Wow, it's been a month

I just looked at my blog and realized it's been a month since I've posted anything. I don't know how many people even read this, or care, but I think it's good for me to sit down and reflect for a while, even though I don't have too many things specifically formed in my mind that I want to say.

The reason I put off writing another post for so long was because I was going to make some sort of statement about the adults reading my blog, but then I changed my mind. I was mad when I first discovered my parents sent my blog to a ton of people I both knew well and barely knew. It angered me because they neither asked for my permission to share it, nor told me afterwards that they shared it. I had to find out from someone else. However, the more I reflected on it, the more I realized how I'm not going to be able to keep it from people anyway. I thought about this blog for a long time, and eventually decided I would go with it anyway, even though I knew there was a risk many people in my life I didn't want reading this would possibly find it. I put my story out in public with the knowledge that this is the internet and indeed anyone can read it. I am trying really hard not to care what other people think about me as well, so I'll just have to deal with whatever judgements come my way, both good and bad as well as misguided.

I don't much mind my friends reading my blog, because I feel like for the most part, people in my generation are much more accepting of mental illness than any generations before us. I hope the trend continues of more acceptance and understanding of mental illness as time goes on. Also, I certainly have met people my age who are just as misjudging as adults, so I just have to work to forgive people who hurt me, especially because for the most part it is unintentional. I also try hard to work for better understanding of mental illness, even though it's still super difficult for me to talk about in person to all but my closest friends.

However, I still feel like there are so many misconceptions about mental illness, and especially depression, that I will most likely cease writing in my blog during the summer. I may have a post or two more, but once I start working, I'll probably stop, because I don't want to jeopardize my job. I would hope that for the most part, people would be understanding, but one can never know, and I've had many bad experiences with discussing mental health with adults. Also, people who have mental illnesses aren't guaranteed to have a job. I was reading about discrimination, and discrimintion against all sorts of things isn't allowed in the work place, but mental illness is not one of those things. So just to be on the safe side, I'll probably not post here while I'm working.

I am sort of just rambling through this post saying whatever is on my mind. There isn't really much central purpose to it. But I guess there doesn't have to be, because it's a blog post. I was just thinking however, that from my perspective, depression is the most stigmatized mental illness. I may be biased, since I suffer from depression, but I do feel like this is taken the least seriously by people. I feel like for the most part, people accept any other mental illness, like schizophrenia, for example, as being more valid than depression. I think it's because people look at some mental illnesses and say they don't understand what's going on, and categorize people as "crazy" and needing help. When people look at depression, they often think, or even say to me, yea, I know exactly what that's like, everyone gets really really sad about things and feels hopeless and down. But depression is so much more beyond that that I don't even know what to say to those things except that people who think they know what depression is, often times really don't. I think part of it may also have to do with the casual way people throw around the word depression, or say that they're feeling depressed. I think that Depression, as an illness, should have a different name. I don't really have any suggestions as to what, but it was just a thought. Also, another reason I probably think Depression is the most stigmatized, is because it's what I suffer from, so I stigmatize myself. I blame myself for my Depression, since that's what many people around me do. My self-esteem for many years has been tiny shattered pieces here and there.

On a completely unrelated note, I felt really good seeing all the people that told me Happy Birthday. I really made me feel loved for a little bit. Which is something, because I very very rarely feel loved. But that could be a whole other blog post and I've already written a lot and I'm tired, so I'm going to sleep.