Author: Alexia

It took me ten years to get officially diagnosed with Generalised Anxiety Disorder – a mental illness I knew I had the moment I heard about in my post-secondary Psychology class. There was a wave of clarity that swept over as I felt my eye twitching again. That day, I had to hold back tears during the lesson, because a part of me knew how hard it was going to be to get anyone to believe me.

I knew that taking on this label would come with its own challenges – mainly on how I was perceived.

I had to see my own mother go through the same thing when she was given her first diagnosis, and then her current one a few years later. The way that our family dynamics changed so drastically – because whilst my mother was struggling, the belief in her ability to recover and maintain herself was so fragile.

My mother became associated with her worst days – days when she couldn’t leave her bed, days when she lashed out or punished herself.

At one point, it became so glaring that even she couldn’t see herself outside of her illness, outside of her suffering. So how could she accept anything else?

Taking all of this in, at only 16, I still asked to go to therapy. I remember feeling my stomach drop when they asked me why, that I seemed okay. I wasn’t “that bad” (but really I was just very high-functioning). But I kept pressing, kept asking, and eventually, I got into that room.

It helped when I went, but life happened – there were times when I couldn’t afford to go because I had to prioritise other needs. My parents, at first, didn’t want to help. Eventually, they agreed.

But even then, talking therapy wasn’t enough. It wasn’t until I was 25 that the idea of medication came up with my therapist. I remember the tears I shed to my therapist, explaining how I could no longer tell what my reality was because I couldn’t sleep or eat.

How I cried again at my family doctor’s appointment, and supplemented the request of medication with a two-page document of all of my symptoms. That day was a Thursday in April, and I remember the absolute relief that I felt once the medication was in my hand.

But with this label came a perception issue. When people hear “mental illness”, “depression”, “anxiety”, they think of specific images and experiences. Irrationality, chaos, unpredictability – all things that can’t be easily understood.

So, no matter what I did and how well I did them; when there were issues that led to me needing to voice my feelings and anxiety, that was all they could see. I was no longer an asset or a stable presence – I was confusing, a liability. My ability to “function” was overridden by my label as a mentally ill person.

But, like my mother, I am more than my diagnosis; I am more than my bad days and moments – and our labels don’t exist to restrict us, but to help us and the people around us understand our lived experiences.

Bad days will happen, but less than good ones. Some days, we will be hard to understand. But what sets our loved ones apart are those who meet us with compassion and empathy, rather than judgement and prejudice.

Stigma surrounding mental health does not appear to me as something loud or explicit. It is more subtle than that – it exists in what is left unsaid, or in the way certain topics are softened in conversation. It also exists in the way mental health is often indirectly referred to in personal or family contexts.

Stigma exists in everyday language. It appears when mental health is reduced to phrases like “it’s just stress”, or “everyone goes through this” – intended to be reassuring, but instead only minimises the experience. These are euphemisms used to direct attention away from the heaviness of the topic.

These expressions do not reject mental health or mental illness outright – but they can shape what is considered acceptable or serious enough to be acknowledged.

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In my experience, it also exists in the way silence is used when the topic is brought up in conversation. It is used as a way to manage discomfort or uncertainty around how to talk about the topic; or the way the topic is laughed off and changed.

Whilst not always intentional, it creates an environment where certain experiences are not fully named or explored. This is accompanied by a layer of shame.   

When reading news, media, or online comments, it’s much of the same. Mental health is framed in simplified ways – either as something to be managed through individual effort; something that becomes visible only when there’s a certain level of severity; or something to be dismissed or minimised.

It exists in a way that mental illness or needing therapy is used as an insult online or in person. It exists in the way that the national mental health hospital is always discussed as a problem, yet never receives the renovations it needs. And it exists in the way that silence is often safer than speaking the truth, reflecting a broader discomfort with emotional complexity.

Stigma, then, is understood less as an obvious act of exclusion and more as something that lives in repetition, tone, and omission. It shapes the idea of what can be said easily, what requires caution, and what is left unspoken.

Stigma isn’t always visible, but it is a pervasive presence in the background of how mental health is understood and discussed. All that comes of it is an unsafe environment.

Having a mental illness means being in a constant balance between silence and speaking up. How much can you say? How far is too far? 

No one talks about the weight of mental illness – how it feels like having an extra limb, but not everyone can see it. There is also a lot of justification that comes with it.

Good days can feel too small and inconsequential. Bad days can feel too vast to name.

The weight is felt when the only thing that helps is sitting at home alone with your comfort shows instead of talking to a trusted friend, for fear of inconvenience.

It is felt in moments when the only thing you want to do is talk about how you’re feeling – you can feel the words aching to pour out, sitting at the tip of your tongue – but all you do is say the same old phrase, “not too bad”, instead. Resorting to small talk or mutual interests to keep that long-practiced smile present on your face, and keeping the drinks flowing.

It is felt in moments when you have to cancel plans or leave early because you’re overwhelmed by the inability to say what you really want to say. To talk about your victories, and vent about your struggles.

This is because you know what would happen if you decide to speak up – to let everything out – especially when you’ve already tried so many times before.

In the workplace, you’re branded as the person who feels too much and can’t handle stress, even when you’ve tried so many times before to prevent yourself from boiling over. You are troublesome; a problem and an inconvenience, rather than a symptom of a broken system.

With friends and family, you’re branded as “the fragile one” – the person that needs more tending to, the person they need to be careful around. Conversation turns tense, shallow, and being honest feels like a nuisance.

It doesn’t matter if you’re doing everything right – going to therapy, taking your medication, changing your bad habits. All they see is a person who is too much. A person that they can’t fit into a simple box. A life that can’t be categorised into simple phases.

So, what choice do you have now? Why is it only left to you to do the talking, the working, the fixing?

Sometimes, taking care of yourself feels as lonely as struggling does.