World Mental Health Awareness

In honor of World Mental Health Day today, I want to take this time to talk about my own mental health struggles over the last couple of years, because I do not think a lot of people are aware of how serious things like depression and anxiety disorder can become unless they have experienced it firsthand. I had been diagnosed with severe depression and severe anxiety disorder years before, but the last two years was when it hit its peak before I finally started getting it under control.

Anxiety disorder is not just about being a double checker, there can be far more to it than that. If it gets bad enough, there can be times when you can't tell the difference between what is real and what isn't, in the sense of knowing when something is a concern and when it is not. Your mind can talk to you and convince you of your worst fears, and it will do so by attacking what is most dear to you in your life. I managed to gain a foothold over mine through the Gods, medication and my own pursuit of information about my concerns. All of my worries turned out to be 99% unfounded. That's what anxiety disorder does, it keeps your brain in fight or flight mode and scrutinizes literally everything you do, if it's something you care about. The interesting part is that your brain does not think it is torturing you, but protecting you. By making you painstakingly devoted to every little detail, it thinks it is preventing disaster or mishap against what you love, but in reality it is tormenting you.

Then there was the severe depression, which can also be crippling if it reaches a strong enough level, It will make you feel like you are worthless and cannot do anything right, which anxiety disorder can also do. That's why it may not be surprising that medications for anxiety can also treat depression. Depression notably plays on your worst memories, insecurities, and regrets. It does not work to find the good in anything, only the bad or negative. It will never build you up, only break you down, and convince you that down is the only way you can go from here. And then you start to wonder why you should continue to live. But one important thing I have always remembered is that depression and anxiety disorder are liars. 

In America, 19% of the population either experiences or has been diagnosed with anxiety disorder, and depression has reached 18%. And all of these mental illnesses are made worse with stress, which makes it more alarming because Americans are at some of the highest levels of stress in our time.

So I would say that the point of this post is to be open and kind to your fellow man or woman. While it's possible to defeat depression and anxiety, remember what Plato said, everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle. So be loving to one another.

In the Goodness of the Gods,

I'll see you at the next Herm down the road,

Chris Aldridge.