Friendships are important. Even more so when you have mental health issues, you can talk to them about things you wouldn’t tell anyone else, unburdening yourself in the trusted ear of your best friends and vice versa. You listen to them about their problems. Relationships with family, especially when they themselves are plagued by mental health issues, is tough particularly when no one talks about what’s going on with them.
The realization that mental health has played a massive part in those closest to me is quite a sobering fact! From general mental health issues to far more complex problems, such crippling depression/anxiety affects life right in front of me. In watching how mental illness has affected those around me I understand the need to talk and be open, more opposed to being closed off, holding everything in surely cannot help. It surprises me whenever I learn something new about them whatever I do find out adds just that little bit more clearer view of who they are and how mental health affects them. When it comes to their view of my mental health story I am of the opinion they thought I was lazy, how they never asked me what was bothering me or ever suspected that I’d have my own mental health issues.
One of the more tough and stress/anxiety inducing people is someone who doesn’t suffer with mental health but with a mental disability that makes them so deluded they believe everything that is “cool” is in reality everything wrong with society. Regularly tempered outbursts cause anxiety to go up and through their actions isolate themselves from others showing them how far they have fallen in terms of their disability. All of this from one-person has developed pity from myself and plenty from other people at just how far this person has fallen and how much anger/anxiety this person causes.
From writing this it has helped put things into perspective, learning things I didn’t expect to has been quite something and has encouraged me to want to talk more and explore my mental health more excepting it and finding ways to deal with it better has helped too; learning this has also helped create new friendships which Is a big plus for me.
“The mind is everything. What you think you become.” – Buddha
© Lewis Bull 2018
Read Lewis’ previous contributions:
- The Goblin Known as Anxiety and Stress
- Anxiety and Solitude
- Anxiety and Friendships
- Anxiety and being on Benefits
- Anxiety and Me
- Anxiety and Openly Showing Emotions
- Me, them and our mental health
- Anxiety, fear and depression
- Anxiety and its Tricks of the Mind
- Worry how you plague us so!
- Battles with the Poison Parrot
- Going Nowhere (Why Me Anxiety?)
- The Road to Nowhere
- The Story of Me, Them and Others
- Crossroads
- Survival guide: how to survive a bad day
The wonderful photograph was taken by Clem Onojeghuo and acquired through Unsplash. It’s a great source for free photos under the Creative Commons Zero license, so check it out!
Letters to the Mind 