Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can also hurt me.

i-know-the-cost-of-happiness:

One of the things that bother me the most is the way mental illness terms are used in our society today. This morning, a I heard a girl describe her previously thinner body as “looking anorexic”. Someone in my anthropology class described their mom as “bipolar” because she was angry at him. Phrases like “I want to die”, “I’m gonna commit suicide” or “I just wanna kill myself” get thrown around constantly, without care. Being triggered is now a joke to describe overreacting. Even though these people probably don’t mean to hurt anyone, the truth is they are. They are hurting countless people.

They may casually say that they looked “anorexic”, but for me to hear that, being someone who is diagnosed with anorexia, with depression, with anxiety, who self harms, who has suicidal ideations and invasive thoughts, these words hurt. For you, being triggered is just a joke, but to me, being triggered means having to deal with a torrent of fear, anxiety, and self hatred every time something as simple as food, or weight is brought up. It means lying in bed at 3:00 in the morning replaying what you said about killing yourself, knowing you didn’t mean it. Except, the difference between you and me is that I am genuinely considering killing my self, and your comments made me feel so fucking invalid for having these thoughts. <p>

And I’m not alone in this. I am not the only one who feels this way. These things aren’t jokes, and they shouldn’t be used lightly. <p>

You would never make a joke like that about cancer or other physical illnesses. Just because you don’t see the effect of my illness, doesn’t mean it’s not there. Just because you can’t see the effects of my illness, doesn’t make it any less deadly than a physical illness.

In fact, when you joke about cancer, a person’s cancer isn’t going to get worse. But when you joke about a mental illness, that person’s mental illness can get worse.

So if you wouldn’t joke about cancer, then don’t joke about mental illnesses.

An illness is an illness, regardless of whether you can see it or not. Suffering is still suffering, regardless of whether you can see it or not.

Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can fucking hurt me.