No one is entitled to anyone elseâs success story
A lot of the âtumblr is anti-recoveryâ panic and moralizing is based around the idea that itâs âdangerousâ to younger people with MIs/chronic illness to see all us Bitter Old Crazies making jokes about NT Advice⢠and acting like weâre never gonna get better. And tbh it strikes me as similar to the recent moral panic about adult or triggering content in fandom spaces. Think of The Children! they cry. Youâre Being a Bad Influence!
But hereâs the thing. Nobody is entitled to someone elseâs success story. Kids with MIs do not have some kind of right to see adults with MIs successfully coping, and in the inverse, itâs not our responsibility to hide our unsuccessful coping away from where impressionable kiddos might see it and be discouraged by it.
First of all, not everyone has a success story. Not everyone gets better. People might be able to improve, or they might not. And by classifying people who acknowledge their circumstances as being the best theyâre likely to get as âanti-recoveryâ, youâre literally trying to silence mentally ill people from talking about their own lives and experiences, just because you donât like to hear about it.
But even for those of us who do have success stories - like, Iâm one of those. I dropped out of college and spent the first 10 years of my adult life living with partners and family, relying on others, driving a 20-year-old clunker of a car which I literally had to duct-tape pieces back onto sometimes, trying to work retail and temp jobs to get by when I could, but I never could hold anything down very long. About 5 years ago, I finally got treatment - meds, specifically, bc Iâd had on and off therapy that only helped a little bit - for my depression. As of this year, I have graduated college with a 4-year degree, bought a newish car (10 yrs old sports car in good condition), held down a single job in my desired career field for almost 4 years, and I bought a house with my partner earlier this year. You couldnât ask for a more solid recovery story than that.
But, and this is key: I donât owe anyone the inspiration of my story. Existing in public as an adult whoâs turned my life around despite severe chronic mental illness doesnât obligate me to serve as a good example or role model to others with MIs. I often choose to take on that role, but itâs a choice, and if I chose instead to keep it to myself, or to publicly vent my bitterness over the decade of life Iâve lost because of my illness, or vent my frustration with the useless NT advice I tried to follow and use to âfixâ myself (to no avail) before finally getting proper treatment, then thatâs my right. This is my blog, my space, Iâll tag things appropriately but I refuse to censor myself from talking about the reality of my mental illness, and if you donât wanna hear my negativity you know where to find the unfollow button.
And in fact, the responsibility in this situation lies not with the people talking, but with the people listening.
When I was in college and for a bit thereafter, I was part of a depression and mental illness forum. I donât remember the name of it anymore, but I spent time on it then like I spend time on Tumblr now. Talking with people, posting and replying. And a lot of it, as one might expect for a gathering of people with depression of varying degrees of severity and treatment resistance, was really negative.
And that was a space that helped and supported me for a good number of years. I could open up about my suicidal thoughts and urges to self-harm. I could receive caring and understanding from people who were like me, who never made me roll my eyes with Pollyanna-ish platitudes or offered empty sentiment to inspire âhopeâ. If I felt hopeless, I could just fucking say that, could act like it. I didnât have to perform positivity for anyone or hide my struggles.
But there came a time, eventually, when I began to find the level of negativity to be harmful for me rather than helpful. I had changed, and I needed something different.
I didnât go around the forum and start telling people they were being too negative.
I didnât try to force people to perform hopefulness and positivity because it would be more beneficial for me personally.
I didnât scold people or accuse them of hindering my recovery.
I left that forum. I said goodbye to my friends, gave people my offsite contact information, and I stopped visiting that forum altogether. Because I had reached a point in my recovery where that environment had gone from helpful to harmful, for me personally. So I took responsibility for my own recovery and my own progress, and I made the decision to move on and find the kind of environment that would be good for me at that point.
Itâs not quite so neat and discrete here on Tumblr, since so many people have personal blogs and reblog a variety of types of content, sometimes adding their contribution, sometimes not. Unless you strictly and only follow topic-specific blogs, youâll be exposed sometimes to things you didnât quite sign up for.
But even here, youâre still responsible for you user experience. You have tools you can use. Blacklist certain tags or phrases or topics. Unfollow or block specific individuals. Do what you need to do, in order to create an environment on your dash that is healthy for you and meets your needs.
And that is YOUR RESPONSIBILITY. Yours. Not mine, not anyone elseâs. We are not responsible for creating an environment that meets your mental health needs. We are individuals who are allowed to talk shit and piss and moan about our lives on our own goddamn blogs if we want to. Which includes making morbid jokes, mocking shitty advice that weâve received from NT people that was anywhere from useless to actively harmful, talking openly about our limitations, being honest about our hopes for recovery or lack thereof, and complaining about the relentless positivity that demands we continue to aspire to a NT model of Recovery⢠even when we know damn well thatâs not a possibility for us.
Youâre not entitled to anyone elseâs success story for inspiration. If you want to hear success stories and positivity, find people who post that stuff and leave us Bitter Old Crazies the fuck alone.
