I see a lot of people discussing whether or not anxiety and depression are "valid disorders", and besides how ridiculous it is to say that a disorder is or isn't valid, I think it comes from the misunderstanding that anxiety and depression ARE disorders.
there not a single disorder that is itself depression, and that is itself anxiety. those are just ways to refer to disorders such as Major Depressive Disorder and Generalized Anxiety Disorders, most commonly.
So you can't say that "depression disorder" is worse than, let's say, schizophrenia. there's no such thing. There are depression disorderS, and anxiety disorderS.
As for if I think there are worse or better disorders, I believe it's up to the individual. I have multiple disorders and I believe some to be better and some to be worse, but someone with the same disorders as me may have a different experience with them, and have different struggles.
"rambling" ahead
There's also the fact that you can't heal from some disorders but you can heal from others, in a way where you no longer have that disorder. I actually used to have Major Depressive Disorder in the past, but then I recovered to a point where I no longer need medication, and it no longer affects me in any way, so I don't have depression anymore!
but! wheter or not someone can heal from a disorder that way is also up to the person affected, and what their psychiatrists/therapists/other professionals involved may decide. My current therapist is open to considering revoking a DID diagnosis to a patient who has reached final fusion (not for functional multiplicity, although he believes in it) and if requested by the patient, despite that not being standard practice.
(he believes that if you need someone's consent to diagnose them, you can't force with that diagnosis forever either)
So yeah, yet again, it's up to the individual experience.
There's also more things to consider. someone's disorder can present differently over the course of their lives, some disorders (like autism) can present with different levels of needs, some disorders could be covert, which means they don't often show (like NPD), some disorders may not be perceived as disorders at all by the person affected by them (like NPD, again, or even CDDs). We should consider that someone's disorders may be misdiagnosed, or that certain symptoms are attributed to one instant of another.
Generally speaking, disorders aren't little badges we are given after meeting enough requirements, but more like boxes we put ourselves into to explain and help deal with different sets of behaviours, and not always are those behaviors a clean cut across different boxes. Disorders are disabilities we need different amount of support for.
It's been a really really rough year. I turned forty in November and am in medical debt, was fired from a better paying survival job because of a transphobic parent, my actual career is hitting the same wall for over fifteen years now no matter what I do, and my parents are still unsupportive and too mentally ill to not make any issues not about their own grievances or ammo against me. And I just feel so hopeless.
I had some hope with a recent fellowship that wouldn't change much for most people, but would have changed the world for me and supposedly they wanted diverse horror screenwriters who write low budget. Guess that's not trans men writers. No one wants us. No fellowships/initiatives support us. We're boring gender traitors after all. I actually thought this script was good. But now I feel stupid and embarrassed. A friend that got into the fellowship last year, helped me with my application and talked me up to the judges, but I'm still not worth more than a form letter rejection. I wasted so much of my friend's time and they talked up someone the studio didn't even think was worth getting to finals. I only hurt him in all of this.
And now part of my same garbage script is being at a live read on Wednesday. Not because it got in on merit, but because I helped the group doing it with some connections. It was a fun idea to do before this news. Now I feel gross and ashamed to show it. I was going to have to read for the lead, because there haven't been any trans masc actors available to attend. I don't think I can without crying. And even worse, the script before mine, by a cis woman award-winner, is about James Barry being a "secret woman" and this ahistoric transandrophobia has been greenlit. To go after as a loser trans man who's work and self is considered worthless by the industry feels extra shitty. I'm gonna ask to pull my script.
My dysthymia is always rough. But I've been struggling with more depression the last few months. I thought it would get better. It's full-blown major depression now.
I was supposed to call unemployment to cover me during the summer because my information got screwed up and they're refusing my application because my birth certificate still has F and my dead name on it. So I'm running out of money fast and won't be able to make rent.
I just need something to go right. But nothing ever does or will. I'm tired of being a failure. I'm tired of the constant transphobia at work and the industry and what should be helpful government services. I'm tired of the transandrophobia online and in "feminist" spaces. I'm just tired of everything and don't know what to do anymore. It's not getting better. All I want is some small win, a glimmer of hope, that everything I do isn't worthless - but it's not there, it's never there.
Can I please just have an aneurism or heart attack or let there be a horrible fatal natural disaster here or anything please God I just don't want to be alive right now. I feel like I'm gonna break down crying again. I don't wanna do anything anymore. Why was I born wrong why was I born terrible.
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One of the things that ableism and racism come together to affect me on every single time, is when I need to get my hair cut because it's matted.
Keep in mind, despite asking to get my hair cut very short, barbers and hair stylist alike that do agree to help me out here, will often spend the entire time lecturing me or just being outright demeaning.
It's not that I don't know what I'm doing, or that I'm some sort of dirty careless freak, just genuinely ive avoided dealing with my biracial hair as much as possible because chronic pain and autism turns washing my hair into a fucking cage match, and depression makes doing a task consistently if it my life doesn't genuinely depend on it, near impossible.
But I can't walk into every hair shop, holding a sign saying I'm fresh out of a six year relationship, crippled, autistic, and depressed
Oil pastels and ink on multimedia paper, a piece I did of a beetle photographed in our garden.
“Some days I feel so empty inside that I doubt I have anything worth putting on a page and I’m overwhelmed by my all nothing. Sometimes there are so many ideas I want to render, but I don’t know where to start and the frustration builds. I have so many blank pages and yet not enough of me to fill them up. The void creates anxiety and I choose some distraction instead. I must try to break the cycle. Little by little I will make my joy a priority.
I am worth the effort. These things are worth doing.”
