. Find a therapist, there is nothing wrong with going to see a therapist, in fact was of the best decisions of my life. It is a great way to get your thoughts out, especially since that person will want and be able to help you. They will also understand exactly what you are going through. Find a support system. If you are lucky enough to have friends or family members that understand your problems, talk to them and ask them for help. 

• Know that you are not alone. You already know that I feel and go through it, you know you go through it, and so the cycle goes. Understand there is A LOT of OTHER PEOPLE out there THAT FEEL THE SAME WAY THAT YOU DO. I promise you there is, and there are people that don't have an illness that you and care how you feel as well. Keep battling and keep thinking positive thoughts., 

• Set easy to achieve goals for yourself. I know it sounds somewhat elementary, but achieving short-term goals can really boost your confidence and can be a great way to fight your depression. Of course, making a goal does set yourself up for failure, so start off with some easy tasks like running a half-mile, or even doing something productive around the house. Eventually you can move your way up to setting more challenging goals once you feel confident enough.

• Learn about your illness. Make sure you are properly diagnosed. Talk to others that have the same or similar symptoms. Then find ways to combat your symptoms. Eat healthier, workout, read, write, hang out with friends and family members, pick up hobbies. All of these things truly help. 

• You will never learn to "Just live with it". You will have people tell you to "Toughen up" and "Oh it will just pass". While they might truly mean well, they are incorrect.  The longer you ignore your illness, the less of a chance you have of surviving. This illness will eat your mind and soul and one day it will kill you.  Know that there are people out there that want and will help you. 

• Know that you will have really bad days. Even if you are doing everything in your power that you can be doing to help your illness, you are still going to have those really bad days. Relax and understand that these days are going to happen. This is OK so long as you do not let one bad day turn into one bad week and so on. Understand that tomorrow can and most likely will be better. 

• Understand that you can and will get better. Find some way that you can positively motivate yourself to get better. Your body is a temple, but so is your mind. It is the most important part of your body. Continue to think positive thoughts,  continue to learn new things, do things that better health as much as possible. 

Lastly, find a way to enjoy life. Perhaps the most bizarre part of having a mental illness, especially depression, is that we tend to be more creative. Partly because we are not right in the head, literally, and thus we usually tend to have a more open-mind, allowing us to do great things. 

If you are reading this, understand that someone truly cares about you. Even if it is just one or two people, that is another human being that would be devastated if something happened to you. If you are hurting let someone know as soon as possible. 

As for the stigma that is mental health. 

• Understand just how big of a problem mental illness in our country truly is. Everyday we see people on the news committing evil acts and we also see people killing themselves all of the time. Some of these things can be prevented if we as a society learn that mental illnesses are real, and are a huge problem.  According to National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI), one out of four American families includes a member diagnosed with some type of mental illness. Indeed, one out of every 17 people is saddled with mental illness in the United States at any given time.

• Learn to actually care. I cannot tell you how many times I have had someone tell me "I am here if you need someone to talk to" and then actually approach that person, only to have them judge me or give me an half-assed attempt at listening to me and my problems. If you are going to attempt to care about someone that is suffering, actually listen to them. Do not just tell them "It will be OK", ask them what you can do to help, offer to hang out with them or even take them to see a therapist. Try to inspire real hope into their lives, tell them that you care and how much you care about them. Show them how much you care! 

• Educate yourselves and the people around you. We as a nation and as human beings need to learn the statistics that go with mental health and about all of the different types of diseases that there are. We need to learn how a mental illnesses not only effects the person that is suffering from the disease, but everyone that is in their life. I honestly believe that we need to start teaching about mental illnesses in our schools, and we as a society need to find a way to get more and better treatment for the people suffering. 

• Understand how common this really is.

http://www.healthline.com/health/depression/statistics-infographic

With all of the shootings, and stabbings, and suicides going on in the world, we are now at a crucial point in our history when it comes to mental health. We need to raise a lot more awareness, we need to educate as many people as possible, and we certainly need to find a way to provide better health care to the people that are suffering from these diseases. Talk to as many people as possible about this subject, you have no idea how many lives can be saved if we truly find a way to end the stigma of mental illnesses. 

Feel free to contact me chadnln@gmail.com, @madchad412 on Twitter