Media coverage of cannabis is currently not very positive and tributes to the stigma behind cannabis that being said the media coverage of mental illness is also sorely lacking the department of diversity and intersection into intersectionality. Many people have a very skewed concept of people who consume cannabis as well as a bias towards the actual imagery of those who suffer from mental illnesses, and also what mental illnesses look like. This view comes from poorly portrayed representation within social media as well as in regular media circuits such as movies and television many times we kind of have a certain image of who is depressed person what depression looks like what ADHD looks like, what anxiety looks like, and what to do with medical cannabis. I want to use this media to show not only the representation of a multi ethnic black minority that is struggling with mental health issues, but also I want to touch upon certain aspects of ADHD as well as depression that are not normally mentioned that affect your everyday life.
We tend to see depression as simply being just sad, however depression can impact your concentration levels, your work performance, even your school work with your ability to meet deadlines, and also fulfil commitments within your interpersonal life. Where depression is not as simple as having a more positive outlook the chemical imbalances actually have a physical effect on your body and even just how you can move around. You have lower levels of energy, your sleep gets messed up, all of these things just impact your functionality. Lack of proper sleep impacts how you go about just basic tasks. Depression also affects your eating habits, and self care because when you are depressed your self-esteem tends to take a really hard dive. This dive actually will have an overall effect on not only how you see yourself, but then also how you feel like you can care for yourself. The thought of self care becomes a kind of daunting task to just go through every day.
Types of anxiety which is also lacking social media diversity. My type of anxiety is considered the procrastinator anxiety so whenever something triggers my anxiety I don’t exactly always have a panic attack. I tend to have Avoidance anxiety so I to go towards the more avoidance path and might actually do something else that’s productive besides the task at hand. Another aspect that gets triggered when it comes to the avoidance anxiety by I kind of realized this year just because I didn’t really think too much of it was BFRB which is body focused repetitive behaviors.
TTM which is the hair pulling or cutting anxiety response, I started off subconsciously; The SE version is pretty much picking at pulling at your skin that could leave visible scars or other marks. I have issues when it comes to picking and pulling not only acne, but also any type of scabs.
The image of a person with mental illness is kind of specific and there are generalized ideas of what depression and other mood look like. Many of these have to do with the whole concept of you outgrowing symptoms or false imagery of how depression looks on a daily basis. While I promote medical cannabis use and I am currently a medical cannabis patient I also admit supporter of mental health awareness as well as treating mental health because self care goes beyond getting your nails done or massage sometimes self care as actually going to see a therapist and talking through your childhood trauma thoughts now impacting your everyday life as well as your view of the world it’s being able to treat the root causes of your depression and coming to terms with having a mood disorder.