Stigmatising the Stigma Surrounding Mental Illness

Carly Davis writes about her struggle coming to terms with Bipolar 2 and reflects on other members of her family who may have suffered an undiagnosed mental illness.

It’s not like having cancer or a physical disability where you can see what the problem is. People tend to have empathy for those with diseases that show, but when it comes to having anxiety, depression, or bipolar disorder, their empathy doesn’t extend very far. I would know. I’ve been my own worst enemy for over ten years now. Mental disorders don’t show on the outside. They linger under the surface – they hide in your mind. Only the person suffering truly knows how bad it can get.

I don’t know what it is that triggered my mental disorder. I don’t think it was just one thing though. Maybe it was the years of bullying that I’d endured in school. Maybe it was the fact that I grew up extremely poor, and tried my hardest to constantly hide that fact. But maybe it wasn’t either of those things. Maybe I just had a genetic predisposition to mental illness. For a long time I didn’t know what was wrong with me. I just thought that I had weird quirks. I thought that I was just moody, that I loved to spend money; and that I was impulsive, but that wasn’t just it. Those quirks weren’t a problem in itself – they were symptoms of a bigger issue.

My moods go from one extreme to another. I find myself making irrational decisions that come with negative consequences. My mind races with thoughts, both negative and positive. When I’m in one of my good moods, I want to cram as much into my days as I possibly can. My confidence explodes, and I always feel smarter, and more creative. I taught myself how to play guitar at nineteen because I decided that I was going to be a musician, which never came close to happening; I can’t even sing. I’ll write and draw for hours to get some of what I’m feeling on the inside out. When I’m good I’m great, but it never lasts, and after everything settles down I’m left feeling hopeless and mentally exhausted. The things that supposedly bring me joy don’t anymore.

I grew up spending a lot of time with my unconventional grandmother. She liked to collect things, but not just normal things. She liked to collect things that belonged to other people – things they’d throw out for garbage. She collected so much stuff that I’d have to climb over mountains of it to get from one room to the other. There were things thrown all over the place. Every room in her house was flooded with material things she didn’t even use.

My grandmother was a hoarder to the highest degree; she had a mental illness that was never treated. As an outsider you couldn’t see it. My grandmother was beautiful, and looked healthy enough, but I could never tell what was going on in her mind. I didn’t realize that she was sick until I was about sixteen, so all the years before that, I’d judged her lifestyle.

A few years later I’d found myself living with an aunt whose moods would change so frequently that I didn’t know who I’d be encountering from one day to the next. She’d be the most amazing person that I’d ever known, and then, just like that, she’d be a totally different person – mean, cold, and scary. She’d do things that wouldn’t make sense, like go on these shopping sprees, spend a ton of money, and then return everything she bought the next day. She’d get angry out of the blue, saying and doing things that was out of the ordinary. She’d also get really moody and not want to talk to anyone. We’re actually quite similar.

It occurred to me when I hit my twenties that I was never the only one in my family with a mental illness. It was just never acknowledged; it was stigmatised. One of the first things my therapist asked me in our first session was whether or not anyone in my family suffered from mental illness. I couldn’t give her a definitive answer because no one in my family was ever clinically diagnosed.

I didn’t get diagnosed with bipolar 2 until I was twenty-five, and by then I’d damaged my credit score so severely it will probably take the rest of my life for me to repair. The years before being diagnosed I’d been treated for anxiety and depression. I took medications that helped control my panic attacks, and not my impulsiveness and irritability. I haven’t told anyone about my mood disorder. I attempted to, but it was shrugged off and denied, and so I’ve been keeping my journey pretty much to myself until now.

Having an undiagnosed mental disorder can be lonely, and definitely dangerous. A lot of times, people choose not to acknowledge that there’s something wrong for fear of being judged. It’s important to realize that there is a community out there who understands exactly what you’re going through. There’s nothing wrong with getting help to get better. Not everyone can do it alone.