It took until the end of 2017 for people to wake up and realize that abusing prescription drugs just ain't cute. Unfortunately, this even took the fall and loss of Lil Peep, an iconic "pop punk rapper" who reportedly either overdosed on Xanax or lost his life to something laced within the Xanax that he was taking.

After the news broke about Lil Peep, there was a shift in the way we talk about prescription drugs. Much of the new conversation was vastly positive. The message was clear: stop taking prescription drugs, especially Xanax, recreationally. However, every time something good like this is brought to attention, there is a vastly negative and radical reaction that occurs as well.

This time that negative reaction was prescription pill shaming for those who take prescribed medication for mental illness.

Stigma around mental illness has been around for ages and, unfortunately, may not be going anyway for a long time, especially given the recent uptick in a trend called pill shaming. Pill shaming takes many forms, both overtly and covertly.

Pill shaming is the act of generating negative stigma toward those who need medical help to work toward a more stable mental state. For many people who are mentally ill, a chemical imbalance is a fault. No matter how much talk therapy someone may have, a problematic chemical imbalance cannot be talked away. For others, while their mental illness may stem from certain situations or past history, it may still be difficult for them to cope enough for discussion. This is where their medicine helps them reach a therapeutic balance, where now they can talk through what is causing their mental illness.

Historically, pill shaming has arisen as a part of a larger stigma against those with mental illness. Books, such as "Prozac Nation" by Elizabeth Wurtzel, highlight the difficulty previous generations of mentally ill people had when attempting to "get better." For a long time, parents believed their mentally ill children were just naughty or misbehaved. Other times the individual would be told that they were just not trying hard enough to be happy. This effectively negated and invalidated an individual's personal experiences with their mental illness and shamed them away from reaching out for professional help, eliminating their access to medicine.

The narrative is changing now. Mental illness is no longer kept in the dark as it was in the past. Now, pop culture and society as a whole has encouraged people to come forward with their stories and go to professional counselors to get help. Our stigma against mental illness was dropping… is dropping.

But there seems to be another bar that us mentally ill people need to overcome. While it is recognized that mental illness is valid and that mentally ill people need help, neurotypical people have begun to believe that is up to them to tell us how we do that.

Mindfulness media has become a large pop culture trends. Yoga, kale, excessive amounts of water are supposed to solve all of our issues. And for those who are neurotypical, yes these things can be the end all and be all of their pursuit of a reduction of stress, but for those of us with an inherent chemical imbalance, no amount of downward dog will jog our brain into action.

People use their go-to mindfulness tactics as a way to discourage people from pursuing medicine for their mental illness. I can not tell you how many times my explanation of my medicine has led to a grimace and a backhanded comment about how maybe if I tried this new fad technique I wouldn't have a problem remaining balanced.

In fact, even medical professionals, who job it is to prescribe my pills, often negate the claims of their clients. When I walk into my current psychiatrist's office, I fear that she will think I am lying about my experiences and that I only want these pills because I like being doped up. She has consistently ignored my concerns and my own knowledge of my mental illness. When I asked for a prescription change because Lexapro just wasn't doing it, I was met with a baffled and stuck-up expression that read effectively as "how dare you think you know better than me." It is clear that this pill shaming isn't just in everyday culture, it goes right to professionals.

"Stay on your current medication and just go to therapy more often," she said. I left there knowing that the night terrors that were occurring as a symptom of my medication would persist that night.

We have managed to work on eliminating the stigma against mental illness while keeping our negative attitude toward medically used pills the same. People have taken to Twitter to express that prescribed pills do nothing but close our minds.

XANAX is legal. and LSD is not. xanax is legal and psilocybin is not. xanax is heavily PRESCRIBED. it kills people or turns them into robots. psychedelics wake people up. our government legalizes drugs that diminish our minds and bans drugs that expand them
— jordan🦋→ ATL (@jordanburak8) November 18, 2017

The false idea that medicine will turn us into robots has been perpetuated across generations. It is also a reason that so many people fear getting help. Those who take Xanax for medical purposes know that a robotic feel can come from either an overdose or if the drug just is not right for you (which does happen and can be fixed).

After Lil' Peep's death, people resorted to attacking the very thing that keeps me mentally stable and operating every day. In fact, some of my close friends even tried to convince me to stop taking my medicine because I "didn't need it." Unfortunately, I listened and only a few weeks later, I hit a bad case of ultradian cycling, which is a medical term for when bipolar disorder goes completely haywire.

Your pill shaming just ain't cute when I'm laying in my bed, unable to breathe.