People use serious mental health issues to casually in general conversation. This is a trivialization of serious conditions like depression. Using these terms in this manner makes them seem like personal flaws that can be fixed rather than serious medical conditions. People are not so quick to joke about other serious medical conditions like cancer and stroke.
Key Takeaways:
- we shouldn’t use mental health-related phrases in ways that aren’t literal.
- It’s actually demeaning to those with true illnesses that can’t easily stop these behaviors
- Simply put, medical conditions, including mental health disorders, don’t make for good metaphors.
“It’s actually demeaning to those with true illnesses that can’t easily stop these behaviors. “If we trivialize them into something else or we make that become the person’s identity, we have done everyone a disservice.””