Have you ever been in Hannah’s shoes? I can’t speak for everyone who has but I can tell you this. We have been fighting and begging to shed light on this subject for years. I don’t want to romanticize what I’m telling you. It isn’t romantic. Our society talks about ending smoking, drugs, violence, racism, etc. Why don’t we talk about ending self-harm? Why do we only talk about suicide when it happens locally or when other people are physically hurt in the process? Why do we only talk about it for a few months (if that) and act like we’ve moved on? Why don’t we talk about ending the stigma around mental health? There are people who do talk about it, don’t get me wrong. But not anywhere near often enough or public enough. These conversations aren’t easy ones. Just as watching 13 Reasons Why isn’t easy. Imagine this for a moment though… You aren’t watching. You are in that moment. You are being ripped of your innocence, your soul is chipped away piece by piece, and your eyes glaze over like you’ve already died but your heart still beats slowly and your chest roars a flame inside when you try to breath. Let’s say you survived that. You figured out a way to warm your heart back up and a way to breath easier over the years. Would you want to keep other people from experiencing what you went through? How do you educate, prevent, and help? Try talking about it in a public forum, social media or in school. The response you receive won’t always be comforting, won’t always be welcoming, and most likely won’t be encouraged. But what if we did do these things? What if we educated and helped people experiencing mental illness just as we do other illnesses?

What if when you talked about your story you were encourage to share? What if when you talked about your story your words were welcomed?

There is a chance those of us who have been in Hannah’s shoes, who experience any subject our world stigmatizes as something that should be hush hush can not only ease our recovery by sharing but can properly educate others on the subjects. No matter how qualified you are as a therapist or a school counselor, anything to the sort, you can only connect to something or someone so much if you have never been through what they have been through. As a society let’s let the people who have been there, who have overcome, who live in recovery, who loved people who lost their battles… let’s let them do the talking. Let’s listen to people with real stories not rhetorical questions and shocked faces. Let’s fight ending self-harm the way we fight ending drug use and smoking cigarettes. Why should we? Here’s a reason why…

History repeats itself.

I have heard this rule in social studies since I was in sixth grade. This is the sole reason we study the history of the United States, of the whole world, and other countries. We study history to learn and to move forward. By talking about mental illness we can learn. In the process of learning we may be able to move forward in the way we handle mental illness. There is not a singular solution to treating mental illness or a cure. Anyone with a mental illness can attest to this. But there’s also not a singular solution to numerous other subjects our society talks about and fights the surrounding battles.

Mental illness is not correctly portrayed in Hollywood hardly ever. 13 Reasons Why does feature certain scenes that can be criticized for their lack of realism or accuracy. Even so 13 Reasons Why is a start, a step in the right direction to starting the conversation our society has needed for decades. As a society we can’t win the battles mental illness creates but we can ban together to fight and win the war of mental illness. Be another step in the right direction. Don’t make humor out of mental illness, do not shame those who have these illnesses. Be a supporter. Be a safe space. Do not judge but open your arms and your heart. I’m challenging you to do something (small or big) everyday to de-stigmatize mental illness. You can look someone in the eye and genuinely ask them how their day is going, meaning if it’s bad you let them talk about it. We can stop faking our happiness. We can work together to try to create present and future happiness. You can talk about your own experience. You can stand up and shut down bullying. Any effort, small or big, is an effort. Just because there’s no outright solution does not mean you have to be part of the problem.