The Secret Lives of the Mentally Ill
October 30, 2014 7:07 AM   Subscribe

In a Slate Article by David Rosenberg, side-by-side images and descriptions illustrate the "dual lives" of those coping with mental illness.
posted by ourt (21 comments total) 21 users marked this as a favorite
 
So I looked at the photos and read the captions, and I reached this conclusion: The left-hand column is normal human behavior. Real people, doing real people things. The right-hand column is the phony, overachieving, best-face-forward bullshit that people put in online dating profiles. I've been off my antidepressants for months, and I have an appointment with a new psychologist scheduled for December, but after seeing this I'm tempted to cancel it.
posted by Faint of Butt at 7:21 AM on October 30, 2014 [9 favorites]


The left-hand column is also balled-up crying in a corner; getting fat because who gives a shit what you look like; deadened emotional affect to the point that no one has any idea if you're happy, sad, or pissed off; rehearsing and re-rehearsing every single body movement and spoken word; and giving in to depression, skipping therapy, and not taking meds.

Happiness is not all bullshit.
posted by MrMoonPie at 7:40 AM on October 30, 2014 [16 favorites]


Yeah, not impressed with this. A good concept, but this isn't it. Sitting pensively and knitting, which I do constantly, is not mentally ill.
posted by Melismata at 7:41 AM on October 30, 2014 [8 favorites]


These all have the feel of incomplete triptychs. The missing third image is how they truly are when they're all alone with their depression/bipolar disorder, not how they've posed themselves to present that to either a viewing public or the photographer there with them at the time. Note also that the photographer says she's experienced difficulty finding people willing to sit for these portraits in the first place. The ones we see here are the ones who have their lives sufficiently together to be able to acknowledge and reveal something like their otherwise hidden, suffering sides for these modelling sessions.

One thing a lot of these left-hand portraits have in common, though: Look at how in so many of their rooms, the curtains are tightly drawn, with heavy drapes or thick blinds, not letting in any significant light from the outside world, not allowing anyone from there to look in.
posted by Doktor Zed at 7:48 AM on October 30, 2014 [8 favorites]


These pictures are deep, intimate and revealing. Once again, I am reminded how lucky I am to be mentally well, utterly happy and to live in a stable, economically secure situation. I am fortunate.

There's a question I ask when I'm in philosophical-drunk mode: "When we look back two centuries we see vile injustice. Class, skin colour, culture, religion. In 200 years, what will our great-grandchildren despise us for?"

My guess - the despicable way we treat women. And the way we victimize the mentally ill.

Let's fix both. Today.

I'm going to take ten minutes to have a coffee with a person under stress. And I will shut up and listen. Then, I'm going to encourage a woman I work with to take some credit for an awesome thing she did.

Please do something.

Today.
posted by Combat Wombat at 7:49 AM on October 30, 2014 [8 favorites]


The pictures are so-so. It's the captions that sell it, to the extent to which the project is any good.

To wit: Until I get real, real deep into my depression, my behavior looks pretty normal-- it's *why* I'm doing it, what it says to me and what I get out of it, that is the secret, dual-life part.

I'd like to see more of these, but Doktor Zed makes a really important point. These are people together enough that they can risk "showing their depression". They are functional enough that exposing their illness isn't terminally shaming.
posted by Poppa Bear at 7:54 AM on October 30, 2014 [3 favorites]


The flavor I pick up from this is that introversion itself is a kind of mental illness, even if it's mixed in with extroved self-presentation. That is a shitty message.
posted by batfish at 8:35 AM on October 30, 2014 [5 favorites]


I've been dealing with severe depression all my 50+ years and these photos ring so true for me. There's my real, safe-behind-my-door self, and there's the person I project when in public. Sometimes, the effort to switch from the former to the latter can be extremely difficult and fraught with an alarming amount of anxiety, fear, and doubt.
posted by Thorzdad at 9:13 AM on October 30, 2014 [4 favorites]


As Poppa Bear points out, the captions are what make this project work. In this case, these pictures are not worth a thousand words when their subjects have to explain what's going on behind them:

"Trying not to think. LOTS OF SLEEP......." "Feel heavy anxious, think about how everything is messed up, overanalyze, make up false scenarios" "All emotions in play - from giddy to despair and all points in between" "Surrounded by a fog of failure, drowning in the expectations I have not met" "Stuck in deep pain and ancient anger that needs to be kept hidden."

Depression is enough hard to communicate, much less photograph. In some ways, it's easier to illustrate (previously on Metafilter).
posted by Doktor Zed at 9:22 AM on October 30, 2014 [2 favorites]


Yeah, Jesus, what is the matter with you so-called "depressed" people anyhow? If you've got it together enough to answer your phone or e-mail and let someone take pictures of you pretending to be ok, you're clearly no worse off than anyone else. Who cares that you have to fake a mask of having creative energy and social connections? That's just phony bullshit. Why can't you just learn to live with your feelings of "certain failure," "pain," and "self-hatred" like the rest of us?
posted by drlith at 9:27 AM on October 30, 2014 [1 favorite]


While depression and bi-polar are real and substantial mental illnesses, and I wouldn't expect this to cover every flavor of mental illness, I think it's interesting how narrow this is in terms of the ones they feature.
posted by lucasks at 9:28 AM on October 30, 2014


I wish there were some examples of people who are in public/social settings and dealing with their mental illness at the same time. Because being home alone and having some time to myself isn't the thing that really makes it hard to deal with depression, it's the gritting my teeth through the things i need to do everyday.
posted by xingcat at 9:29 AM on October 30, 2014 [1 favorite]


xingcat, that would mean having to explain why a photographer was following you around and almost certainly require the person to out themselves as a depressive, which can be very problematic, especially in the workplace. A lot of us don't tell our co-workers or acquaintances about the depression. It's easier that way.
posted by Thorzdad at 9:59 AM on October 30, 2014 [1 favorite]


I have anxiety disorder among other things, and am currently unmedicated while waiting to see a new therapist next week. I'm glad you personally think that you no longer need your antidepressants. But I am exhausted trying to appear normal. I come home from work and it's a struggle to get me and my kid fed, bathed, and ready for bed without zonking out as soon as I cross the threshold. Please don't minimize other people's need for medication.
posted by FunkyHelix at 10:02 AM on October 30, 2014 [2 favorites]


FunkyHelix, I totally feel you - Monday and Tuesday I had the office to myself, completely for the most part. I came home to my roommate glowing and telling them how good I felt, not having to deal with people in the office. Yesterday, a LOT of people were in, including a 2 year old who was banging on the water containers for the cooler and the noise drove me nuts, but I survived and when the days end, I just got home and was so... utterly... drained... The stress it takes just to deal with people and act normal it's tiring.

Sure if you saw me, I'd be surfing the net at home, looking "normal" but inside it's ennui, boredom and lack of traction. I fight so hard to get myself to work on a project. I work up the gumption to get a small thing done, am proud, hoping it will snowball, but I know the free mental space I need to really dig in and I think I end up not pushing harder because if I get on a roll, it affects my required work-day even worse, which would just lead to a cycle.

And this is a job that, while I am surrounded by a lot of noise and people (and a very interrupty boss - which, frankly is like at least 50% of it), I still know it and am comfortable. I can dress very very chill, I don't have to deal with douchebags (I miss having cohorts of my age and culture, but at least it's not all fratboys/bros)... It's a mixed bag, so I worry whether anywhere else will really fulfill anything or if I'm just stuck with this.

Yes, I am on meds; yes, the help quite a bit. Doesn't make it easier, and just because I'm not crying in a corner constantly doesn't mean a brutal toll isn't being taken.

Hell, sometimes there's sub-clinical depression, or as I called it, once, low-grade depression (like low-grade fever)... You're functional, but you're never really happy.

And what is so wrong about not wanting people walking past your window to look in? HMMMM???
posted by symbioid at 10:20 AM on October 30, 2014 [2 favorites]


One of the problems with this is that when I'm doing reasonably well (as I am now and mostly have been for some time, thanks medicine/family/actually good doctor!) I just can't actually relate to what my depression is like. I know I have it! I know if I go off my medicine I will become unable to function and suicidal! I have been there! It has happened within the past few years! I lived like that for an enormous chunk of my life and yet, even having had that experience SO MANY TIMES, I really can't feel what it's like. This is probably at least partially a defense mechanism; I'm sure I function better when I can't even remember the weight of my depression. Still, when I'm in a real position to advocate for myself and talk to people and articulate what depression is to me, I can't do it because when it's not happening there's no way for me to relate to it.
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 11:04 AM on October 30, 2014 [2 favorites]


These all have the feel of incomplete triptychs.

I do think some seem more high functioning than others. I don't know if I doubt they are telling the truth though I do wonder if all their places were that clean! For me personally though yeah, I feel like for most of these, there's another picture on the left, and the right hand picture is torn to pieces.
posted by fleacircus at 11:48 AM on October 30, 2014


Yeah, I'm not impressed with this either. By the title I was expecting something much more hidden, and a starker contrast between the two images, the public and private. Both sides of the portraits look really normal. Certainly if one were to photograph me when I've gotten all presentable for leaving my apartment, versus the more horrid moments in my apartment, the contrast would be greater, both in my surroundings and in myself. But then all the left hand photos are posed for the camera. Perhaps it's difficult to strike a pose of true misery and thus it will always remain hidden.

Because being home alone and having some time to myself isn't the thing that really makes it hard to deal with depression

Well, this is the opposite to me. Being home alone and having all my time to myself is what makes getting through every day the things I need to do every day that much harder.
posted by Blitz at 12:56 PM on October 30, 2014 [1 favorite]


She could have come taken pictures of me today-
#1 8:00 am Me, on my psychiatrist's couch, wringing my hands as I explain for the hundredth time how I just don't feel anymore.
#2 10:15 am Me, now dressed as a ballerina cat, singing, reading and dancing for an audience of 25 babies and toddlers. I am the happiest, funniest, most cheerful librarian you have ever met.
#3 4:00 pm Me, done with work and a therapy appointment, curled up in bed surrounded by laundry. My son needs help with his homework and I need to think about dinner, but I am just totally done.

If I were manic, there would have to be a picture of me at a craft store, buying too many supplies for projects I will never complete.
posted by Biblio at 5:57 PM on October 30, 2014 [3 favorites]


Wow, I'm surprised by the hostile response. I agree that the captions are the most important (and affecting) part, but the photos aren't nothing.

To me, the side on the right is deeply aspirational, and there's nothing wrong with that. I mean, I'm currently in a reasonably functional place wrt my depression (which I credit almost entirely to the Zen practice I've developed since finding Cheri Huber's The Depression Book), but I remember being in a place where I might've grabbed onto a chance to do something like this. Visually illustrate how I feel now, and write about it? Yeah, I can manage that. I hope you don't want something more dynamic than a heap under the covers… Visually illustrate how I imagine (on my best days) I could feel, and the things I wish I could aspire to do? Um… executing that may be a bit tricky, but yeah, I'll try that.

No, when I was spending a month and a half not leaving the apartment, I wouldn't have. No, when I was feeling suicidal, I wouldn't have. But if I were on something of an upswing and I came across the possibility? I might have grabbed onto it as a reminder that I was more than my depression.
posted by Lexica at 9:33 PM on October 30, 2014 [1 favorite]


when I'm doing reasonably well...just can't actually relate to what my depression is like

This difficulty strikes me quite often. I find myself singing these lines from Dylan's Black Crow Blues:

"Sometimes I'm thinkin I'm
Too high to fall
Sometimes I'm thinkin I'm
Much too high to fall
Other times I'm thinkin I'm
So low I don't know
If I can come up at all."

There's something really powerful, for me, in that typically Dylanish paradox, which seems to capture both the inherent oddness of all perception, and the way that mental illness exaggerates the tendency to regard whatever one is feeling in the instant as one's true and eternal state of being.
posted by howfar at 4:27 PM on October 31, 2014


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