this post was submitted on 03 Aug 2023
20 points (95.5% liked)

Mental Health

3757 readers
1 users here now

Welcome!

This is a safe place to discuss, vent, support, and share information about mental health, illness, and wellness.

Thank you for being here. We appreciate who you are today. Please show respect and empathy when making or replying to posts.

The rules for posting and commenting, besides the rules defined here for lemmy.world, are as follows:

Rules

1-Posts promoting paid products and services of any kind are not allowed here.

2-All posts and comments must be helpful and supportive. Do not put vulnerable people at risk.

3-Do not DM or ask to speak privately to any of our members unless they specifically request it.

If a person from this community disturbs you in a comment, please report the comment. If you receive a DM you did not request, send a screenshot of the DM in a message to a moderator. This is a bannable offense.

4-Suicide, Self-Harm, Death-- Extended discussions are STRONGLY DISCOURAGED here. First, mods and community members are caring people, but not experts in crisis situations. Second, we want to avoid Lemmy becoming like many commercial social media platforms, where comments can snowball into counterproductive talk.

If you or someone you know needs more help than can be found here, please refer to the pinned resources.

If BRIEF mention of these topics is an important part of your post, please flag your post as NSFW and include a (trigger warning: suicide, self-harm, death, etc.)in the title so that other readers who may feel triggered can avoid it. Please also include a trigger warning on all comments mentioning these topics in a post that was not already tagged as such.

Partner Communities

- Therapy

Neurodegenerative Disease Support

ADHD

Autism

Fibromyalgia

TMJ

Chronic Pain

Bipolar Disorder

Avoidant Personality Disorder

Friends and Family of People with Addiction

To partner with our community and be included here, you are free to message the current moderators or comment on our pinned post.

Community Moderation

Some moderators are mental health professionals and some are not. All are carefully selected by the moderation team and will be actively monitoring posts and comments. If you are interested in joining the team, you can send a message to ZenGrammy for more information.

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
 

I've been experiencing an increase in severity of my psychological issues over the past few months that led me to make an appointment with a psychiatrist for a general mental health evaluation and potential ADHD testing after that depending on what they find. I'm anxious (one of my problems) about appearing so normal that I won't get help, because I've become really good at faking being ok for decades now. I doubt anyone that knows me personally knows that anything is wrong. Does anyone have experience with this in terms of being diagnosed? I'm just worried I'm going to spend all this money and time and they'll say I don't need any help and I'm right back where I started.

top 6 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

If the evaluation is legit then it should address masking (which is the term for what you refer to as "faking being ok"). If it's something you're worried about you can bring it up, since masking is a known phenomenon in the mental health field, particularly with people who have asd or ADHD, or similar conditions.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Thank you, I will bring it up at the beginning of the eval.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Yes I know what you mean. Psychology doesn’t have much in the way of formal acceptance of masking layers.

However, individual practitioners do. Just be as honest as possible, and provide meta information. Tell them what you told us.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

Thank you, good advice.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

I haven't gone through such an intake myself, but have watched loved ones' evaluations. One thing I suspect will happen is you'll be given questionnaires asking about whether you do/think certain things "always," "sometimes," "rarely," "never." (Or similar language.)

You might also list what you have been experiencing, and why you think the issues have increased in severity. Use this as a prompt for yourself when you are being evaluated and asked, in essence, "what brings you here?"

Obviously, this is not a time to either overstate what's going on, or to hold back on what you're feeling is "off." A good psychiatrist and mental health team will assuredly have the tools to get beyond the "normal" façade that makes it easier to function, but leaves you aware that it's something of a sham.

Best wishes to you.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Use this as a prompt for yourself when you are being evaluated and asked, in essence, “what brings you here?”

This really helps me, thank you. That's a fantastic way to mentally frame the questions so I can answer correctly.