My take on me and mental health-(feel free to get offended)

Don't let someone else's narrative define or rather belittle yours. In a world of words I can be reduced to syllables, words and labels. Ones that may or may not define me and I will inevitably be caught in that binary. My generation dealt with their pains differently than the present generation. Words like depression, anxiety, mental health were new if not absent from our vocabulary. We were new to the idea of inventing words to define our world. 'Toxic' was the river with affluence that I was running a signature campaign to get cleaned up. 'Agency' was a place where my parents got a gas cylinder or a ticket booking. 'Mental' was an offensive word but we used it freely and no one seemingly got offended.  I lived my time.  Lived through the traumas of sexual abuse and mental abuse by sharing my stories with my friends, most of whom had been through the same and we told each other to move on, though I doubt any of us ever did. We did not have therapy, nor did we have safe spaces.  Forget safe space we had no privacy. I shared my bedroom with my siblings and our parents stored their woollens and old clothes in a metal chest in our bedroom, it was also the room that had the TV!! 

I built a broken life of inner struggles and physical pains all the time thinking this is life and this is how it is. I was never happy, but I never knew that and that ignorance allowed me to go on. Most of what we read today about mental health, even the personal stories is built on words and theories that are politically correct and scientifically authenticated. In the avalanche of words, statements and opinions there is very little space for honesty which can be politically incorrect or without any scientific fact. It almost seems like the space of mental health is overtaken by those who are literate and literacy is the only way in or out of it, (that too only in english)

I was recently told that my generation knows nothing about mental health. I was initially offended but also grateful cause my ignorance let me survive somethings that would have killed me otherwise ( and i am not using the word killed lightly over here).

Am I advocating ignoring mental health? no on the contrary,  just because one didn't have the words and the means does not mean one did not endure it. Nor does it mean that unless you express it, in words and label it, it didn't happen. I am suspicious of the overemphasis of words and theories that have taken over this space. What is mental well being and who is defining it?  Who is defining wellness, illness and cure? Maybe I coped differently. Maybe I did things that today is called burying the truth, or hiding or escaping. But If like me, you survived, then let me tell you, that I see that as a strength in me and you could too. Every method of survival is valid. Denial can be a part of it. 

Today there are umpteen ways to define poor mental health and a fixed idea of normal. There is a constant stress on normalising mental health issues and I get that, but it also has the exact opposite effect of compartmentalising people. I have heard introductions which go, oh "she is xvx, she is manic depressive". "He is abc, he is clinically depressed. "Hi  I am a writer, I write on culture and I am also working through my anxiety disorder". I have never understood what I am supposed to do with that information. Treat them differently? Not treat them differently? If we all have mental health issues should we not be accommodating this into our life anyway? But I am told that we can never say that this is common or that many people are dealing with it, cause that would belittle that persons problem. And therein again lies my dilemma, doesnt it help to know that you are not alone in this struggle?  It definitely helped me when the #metoo movement erupted cause I felt I wasn't the only one. Also on a one on one,  here I am siting bang in front of you, facing the same problem as you, but just because I don't have the right words or diagnoses I must acknowledge your problem and not say "hey, I understand", cause that is callous? 

We have reached a time when I can tell someone I am depressed and they can tell me based on a tick list if I am or I am not. My personal opinion does not count, (though there is a lot of talk of listen, empathise etc, you can be discounted on the basis of popular science). It will also depend on who I express this to and what I say. I can read the symptoms of an illness on webMD, quote those to a psychiatrist and it is quite likely that I will be prescribed drugs for the same. 

This is what I tell myself as I am walking out of my 40s. "Take care of yourselves. Take the help you need. You have been through a lot and you don't even know it. You without your finite idea of self, (the whole load of personality disorders!)  may seem invisible to the world without the words, the labels, the declaration of problems and achievement.  What got you this far is this chaos, confusion and delusion. So lets move on. To each soul I shared this journey with, to everyone that laughed with me and everyone who messed me up.... Thank you for adding to the chaos."