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I’m not sure I believe in mental illness anymore. I think mental illness might just be certain types of neural diversity - predisposition to certain traits - and external factors determine whether those traits are allowed to flourish comfortably or triggered into trauma response
capitalism is hardest on people with mental illness/neurodiversity - it puts us in the worst possible environment for our brains and bodies, forces maximum discomfort, and because of our lack of resources, crushes us most in this cycle of labor/triggers/mental decline/repeat
the very act of being forced to live in a competition-based system with social stratification, social roles, hierarchy, ego, winners & losers, in-groups & out-groups, social status is in itself deeply traumatic to neurodivergent brains who do not see or believe in those concepts
i believe there might be another definition for depression - a root cause, of which depression is the effect. empathy. empathy is to truly feel for others. not intellectually, but emotionally. to feel deep empathy when living in a cruel social system causes immense pain & trauma
any argument you might desire to make based off of the arguments you’ve heard neurotypical people make that “mental illness isn’t real” is going to mean you will be arguing with some imaginary person that isn’t here, and not actually hearing my argument. stop that or go away.
i am not saying the lived experiences and the pain of mental illness aren’t real. i’m autistic and been diagnosed with bipolar and anxiety for a decade. if you think i’m saying the experiences of being mentally ill aren’t real, you are having a conversation with yourself. ok.
take away all the labels of mental illness, the definitions, the stigma - remove everything that is part of a social narrative and purely look at the material facts. the triggers, emotions, physical responses, etc. remove the narrative. these things are real. the narrative isn’t
if the idea of removing the narrative and simply seeing the facts, and examining what other narratives might be more rationally developed around these facts, makes no sense to you - congratulations, you’re very neurotypical and you shouldn’t work in the mental health field
children who are having existential dread, emotional breakdowns over the plight of others (like trees, incarcerated people, victims of genocide hundreds of years ago), who don’t understand social inclusion and exclusion - these are neurodivergent, empathetic people
we can say those kids are experiencing mental illness - but why? they are experiencing a logical, natural reaction to living in a world where people kill each other, hate each other, reject each other, and make decisions from ego, selfishness, greed
the neurotypical response would be something like - well because that’s the way the world is. maybe it shouldn’t be, but it is, people will always be that way, so it’s on these people to cope. everyone else is coping. these depressed kids don’t have coping skills.
but THAT IS A NEUROTYPICAL WORLDVIEW. it is in itself ableist and ableism in its deepest sense is a demand for conformity. we do not have to accept a neurotypical narrative to put our lived experience in context. it’s a narrative based in social rules, which are not real to me
neurotypical people are not coping with something if they are not experiencing it in the first place. neurotypical people are not coping with their empathy for trees, incarcerated people, and victims of genocide. they are not experiencing it at all.
so that means really these people experiencing depression are the ones coping. they develop coping mechanisms that go from deep breathing, repeating numbers or phrases, hand tapping, self medicating, cutting - things to distract from and dull the pain.
these coping mechanisms can be extreme and damaging because they are never enough. how do you truly cope with empathy you can’t shut off and a world of immense, constant, unimaginable cruelty that your brain cannot comprehend bc it’s based in concepts that aren’t real to you?
then the bigger question is - why is the tendency for empathy the one we see as an illness to be cured? why instead wouldn’t the tendency for a lack of empathy and orientation towards pure self interest be the one pathologized? because it’s held by the majority. that’s it.
when i say that social roles aren’t real, i don’t mean they can’t affect us. but they’re cultural concepts, human inventions. a stop sign is not real. i will follow it because to live in a society we make certain agreements to imbue things with meaning to create order & cooperate
the social story neurotypical people are living in is not real, it’s one narrative. we might have to live physically in a world dominated by their narrative, and be affected by it, but we do not have to accept it ourselves as the truth.
if you jump to “so we shouldn’t take medicine because we don’t have a disease?” you need to remember that you’re arguing in your head with a neurotypical person because i, an autistic person, am not making that argument. that argument still exists only in the NT narrative.
what you are experiencing is real. your feelings, your physical sensations. the effect that medication has on your system is real. the narrative of what medication means is not real. the narrative that using substances to ease your mind means anything at all is not real.
modern psychiatry might be explaining this as mental illnesses just like previous centuries burned witches or said people were possessed by demons but it’s all one overarching ableist narrative. some brains are faulty, broken, not strong enough, missing something.
modern society says my autistic brain is missing something because i do not value the social narrative (they’d say i “don’t get social cues”). but the social narrative is not real. it’s an agreement. it’s an imaginary thing humans decided to agree is real & operate within.
just because my body and brain need care to survive in this world doesn’t make them broken. every organic being needs care. the care i need is different. the level of care i need is different. any meaning ascribed to any of that is not objective fact - it’s just a story.
I take psychiatric medication every day, as well as medication to regulate other processes affected by my connective tissue that make my brain and body more flexible but more sensitive. Everyone does things to maintain & regulate their systems. That’s normal.
There is also no true objective moral negative meaning behind being broken. Just because I say I don’t think my brain is broken, doesn’t even mean I think it would be bad if it were. In fact, I think my brain was broken a bit before when I tried to make it neurotypical.
The question is - how is it affecting me? Personally, I did not like my brain being broken. It was painful and confusing. I didn’t get to focus on things I like. I couldn’t express myself without anxiety. My brain feels much better when I stop trying to break it.
Me accepting being autistic and interacting with the world as an openly autistic person is allowing my brain to work the way it is built to. It is much more satisfying to me. None of that changes the fact that I take medication, eat food, rest, drink water, etc to keep it running
My autistic brain not being broken and in fact working exactly the way it was built to doesn’t mean that I won’t experience negative physical and mental sensations. It is up to me how I would like to deal with those. I include medication bc it makes it easier to handle NT society
So if you are experiencing mental illness, your experiences are real. You can choose to use society’s labels when they help you receive the things you want and need. You can also choose to assess yourself & examine alternate narratives for why your brain is the way it is.
I’m happy to use society’s labels for me if it helps me get what I need. NT society doesn’t understand me, so I have to represent myself in symbols they can recognize. I’m happy to say I am mentally ill and have bipolar disorder when interacting with society and it is relevant.
I am happy to call myself autistic because it will help the world get a fuller picture of what autistic people actually are like. But I do not, and don’t have to, internalize their narratives and believe them myself. I am not limited to analyzing myself through their lens.
And in fact, when I examine the cultural narrative and find it unsupported by the facts, I am incapable of believing it. That’s part of being autistic. I can’t believe a narrative I don’t really think is rational. And I don’t believe that their narrative is rational.
You can choose to relate to your own brain how you want. If the cultural narrative is working for you and you feel your brain is fixed with certain therapy or medication and then you can exist in NT society & be satisfied, great. Keep that narrative for yourself.
But it seems to me that a lot of people are not at all happy under this narrative. It’s causing more pain, shame, self blame, discomfort - more trauma. Do you don’t have to accept it. What if the thing that you think causes you pain in your brain is actually beautiful?
What is the pain is actually being caused by the fact that you are seeing, feeling, processing things that horrify, sadden, stress, and tire you? That doesn’t mean you have to not process those things, or simply accept the pain that comes from it.
You can still manage the pain caused by processing those things, and you can manage your physical organism so it is as pleasant for you to be in as you can. But at the same time, you can feel beautiful, good, and proud that your brain is the way it is.
You don’t have to see yourself as a broken version of a regular person if you don’t want to. You can see yourself as a whole and complete *you* that you love. These are narratives. These are options. And your narrative for your brain is up to you.
