Lately, I've noticed something that has received both praise and harsh criticism in the work place. To some it's seen as an excuse, to others It's seen as a victory for workplace equality. Mental health days are not talked about often, however, I believe they are important for a plethora of reasons.

Mental health days are necessary at certain times in our lives.

Regardless of whether you have a mental health disability or not. There are times when you can't function your best because you need to talk to someone about what's going on in your life, you've neglected yourself, or you've been distracted by a serious issue at home or outside of work. However, for many "mentally tough" people this is seen as an excuse.

I believe they have the complete right to think that of someone who takes a mental health day. I agree to disagree with those people though. As mental health comes into the in our common digestion of media in the future I have a hunch we will begin to recognize subtle changes in our behavior, and performance in social, professional, and recreational aspects of our lives.

Of course, this is not a blanket statement, but being someone who has benefitted from confronting mental health issues head-on, I might be able to provide a relatable testimony. Like everyone else, I didn't grow up in a "stable" household. It was only my mother, and myself. My father was abusive early on and disappeared through most of my childhood. There were countless times where I would wait outside all day for him to pick me up, only for me to go inside and get ready for bed at the end of the day.

Of course, this is nothing very different from most people's reality, but I struggled with depression for a large portion of my teenage years. As young people who are flexible, kids and teens are some of the most resilient people. Just as I felt I was starting to blossom, with impeccable timing my father's family shows up once again in my life. Not only to re-introduce themselves to me but to kindly give the warning that they would be selling the house I lived in that they paid off in place of backed-child support. This enhanced the depression I was dealing with at the time.

Now although I was in high school I was also in scouts and track. I saw my performance in school dramatically decline as I would space out in class thinking about where I would lay my head to rest in the future, I wasn't able to engage in conversations with friends and I felt left out of being with my friends even when they would invite me to go out with them, and I noticed I was running slower in track as well.

While I knew that I was dealing with some serious issues in my depression I never saw the correlation between my declining performance in school, scouts, and track with the issues I had to deal with mentally. As the school year wore on, my performance suffered, but luckily it was the discovery of taking a mental health day that I was able to see I needed to work on myself for a bit and give everything a break for a day.

I was fed up with my lack of progress in track one day and I was adamant that I would get better. I decided that instead of going to school one day I would fake being sick so I could go for a long run and push myself, sorry mom. It was on that run that I made some major realizations.

I realized that I wasn't in control of the situation and that I couldn't be with my parents. They were going to do what they wanted regardless. I did realize that I needed to address my depression, re-focus all of my attention on school so I could pull a B-average grade point, and finish my Eagle project in scouts before the year was over. I also realized I needed to communicate my issues and share with my teachers and coach what was going on no matter how scared I was to tell them because while I was on that run I realized that I needed to miss school and everything else for once so I could focus on myself.

Of course like clockwork, everything started to improve and feel optimistic to me. I finished my Eagle project to become an Eagle scout, I became an all-state track runner after telling my coach I needed to be pushed mentally with everything going on at home, and I graduated with a B-average grade point.

I won't and I never could attribute turning everything around to just that one day, but because I gave myself the mental health day I saw that I needed to address what was happening in my life and focus on myself in order to steer my life back on track. It took a lot of work from myself to get past everything at home. I had to find a method to channel the despair I was feeling into something positive, and through taking a mental health day I gave myself the chance to focus on some options. My experiences absolutely do not speak for anyone else dealing with mental health issues. I actually see what I went through as a cake-walk compared to what some of my friends deal with on a daily basis.

The one thing that does seem to be the common theme surrounding mental health days is that we all need days to address ourselves and things that might be hindering us from being the best that we can be. It's tough to bring ourselves to admit when we need help, but sometimes the best person that can help us is our own selves when we have the proper space we need.