People with depression often feel like they can’t express themselves without judgement. There is a stigma that mental illness isn’t as worthy as a physical illness. People are less forgiving and sympathetic when it comes to mental pain. To me they are two of the same, except physical illness isn’t loaded with shame. It’s easier to comfort someone when they say “my stomach hurts” rather than “my heart is broken” and the reality is most of us would prefer to call in sick with a “migraine” rather than be vulnerable and say the truth – “I am having a bad day”. Many people will still treat mental illness as an inadequate reason to not be present in society. I am hopeful this perception will change but until that happens, I’ll continue to write about it. Allow me to explain all of this with a real-life example.

When confronted with Alopecia Leon concealed his emotions because he felt misunderstood. For the reason that there was little emotional acknowledgement for what he was going through. Almost everyone compared his situation with another illness, one they believed was worse. It was almost like people had this instinctive reaction to play it down in an attempt to make him feel better. I myself was guilty of this in the very beginning. There have been many times when I have explained the psychological aspect of Alopecia to be met with the response “it’s just hair” and “he’s not dying” words dealt by even those closest to us and possibly many reading this. For people like Leon the method of comparing or being told to “think happy thoughts” doesn’t make mental pain any less difficult to bear. If anything, it makes things worse (and it’s really annoying). It made him feel like he wasn’t allowed to be sad because there were “worse” conditions. He felt guilty and silly for being depressed because of his alopecia. His frequent attempt to conceal emotions increased the burden and lead him to more problems. While we knew this was not a display of heartlessness nor was it malicious, it demonstrated that most people had no idea about mental pain or how to support someone with it. It was an opportunity for me to help them learn. I took the unawareness as my cue to talk about it with whoever wanted to listen. The more I speak about it, the more support there will be for Leon and other people living with depression. As long as we keep the discussion going the better things will be.

It took years for me to understand mental illness and appreciate and nourish my own mental health. I am comfortable to use my voice and stand up for Leon and anyone else suffering from depression. There should only be one way of looking at this issue and that’s by the facts, the stats and the unmistakable evidence that depression is a mental illness and it is a terminal disease of the mind. If you disagree, I welcome you to the following figures. Almost eight people die by suicide each day in Australia. Six of these people are men. It could be your husband, friend, son or father. Suicide is the leading cause of death for Australians aged 15 to 24. Our future leaders are falling victim because they feel life is not worth living. Depression and anxiety are deadly diseases and I will never understand how every part of our body gets support when it is ill but our biggest organ, the brain does not. I am not going to pretend I am not expecting some form of divided opinion on the matter but it is not our difference in opinion that divides us it is our inability to recognise that we need to support each other.

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