Anxiety and depression: how to beat the mental health shame

There is still such a difference between people’s opinions on being physically hurt and being mentally hurt in our culture. And that’s bloody unfair! It’s so blatantly unjust that being a little bit angry is okay. Now, use that anger as fuel on your journey!

Imagine if you have a terrible back injury—a disc prolapse, for instance. I’ve had such a prolapse twice, and I assure you the pain can be impressive. Assume, for now, that the pain is so dreadful you can hardly walk, have a conversation, or even think clearly.

Then imagine you must go to work, raise your children, and meet your friends without letting anyone know you’re in pain. You have to walk when each step feels like a dagger stab in your spine, do small talk when you just want to scream and complete all the everyday chores as if nothing had happened. Why? Because of shame.

Can you imagine that having a back injury, or any physical injury, would be this shameful? Probably not.

However, having a mental injury is entirely different. Everyone who has ever suffered from anxiety or depression knows this. How can we beat the unfair shame of such totally normal mental health conditions?

(Featured image: the unfair shame of mental health challenges – AI-generated illustration.)

The necessity of shame

For many people, shame is very prominent in their emotional galleries. That shouldn’t be surprising. Humans are highly social animals, and evolution has built shame into us to prevent us from falling out with our clan, which could have been equal to a death sentence 50,000 years ago.

The mother of shame is the fear of being judged, criticised, or (God forbid!) rejected by others.

Shame acts as an ‘internal police force’ that ensures we comply with the rules (norms and expectations) of the groups we belong to. In itself, shame is not such a bad invention. Think of the individuals who lack this ‘internal police force’ altogether. They are shameless, and we typically refer to them as psychopaths and sociopaths.

When shame turns bad

The problem with shame, as with most emotions initially created to help us, is that it is blind and not particularly intelligent. It doesn’t evaluate the situation in question and asks, “Is this really something to be ashamed of?” 

And when our rational brains finally scramble out of bed to consider this, it’s already too late. Shame has by then declared a state of emergency and martial law in our minds.

Shame was perhaps intended to be the mild-natured village bobby who could advise us not to do anything we would regret. Somewhere along the way, however, it became a suppressing tyrant.

The selective shame of being injured

We can imagine that our ancestors, 50,000 years ago, would have hesitated to admit they were injured in some way. They wouldn’t want to be seen as the weakest link in their clan or a burden on the rest. 

On the other hand, we humans also tend to admire people who pull their weight despite a handicap, such as pain or injury. They are heroes! But not always.

Both times I had disc prolapses, I was knocked out by the intense pain for a couple of days.  But then, I found pride in returning to work with a laptop on my stomach while lying on the couch. I was the ‘tough guy’; I could even brag a little about it.

But how many times did the pain of social anxiety cripple me? Sometimes, this pain was even worse than the pain of the disc prolapses. I remember hiding in the loo at work between meetings, hyperventilating and biting my knuckles. But I always ’pulled myself together’ before the next meeting. I didn’t say anything; I just carried on.

Did I feel like a hero? No! Would anyone have admired me if they had known? I doubt it. Unfair? Yes!

I was a hero, damn it!

Want to fight windmills? Try changing other people’s attitudes.

I know now that I was a hero. It is heroic to get up every day and do what is required of you when you can’t see anything but darkness and despair in your future, and fear is about to rip your intestines out at any moment.

However, I didn’t see it that way back then, and I had no reason to expect others to do so. I grew up in a culture where enduring physical pain (but without any moaning, please!) could be praised while even mild mental challenges had to be spoken of in whispers, if spoken of at all. The shame of my ‘condition’ kept me paralysed for 40 years before I consciously admitted my problems, even to myself.

Changing the culture and attitudes of your society and the groups you belong to is hard and slow work. It’s usually impossible for one person alone. People generally don’t change their ingrown attitudes toward anything (e.g., other people’s mental health, sexual orientation, or skin colour) unless something happens that directly affects them or someone they love.

But other people’s attitudes aren’t always what you think they are

What I have seen, however, is that people’s attitudes towards mental health challenges are usually neither bluntly condemning nor overly accepting. Each person’s perspective typically lies somewhere on the spectrum in between.

And here’s a ‘secret’ I learned in the trenches: Most people out there don’t care. They won’t condemn you if they get to know about your struggles with anxiety or depression, but they just don’t care and would rather not hear about it at all. Why? Because they feel they have enough to worry about in their own lives.

Here’s another ‘secret’: more people than you can imagine have had personal experiences with anxiety and depression. These are the people who will treat you with understanding and respect if you are honest about your problem.

Even though the risk of being judged isn’t as high as you may think, you cannot expect too much from people without this personal experience.

Most people have some experience with physical pain, which may make them empathetic if you have a disc prolapse, for instance. On the other hand, people who have never experienced the full horror of anxiety or depression at its worst won’t have a clue about how it feels.

You can’t change people’s attitudes much, so how can you beat the mental health shame?

Beat the shame on its home ground: your own mind

Please don’t waste your time challenging other people’s judgmental dispositions or indifference unless you have the energy and stamina to go into combat. And do other people’s attitudes towards your problem really matter much anyway?

Okay, okay. Sometimes, they matter, for instance, if the ‘other people’ in question are people you rely on, such as your spouse or parents.

But the one person whose attitudes matter the most is you.

Continue to tell yourself that you’re weak, foolish, thick, and unworthy simply because you happen to suffer from anxiety or depression, and you will be miserable regardless of what others say or do.

The attitudes you’ll benefit the most from changing are most likely your own.

What is the best way to beat this shame, then?

I would never claim I have a quick and easy fix for everyone else’s problems. If I did, I would be one of those people I somewhat spitefully call ‘the simplicity prophets’.

However, I sincerely believe that understanding your situation will help. This is precisely what I emphasise the most in my article Leaving anxiety and depression behind: how to get started, where I list 40 pieces of advice based on hard-earned personal experience.

Then, please begin speaking kindly to yourself. One of the first changes I made when I embarked on my own journey out of anxiety and depression was to reduce all my negative self-talk. I realised that I silently shouted, “Idiot! Idiot! Idiot!” to myself countless times each day, and I decided to end it. Such self-deprecating behaviour only fuels a vicious cycle of anxiety and depression.

Furthermore, if fear of being judged, criticised, or rejected triggers your shame, please remember that most people don’t care and don’t want to hear about it. And they won’t need to hear about it unless they are people you depend heavily on. The majority of people in your neighbourhood, your workplace, and even in your family will be nothing worse than indifferent if they incidentally get to know anything.

And finally:

Feel the unfairness of the shame you carry and be enraged!

Most likely, you suffer from anxiety or depression because something happened to you. It wasn’t your fault. So, it shouldn’t be anything to be ashamed of, right?

But what if you at least contributed to what happened to you? Well, there’s still such a difference in how we look at physical and mental injuries. Both my disc prolapses were probably triggered because I thoughtlessly twisted my spine too abruptly. It was (partly) my fault. Did I soak myself in shame? No!

 However, I have done things in my life stupid enough to worsen my anxiety and depression, and (surprise, surprise) I did shout, “Idiot! Idiot! Idiot!” to myself around the clock for years.

It’s not fair!

And what should we do when we see and understand unfairness and injustice? We should get enraged! At least a little bit. Please, try. Some anger can be the fuel you need to leave your anxiety and depression behind.