A pretty darn candid post.

[innerbrat]

I just want to make something clear: the world isn't divided in to 'real' people and fakers. Take a second and remember you know this. Whether you're defining a woman by her body (“real woman have curves”) or a man by his behaviour (“real men drink bitter!”) or whatever in fact, you're wrong. All women are real women. Scientists are real people.

Comments

[ceitfianna]

Thank you for sharing and writing this.

[furikku]

Was going to say something like this.

[batyatoon]

THIS. Yes.

[catbo]

utterly brilliant (this is, you are)

some (not nearly all) of this I experienced as a child, some of it astonishingly word-for-word. I have never managed to think it through let alone write it down this coherently. Your posts are frequently insightful, and I rarely comment, but please know I always appreciate reading them.

[pippaalice]

This is very interesting. I have noticed a trend for people to manifest physical symptoms to ‘prove’ their illness. Because let’s face it Major Depressive Disorder isn’t sexy is it? And if you say ‘I’m depressesed’ well that can mean anything. And you can’t see depression so people think you’re attention seeking.

I hope you are not being too hard on yourself because all of those events you mention are ones which clearly had an impact on you, which means they weren’t ‘desperate for attention’ or ‘cries for help’ but genuine reflexions on your own feelings. And that’s totally valid. I do actually think there are fakers. And manipulative people, but it isn’t manipulative to carry around something difficult in your head and occasionally need to scream it out.

Um I hope I haven’t missed the point somewhat. :/

[pippaalice]

BTW What I mean by fakers isn't people who need help (including ones who've gone really too far into something in their head like Liz Jones (IMHO)) I mean people who are not sad or in need of help but are out to get whatever they can in a rather heartless way. Though many people think Liz Jones is in the latter catagory I guess.!)

[minnesattva]

I have noticed a trend for people to manifest physical symptoms to ‘prove’ their illness.

Gah, that's so true it hurts. I couldn't will the anxiety to append itself to my depression (any more than one could will oneself into or out of an eating disorder or ADD) but I'd be lying if I didn't say that part of me was a little bit grateful when it showed up last year. Even though it fucked up my life to the point where I couldn't, and can't, work, giving me all the more things to be anxious about... because at least I didn't have to say "I didn't do anything yesterday because I just couldn't"; I could now say "I didn't do anything yesterday because my sleep pattern is all shot to hell and I had another horrible headache and the nausea came back." The pressure to not be a faker or attention-seeker can actually make me glad to feel worse; that's even more fucked-up than I'd previously consciously noticed... The wonderful insightful comments have given me a lot to think about here.

[pippaalice]

It's sad people can't be taken seriously to start with isn't it? Anyway I love this post, I hope that it makes people think about the needs of other people.

[maryrcrumpton]

Wow.

Thank you.

Mary x