Honesty is Integrity

Two things have regularly held me back in life: my mental health and my reluctance to be honest about it.

I have suffered with an eating disorder, depression and more recently; anxiety, but more prominently, more obstructively, I have suffered with shame.

Shame is the feeling of humiliation for something you have done or something about you that you perceive to be wrong. Shame can be an appropriate and even helpful emotion in certain circumstances. If you’ve hurt someone, for instance, shame might allow you to make amends with that person and to make the decision not to do it again. But when shame is directed incorrectly it can have extremely destructive effects on our inner self.

When, at 15 years old and with a dangerously starved frame I was diagnosed with an eating disorder, the news came as a shock, despite the clearly evident verdict. The shock was then followed by a wave of guilt and shame: how could I have done this to myself? To those close to me? I snapped into a determination to rid myself of this illness, a kind of determination that disregarded any real acknowledgement of the problem. Denial is a very powerful emotion; it is a survival tactic but one that is highly counter-productive in the long run.

Later, when at 19 and at my wits end after months of tumbling deeper and deeper into a dark abyss of tormenting depression, I went along to the doctors, I felt deeply ashamed. I felt as though I were confessing a heartless crime to a police officer rather than admitting to a professional that I was struggling with an illness. I felt weak; who does this I thought? Who can’t cope with life and their own mind to this extent?

When I found Jesus around this time, he began first by instilling the most life giving, colossal wave of hope and then by stripping me of my crippling guilt. Holding out his arms he welcomed me as his child; blemish free. My shame began to lift like a heavy, grey cloud breaking into sunlight.

This change has been enormous, but I still live in this world. I still live in this world where to struggle with mental health issues is seen on the most part as weakness. I also still have prejudices within myself and against myself. I have found it’s often easy to look at someone else’s struggle with their mental health with sympathy and with admiration at how they cope. It’s easy to feel that they somehow seem more worthy of suffering. Perhaps they have a rare and extreme diagnosis; perhaps they’ve seen worse things than me. And so, like many, many others, I have often strived to keep my mental health struggles quiet.

But the reality is that I suffer nonetheless. No matter how many times I tell myself ‘be strong, you never know who you’re inspiring’ (brilliant advice in the right situation), I am still left struggling with a mental health that is far from perfect. The difference between keeping it quiet and denying it or being open and honest about it, is that you are suffering alone, instead of living authentically. Because really, shame surrounding mental illness is a lie. And being open with other people doesn’t turn you into some raving madman. Instead it allows you to see that mental health issues are extremely common and that you are not alone. It shows you that there are things that can help, and that you have just as much right to look for help for say, chronic asthma, as you would mental health issues.

God has brought me a huge, and I mean really monumental way from where I was, but my journey with mental health hasn’t ended. I am not entirely rid of my depression, but I have the certainty of hope that carries me through. And through my recent acquaintance with anxiety I have learnt that it is a part of life that we might suffer with mental illness, just as we might physical illness. We are not bulletproof after all, we are human and life is tough sometimes. I have learnt that accepting support off others is a huge step in terms of treatment and healing.

Now is the time to not be ashamed, because there is huge bravery in openness and there is incomparable strength to be found in interdependence with others.