Elle M NOPe

Last night, a “friend”, who only knows me on social media, outed me as having bipolar disorder. I reacted badly. How dare he do such a thing. This is someone who only knows me from Facebook. While most of my updates there are quirky and whimsical and strange – they are honest, and relevant to how I am feeling. I managed to keep my feelings of being threatened to myself, and not react online. But it took me a long time to come down from such a statement.

Here is the thing about mental health and mental illness. We don’t all fit in the same box. So while this person recognized some characteristics of my behaviour in his own life – it does not mean that we fit in the same category.

So here I am, setting the record straight. I am not bipolar. However, I do live with the disorder cPTSD. And part of that is near crippling anxiety. In fact, as I write this, I am sitting in a coffee house, a rare occurrence, since I find it difficult to leave my home. And someone is sitting much too close to me – and its taking everything I have to not pack up and go home. But I made a deal with myself, that if I could spend 2 hours outside of my home every week, then I would start giving myself a break. I can be nicer to myself, because I made an effort. You don’t need to tell me that I should already act nicer towards myself – it wont work. I need to feel like I deserve it. So here I sit, in an over-crowded space, forcing myself to stare at this screen and ignore the 30 or so other patrons who are jostling their caffeine buzz all around me.

Why its dangerous to judge someone and out their mental illness – especially when based on your own experience.

1. Its none of your business. Even if you suspect they are living with the same condition – they may not realize it. And you should absolutely not say anything in a public forum. Ask that person privately if they are ok. Say that you are concerned, because you have noticed some behavioural changes. Be kind about it. Approach the subject gently. Or say nothing at all, because it is none of your business.

2. Remember that people don’t share everything on social media. You don’t know what led up to writing such a post that concerned you. Even for people who are quite open – a few sentences can’t accurately sum up their week, month, year.

3. Misconceptions of mental illness are widespread. I am really open about my struggles. I talk about anxiety a lot. But I had never felt the need to disclose my own diagnosis before. Mostly because its not well understood – and not all doctors acknowledge it. But thanks to your well intentioned comment – I felt it necessary to disclose my mental health history on a public forum. And while I don’t care what others think about my life – I would rather not field questions about what led to such a diagnosis, or what prompted me to start getting treatment in the first place. These details I would like to keep private, or share with the person who needs to know. And if you are not my partner, you definitely don’t need to know.

4. Your assumption is triggering. Not only emotionally but physically. Being outed the way I did, spiked my anxiety. My trauma response is to vomit. So when I read about how you think I am bipolar, I went into a full blown panic attack. That includes vomiting, a big rise in my temperature, and sudden oncoming exhaustion. So for the first time since I was a kid, I was in bed at 6:45pm – trying to soothe myself into sleep. It didn’t work though, because I was too upset to get close my eyes. And since my mind kept replaying your words over and over and over again, falling asleep became impossible.

5. You have put my relationships at risk. Not everyone is as open minded about mental health as you may be, or as I am. Many people in my life had no idea that I have been under the care of a psychiatrist since I was 26 years old. Many have no idea at all what my history is. Nor would they be able to understand it. And while I am open about my life with a lot of people, I am not with the people who may have a hard time with my diagnosis, or my being public about it.

6. I have work colleagues who do not know anything about my life, and this information may complicate my employment. If I don’t have full time employment, I lose my healthcare benefits. If I lose those benefits, I no longer have access to therapy.

I know that the person who did this, did not mean to harm me. I believe he was excited to see a commonality and made the connection without thinking what he was doing. After all, there is no shame in living with a mental illness. We all have periods where we need help. This person just had no idea that his comment would send me spiraling and think about events that sent me to seek out treatment in the first place; a really dark period in my life, that is very difficult to revisit – even after years of help.

So I implore you. If you are in a situation, where you are wanting to address a friend’s sudden unusual behaviour, or a commonality that you both share, please do it privately.

*graphic found via pinterest. – FullyFlourishing uploaded by florence nwokoro