And that sadly also comes from medical professionals. They were all too willing to slap a label on my mom and medicate her, but it took my dad advocating for what he had seen and researched on his own to get them to even consider that it was an adverse side effect to medication that had given her the condition in the first place. It was, and once she was off that medication, she was better. But even then, she was never cured, and stress would bring on another episode.

I truly feel for everyone trying to navigate the mental health landscape on their own. Naming something is not the same as fixing something, although it can be an important first step. And sometimes the only “fix" is adapting your life to make episodes less frequent, but it’s still always there like the sword of damocles hanging over your head.