Anxiety doesn't go away. It's continuous but something that can be maintained. It takes a while to get there. Recently, It's been a hardship for a member of my family. I never imagined we'd (as a family) go through what we did this past winter — the tears, the hurt, the situations I was put in, the worry, the scare. The consistent cursing us out, being angry and the number of times we were told "I hate you" or saying things that were not meant.
That's just the start of it. That is just a hint of what it was like.
Anxiety and depression is not something to mess around with. I had no idea that she was going through so much and it's important to know how to help someone with anxiety and depression and know the signs of it.
Over the last couple of months, I have learned about mental health and how to better understand it. I have realized to not hound about what is going on and eventually, if the person wants to talk and open up to you they will don't take everything they say personally. This one has been one of the hardest things for me to understand because I take everything to the heart and it's just how I have been. But try not to take things personally, the majority of the time if they say something mean they don't mean it.
The last thing I could recommend would be to just be there for them and assure them that they are not alone, rather that means listening to them or taking them out to lunch. Just be there. There is not enough talk about mental health and it needs to be a topic of conversations. Everyone is so worried about themselves and what it takes to be the top dog that people aren't concerned enough with others and how they are feeling. Things like "go kill yourself" and "I just want to die" saying that "jokingly" is not funny because you never know what someone else is going through, they may actually do that because you said so.
Mental health is very prominent to our society today and you never know what a person is going through. It is simple — be a good person to everyone, check in on your friends, ask them how they are doing. You can make a bad day a good day by doing something so little like that. Be the person to make a change. No matter who you are, where you are in your life — make someone's day — you could be saving their lives. That's huge.
