Nothing and I mean nothing frustrates me more than when people glamourise mental illness. This is something that I have wanted to write about for a while but I’m not sure what to write down in case what I say doesn’t make sense, you know that feeling when you have so much to say that it ends up becoming a jumbled mess when written down? Yes that’s my issue.
Anxiety, depression, eating disorders, bipolar, paranoia, the list goes on, these are SERIOUS illnesses, but when spoke about most unfortunately are not taken seriously until it’s too late. However, there are a number of people who use mental illness like it’s the next trending accessory, you can’t just pick depression up from the shelf in your local Primark.
Mental illness years ago was something no one dared to mention, they were scared, no one knew what was wrong with them, so they’d suffer in silence in fear of other opinions, but now as grateful as I am that it has become something that I am thankful people are talking about more, unfortunately there are some that still don’t understand. It is branding mental illnesses as a television advert almost enticing people to get one of their own. It’s such a toxic environment and it’s harmful!
Educating others on mental illness is still so important, sometimes it may seem like we are talking to a brick wall but there is a tiny amount of people that we could educate just by making them aware, what mental illness is, how we can help others, what we can do to avoid it becoming the next high street fashion trend.
Social media is what people call a highlight of our lives and sometimes it is but it also is a fake portrayal of what really goes on in the world, mental illnesses that are shown on social media and TV are 99.9% of the time inaccurate in its representation, mental illness is definitely covered up in the media to almost look ‘cute’ to be ‘on trend’ and if that is how it is spoke about and where young people see most of it are we really surprised that this is how it’s turned out? I’m not surprised at all.
Mental health isn’t supposed to look cute with your outfit, it is an internal war that people battle every day.
Blogger Beth 