When Self-Advocacy Faulters: Reflecting on My Psychiatic Journey

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In this episode, I share what came of my latest psychiatry appointment  and honestly, it left me feeling pretty frustrated. Again.

I talk about what it’s like trying to navigate the mental health system while dealing with anxiety and depression at the same time. When you’re already running on empty, self-advocacy feels almost impossible. The system wants us to be proactive, but how do you do that when you can barely get out of bed?

I open up about:

• Why the mental health system feels reactive instead of preventative
• How depression and anxiety pull me in opposite directions — one shutting down the future, the other making it terrifying
• My mirtazapine being pushed up to 30mg, moving me into the therapeutic range
• Juggling around eight medications, even though my original hope was to taper down and start again
• The double-edged sword of “insight” - it looks good on paper, but in reality, it often just feeds my depression
• The short, surface-level appointments in public psychiatry that leave little space for the real stuff
• And at the heart of it all - the fact that I’ve lost my ability to laugh and smile, and how deeply that hurts

It’s an honest, heavy one - but I think it’s important. 

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