Mental illnesses are often romanticized. This is a common fact, and the fact that we have the internet makes it even easier to see this romanticization happen. Lately I've seen a lot of posts saying

"Statistically speaking people with depression are smarter"

or that "People with anxiety have better, closer friends"

or my absolute favorite: "People with mental illnesses live better lives."

These generalizations, and these romanticizations fill me with a righteous anger, especially since these things stem from people being uninformed.

So let me educate you a little bit:

Depression is not quotes on a Pinterest board. Depression isn't about love piecing someone's mind back together. Depression is not walking in the rain on sad days.

Depression is not beautiful. It is not good. It is by far one of the worst things that has happened to me.

Anxiety is not disliking being separated from your significant other for more than 5 minutes. Anxiety is not something that would go away if I removed all the stress in my life. Anxiety can not be beaten with just exercise and sweat.

Anxiety is not thought-provoking. It's painful. It hurts, and it can cause your breath to leave your chest too fast.

I'm not saying these things to be dramatic. I'm saying them because they're true.

And I'm not going to try and tell you exactly what depression is, or exactly what anxiety is because it differs for a lot of people. Just because it's one way for me doesn't mean my friend experiences it in the same capacity. The same is true of any illness, physical or otherwise.

You can't say everything's the same, when every person is different.

But whatever you do, don't romanticize suffering. Don't make the world into a manic pixie girl dream world, where love always prevails, tattoos fix everything, and there's a prevalence of heteronormativity.

Don't tell me that my suffering is good. That I'll come out on the other side scarred, but better for my journey.

Don't tell me that going through these painful moments is a balm for the soul. Don't tell me we wouldn't know the rainbows if we didn't have the rain.

Because no one really knows what you're going through unless you tell them. And society has created such a stigma and such a romanticization around mental health issues, that people feel like they can't tell others, and they can't get help. And you know what this leads to?

This leads to people harming or killing themselves because they see no other option.

Because they don't "need" to get help for something that's beautiful and overall good. And they don't need to tell others if this beautiful and good thing is actually just a figment of their imagination.

You might think I'm being emotional. That I'm crazy and that I don't know what I'm talking about.

Okay, sure. You can go think that. But before you decide completely, go to Tumblr, Pinterest, Facebook, whatever site you want, and type in a mental illness. See what you get. Then go do the same to Google, and read about people with this mental illness and what they say about it.

Because I guarantee, they don't want their suffering to be called beautiful.

They want it to be called suffering too.