I’m writing this just because I’m sitting flicking through my dash and some of the posts are making me sick to my stomach.

The idea that to qualify as having depression you’re not allowed to talk about it, that if you don’t attempt to hide your self-harm scars then you’re ‘just doing it for attention’, that fundamentally if you’re honest then you’re a fake, is sickening.

A blog is personal, a blog is for the person who runs it. A mental illness is all consuming, it pre-occupies a person’s life, and if an individual blogs about their fucking struggles it does not give you a right to call them an attention whore and tell them to go kill themselves.

People seem to think that they are in some way being an advocate for the ‘truly mentally ill’ but bullying the people who just do it for ‘attention’. But that’s not what happens. What happens is that you are contributing to the stigma surrounding it, people will be afraid to talk openly about mental illness for fear of being purposefully triggered, told to go kill themselves, and ‘fake’. People won’t seek out help for fear of being written off as just ‘attention seeking’. 

If a person is struggling they should be allowed to reach out for help, they should be allowed to write what they like on their personal blog without being ridiculed for being mentally ill and being honest about it. Hiding mental illness is not something to brandish like a badge of honour, it does not make you better than those who choose to be open.

And if anyone is willing to cut themselves up for the sake of attention, then there’s something wrong there, that person needs help, whether you want to admit it or not.

Shaming someone for mental illness is a disgusting thing to do.