Removing the stigma and myths that surround mental illness

Tuesday, February 17, 2015

Words DO hurt!

I've gradually come out more and more about my illness on Facebook.  It's an ideal platform for me, because I have the settings locked down tighter than a Spider's anus.  This means that only people that I trust fully get to see the full contents of my Facebook account.  In other words, if you don't see these posts via Facebook, you're shit outta luck lol.

Anyway, moving swiftly on, on my trusty Facebook friends list is a lady that I greatly admire.  She has 2 gorgeous kids, and got married just recently to a man with a great job, though it does appear that he flies a lot for various meetings and seminars and so on.  At the moment, they're on Vacation.


Over the weekend, myself and my fiance noticed that our laptop wasn't quite working correctly, and then, on Monday we got the black screen of death, with no idea what to do, and no money coming in to be able to even get it looked at - totally my fault, because the money we budgeted for food, ended up being spent on going to and from the A&E department with my overdose issues.

So I posted on Facebook, (via my cheapo phone), letting people know what had happened, and that if it was possible, would they kindly  be able to lend us a few pounds/dollars into my PayPal account so that we could replace our laptop.  I wasn't asking for like £600 or £700.  Honestly, £250 or £300 would have been enough to replace ours with a second-hand refurbished laptop so that I still have contact with the outside world, (plus my phone doesn't support blogger!)  With my social anxiety being so bad, Facebook, blogger and email are the things that keep me in touch with the outside world, and most of my friends understand this.

However, the response I got from this lady shocked me to the core.  Without going into all the details, her response basically said "Get OFF your arse...
get motivated....Find yourself...
and buy ya own laptop!!"

I just about died!  How DARE she think that I'm just sitting on my arse, claiming benefits, and expecting others to buy everything for me!  Two of my friends in particular set her straight as to WHY I can't get a job, and why a job would more or less kill me ... Or at least, the resulting anxiety attack would.  She knows I've been to A&E three times ... and yet her response made me feel like she thinks I'm doing this just for attention.

Please guys, PLEASE think before you speak/type.  Words can hurt, even the most innocuous sounding ones.  What also hurts me, is that I've had to put her and her husband on restricted profile on my Facebook.  I can no longer trust them to give me the support I need as I try to fight this illness.

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