Don’t allow the fear and lack of education from others make you feel like a burden. Don’t allow them to tell you that you are ‘faking’ your illness. You know that something is wrong. You know within yourself that you are struggling.
The struggle is real. The stigma surrounding mental illness is real. I will fight to end the stigma of mental illness and the effect this has on people. I want you to know that you are not alone in this struggle. You will never be alone.
Finding out that you have a mental illness such as depression or anxiety can be terrifying. It can be so overwhelming and confusing. It’s made so much harder during the weeks or months before you are diagnosed if no one believes that your struggle is real.
Please never stop fighting. Educate yourself as much as possible on your illness and educate the people around you. You deserve to live a happy and fulfilled life filled with love, compassion, caring and understanding; from the people around you and from yourself.
If at the end of the day, no-one understands the struggles you face, please realise that the people that care about you may have struggles of their own and they may not have the education or understanding to know that your struggle is real. Please don’t let the people that care about you, put you down or make you feel like a burden.
If you have to stand on your own to fight this battle within yourself, please find the courage to do so. Please never give up! You are worth the fight. You will never be alone in this fight with yourself.
If you relapse or begin to struggle again, please don’t let this discourage you. There are people in this world who care about you and your wellbeing. These may be the people you would least expect and great friendships can be formed.
Please reach out to someone if you are struggling. If you don’t receive the support you need from the person you reach out to, please continue to reach out to other people until you are heard.
Be brave.
In order to ‘recover’ there will be setbacks. There will be days where you relapse or when you take 1 step forward & 2 steps back.
On the days that you find yourself feeling overwhelmed and worthless because you have made so much progress and then you find yourself taking 1 step forward and 2 steps back, just know that you will always be one step ahead from where you initially started.
No matter how many times you struggle or ‘take a step back’ just know that you are stronger and braver than you ever were before you began this journey.
end the stigma 
Thank you so much for sharing my post on your blog 🙂 I am so proud that someone has taken the time to read my post & I hope it can bring hope to others in knowing that they are not & never will be alone in their fight to end the stigma of mental health ❤ Never give up! Xo
Reblogged this on Kate Louise and commented:
Thank you so much to @endthestigmablog.wordpress.com for posting my article on their blog! ☺