This will be the final installment in this little series of articles on my mental health experience. I have written about depression, anxiety, and how they have affected my relationships, my worldview, and my life as a whole. These subjects are difficult for me to delve very deeply into, so I have, in a way, been using these articles almost as an exercise for myself even as I use them to express myself. Mental health is a subject that is obviously very close to my heart, and I only speak for myself, but I am being as honest and as transparent as I am able to be.

For the majority of my life, I felt one way and understood the world in one way, and I believed myself to be the average example of a healthy person. I have always done well in school, I have a good home life, and while my family has never been rich, we have never had to go without and have never suffered for our wants.

I learned a very shallow version of mental health through a few clumsy powerpoint presentations that I'm fairly sure my middle school teachers were required to show, and another shallow version in my health classes in high school. I never thought any of the symptoms of mental illness applied to me. I mean, sure I feel numb most of the time. Sure I feel lonely even in the company of my best friends. Sure I have no confidence and only fear when it comes to gaining attention for myself. But that is normal, right?

I wish someone had told me sooner that it wasn't normal.

I wish someone had been able to say, with confidence, without beating around the bush, and without me having to wait for years feeling uncomfortable in my own mind, that I do indeed have mental illnesses, and they do indeed need to be treated and cared for, just like any other illness. Because that is the biggest issue, right there, isn't it?

The thing that makes mental health issues such BIG issues is the fact that they aren't treated like every other disease and condition that humanity faces. Mental health issues are treated as failures of those who suffer from them, as if the victims are simply are not working hard enough to "get over their problems".

The fact is, illnesses such as mine (depression and anxiety) are not so easy to "get over". I do not decide to make my brain produce less than the desired levels of serotonin, dopamine, etc. It is not as simple as just having a better attitude about life or thinking positively. I do not choose to suffer.

Yet diseases of the mind are treated as if they are choices.

Why is that?

We need to do better as a society when it comes to addressing and solving mental health issues. We need to make conversation about our emotions a normal discussion (especially among men, as they are almost always less likely to discuss their emotions). We need to eliminate the taboo of seeing a therapist, even if you feel perfectly fine (because I also thought I felt perfectly fine, and yet here we are). We need to stop limiting knowledge and understanding of mental health to only select groups of people (because why should only those diagnosed with these disorders know about them?).

We need to normalize discourse about mental health.

Because I know that I am not the only person who has felt isolated by my own brain. I know I am not the only one with family members who are at a loss for what to do, or have felt shocked and pained by what should have been obvious, if we only knew how to look for the signs. I am not the only one who is dealing with all of this, and I am not the only one who needs a better understanding of these diseases and how they affect me and those around me.

Mental health is important, and the diseases that affect it are real, and we need to treat them as such.