It’s frustrating because all these folks need to do is just use the word “I” rather than “you” or “we” when talking about their mental state. Like, let me rewrite the comment that made me so mad:
As someone who also has depression and ADHD. There is nothing wrong with me. It’s OK for me to take medication to survive in an environment that’s actively hostile to me, but it’s also OK for me to acknowledge that if our society actually valued people I could live the way I need with the community support I need and I likely wouldn’t need to be medicated any more. It’s like covid, catching covid doesn’t mean there’s Something wrong with me. It means our society isn’t structured in a way to prevent people from getting sick (masks, vaccines, etc) and values profits more than people’s wellbeing.
They’d probably go on to say “this is how I feel about it. I don’t know if you’ve considered this, but having this mindset has been hugely helpful for my life” and then I’d say “oh yeah I have thought about it and that just doesn’t work for me” and we’d be on our merry way.
To me, that is not invalidating or invasive or presumptive or whatever. I might feel a little irritated, but lots of things do that and it’s fine. Regardless of whether or not I agree with the axioms this comment is built on top of, I can respect that it is someone opening a small window into their mental state. Like, shit, who the fuck am I to tell this person that they’d need meds if they lived in a better world? I’m just some dunce on the Internet who isn’t going to lecture someone on what their lived experience is like.
I just wish that folks would realize that other people have different experiences and requirements for happiness and health, and that not meeting those requirements/having those requirements met is, as I understand it, one of the definitions of trauma. Having to live my life unmedicated was traumatic because my brain does not work in a way that is conducive to happiness. Please don’t try to tell me otherwise.
Totally agree. The “there is nothing wrong with us” in particular (and similar sentiments) gets under my skin so bad. I’m happy for them that they are privileged enough to feel that way, but there is absolutely something wrong with me. Is that a value judgment? No. It’s a statement of fact. Just like my physical disabilities constitute something being wrong. It has no bearing on my self-worth, I just feel more able to cope when I acknowledge that there is a problem with me that others don’t face.
Yep. I personally hate debating semantics with people online and have had decent luck in the past by replacing “wrong” with stuff like “it prevents me from being happy” so that people skimming don’t latch onto “wrong” out of context and assume it is a value judgement. It appears that didn’t work in this thread, however. When I think about it I find the necessity of that replacement to be pretty annoying.
It’s frustrating and tiring for me to see how hard it is for people to understand their own privilege. Like, it took me waaaay too long to see my own privilege, and seeing it required a very patient person to lay out parallel life situations where something went well for me and terribly for them. At this point, I don’t begrudge people for struggling to understand the multiplicity of human existence (because who the fuck does), but it does drive me bugfuck nuts when that lack of comprehension leads to people saying that living a life like my pre-medicated hellscape is better than the relative stability I have now. Ign
All that besides, thanks for your comments. They’ve been quite validating and reading them has helped me to feel a bit better about all of this. Hopefully I’ll be able to stop perseverating on this thread and get back to my life.
It’s frustrating because all these folks need to do is just use the word “I” rather than “you” or “we” when talking about their mental state. Like, let me rewrite the comment that made me so mad:
They’d probably go on to say “this is how I feel about it. I don’t know if you’ve considered this, but having this mindset has been hugely helpful for my life” and then I’d say “oh yeah I have thought about it and that just doesn’t work for me” and we’d be on our merry way. To me, that is not invalidating or invasive or presumptive or whatever. I might feel a little irritated, but lots of things do that and it’s fine. Regardless of whether or not I agree with the axioms this comment is built on top of, I can respect that it is someone opening a small window into their mental state. Like, shit, who the fuck am I to tell this person that they’d need meds if they lived in a better world? I’m just some dunce on the Internet who isn’t going to lecture someone on what their lived experience is like.
I just wish that folks would realize that other people have different experiences and requirements for happiness and health, and that not meeting those requirements/having those requirements met is, as I understand it, one of the definitions of trauma. Having to live my life unmedicated was traumatic because my brain does not work in a way that is conducive to happiness. Please don’t try to tell me otherwise.
Totally agree. The “there is nothing wrong with us” in particular (and similar sentiments) gets under my skin so bad. I’m happy for them that they are privileged enough to feel that way, but there is absolutely something wrong with me. Is that a value judgment? No. It’s a statement of fact. Just like my physical disabilities constitute something being wrong. It has no bearing on my self-worth, I just feel more able to cope when I acknowledge that there is a problem with me that others don’t face.
Yep. I personally hate debating semantics with people online and have had decent luck in the past by replacing “wrong” with stuff like “it prevents me from being happy” so that people skimming don’t latch onto “wrong” out of context and assume it is a value judgement. It appears that didn’t work in this thread, however. When I think about it I find the necessity of that replacement to be pretty annoying.
It’s frustrating and tiring for me to see how hard it is for people to understand their own privilege. Like, it took me waaaay too long to see my own privilege, and seeing it required a very patient person to lay out parallel life situations where something went well for me and terribly for them. At this point, I don’t begrudge people for struggling to understand the multiplicity of human existence (because who the fuck does), but it does drive me bugfuck nuts when that lack of comprehension leads to people saying that living a life like my pre-medicated hellscape is better than the relative stability I have now. Ign
All that besides, thanks for your comments. They’ve been quite validating and reading them has helped me to feel a bit better about all of this. Hopefully I’ll be able to stop perseverating on this thread and get back to my life.