09/16/2025
Was hoping to film some more appliance content today, but I’m having a really difficult mental health day (related to circumstances in my personal life that I’m not going to share on social media). I’ll be okay (eventually), but I’m taking the day off from posting because self care is important, especially when my brain is bad.
I’m sharing this NOT because I want sympathy or because I “feel like I need to,” but rather because I want people to understand that this is what life can be like for people who live with the mental illnesses that I do.
I was diagnosed with major depressive disorder (MDD) and generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) when I was about 19 years old, and was diagnosed with ADHD when I was about 32 years old (I’m 36 now). Some days, I just need to call it a day and focus on self care to be able to survive through it. Today just happens to be one of those days.
For those who have people in their lives with similar diagnoses, here are a few important tips to follow if you want to be supportive:
1. Ask the person struggling how you can best support them. Do they want to be left alone? Do they want your help trying to talk through it? Do they just want you to sit with them quietly? The important thing is to ASK how you can be supportive for them and to LISTEN to their response.
2. When that person is struggling, try to ask as little of them as possible. When we’re in the really “bad brain” headspace, everything can feel SO overwhelming and impossible. Give us grace when possible and try to help us however you’re able to (by asking how you can help, not assuming ;)).
3. If the person struggling is someone very close to you (i.e., your spouse), do your best to make a plan with them before the bad brain days hit. Discuss it with them ahead of time so you can learn their preferences before even having to ask. Even if you DO have to ask again how to support them while they’re in a bad brain space, being familiar with what various things work for them when they need support and being able to give the struggling person options can make it easier for you to support them without panicking about it (because you prepared for this!). It can also take a lot of the mental load off of the struggling person if YOU have support suggestions ready to go rather than relying entirely on them to figure out what they need. Sometimes we struggle to even know what we need!
(Some good support examples — offering food/hydration, asking if they would like company or to be left alone, checking to make sure they’ve taken their meds today, etc.)
4. Don’t tell the person struggling that they don’t need to talk about it on social media or that they “don’t owe anyone an explanation,” because that’s often not what we’re trying to do anyway. The only way we break the stigmas is by talking about them. I share my perspective and experiences because I recognize both that I’m not alone in my struggles and that I’m better at communicating my struggles than most people in my situation.
So even though today is a “bad brain day” for me, I took the time to type this all out because I know that there are so, so many others out there going through something similar who don’t know how to express it.
And now I’m gonna go hydrated, take my meds, and take a nap.
✌️❤️
