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And a (as good as is possible) Happy Holiday to you too Jackie! …And thank you so much for all those years of enjoying your comic, much appreciated!! Greetings from The Netherlands.

On the comic- seems like Thomas and Carol are hitting on a big truth I’m hitting on- lots of people are issues but don’t wanna get made fun of by their own

And…. Merry Christmas Jackie. I hope your day is well, miraculously pain free, and able to be enjoyed for all it is and isn’t

Happy Holidays, and/or Merry Christmas, Jackie + everyone!

And, I’ll give people the option- you can choose to not have December-time holidays, if that if what you’d rather do. If holidays aren’t your thing, I hope you have a fun day, anyhow.

I hope everyone has an excellent day! :D :D

Being too scared of mockery to admit a mental health issue IS a mental health issue in and of itself.

Your mental health is not all that different than your physical health. It takes regular maintenance to keep everything running smoothly. While your support network of friends and family can handle a lot of those maintenance functions, there’s always something going on in your life that you don’t share with them because you fear their judgement.

And that’s where getting professional help comes into play. A professional does not judge, but helps you deal with it and move on.

True, but it’s a fine balance. You don’t want to terrorize those with real issues, but you also don’t want to cater to people faking it for attention and special treatment, because boundaries keep people grounded in reality. I grew up with the former, and it certainly caused me issues, but I’ve seen the latter really mess people up to, when you get grown adults still acting like children because they have no idea how to cope with rules and expectations–they break down or blow up and, shock and gasp, that doesn’t work like it did when they were a kid/teen. I don’t know the right answer.

Attention whoring is one of the biggest stigmas any person with a mental health illness can face. While it isn’t a foregone conclusion that every person who shows a mental health issue is doing it for the attention, at the very least, you have to be willing to ask the right questions and determine whether or not they are being legitimately pained or are just being selfish.

But brushing off every last person who shows a mental issue is also not the answer here. At the very least, you need to listen.

BWM, there’s a difference between requiring someone follow rules and follow basic standards of behavior, and being a jerk to someone with real issues and problems.

Well…no, not necessarily, it’s not all nice and tidy like that, that’s my point. For example, compare “shyness” to “social anxiety”. It’s good and healthy to push/drag the shy person out of their comfort zone, to a point, precisely to help them learn to cope and grow as a person. It’s very not good to badger someone who is truly suffering from anxiety, causing them to freak out or fall into depression (being a common comorbidity) when they can’t handle it. But treating every shy person like they might have anxiety and never forcing them to do things like work in a group project or present in front of the class isn’t good either. And it’s not easy to separate; even professionals don’t always get it right, and that’s assuming everyone is getting checked.

I’m just saying that, while we used to just tell every single person to “deal with it”, and that was bad, it now seems like alot of people think every character flaw they have is a mental illness, something they are stuck with forever and not a challenge to overcome. And as a parent, or a teacher, or a boss, it’s difficult to tell which is which, when to pull the leash and when to give some slack.

Many of the people I’ve known who faked mental health issues to get attention actually had mental health issues. They generally weren’t the ones they faked, but they did feel like confirmation of the claim “You’d have to be crazy to fake mental illness to get attention.”

That said, it’s probably important for people to understand that mental illnesses are challenges to overcome, not something that one is stuck with forever. The difference seems to be in the level of effort involved and the likelihood of working it out without professional help.

I’m clearly too tired and not thinking through what I’m typing enough before posting. Many mental health issues are not things one can simply work through and be done with them. I was not intending to say otherwise, despite that being what I said.

That said, what I intended to convey is, much or maybe all the time, one can get improvement. A mental health diagnosis is not something to accept and simply live with as it’s been. Exactly how one works through ones issues is very individualized and I’m not one of the professionals that can help someone do that. But I’ve talked with such professionals, I’ve worked with them to come up with strategies that work for me, so I may still be depressed, but I’m a productive depressed person, and I’m not as depressed as I would be if I were still a basket case.

They’re not all able to help everyone. It’s possible none of them can help everyone. I had to see half a dozen before I found one I really clicked with. But having gone through that, I’m in a better place than I was.

Different mental illnesses probably have different degrees to which one can improve ones living situation. Different people are different and they’ve had different experiences, so even with everything else “the same”, treatment and the expected best case may be quite different.

I do want to be very clear though, to the extent that mental health issues are challenges to be worked, that’s generally not going to happen because some layperson pushed the mentally ill person’s limits to do the thing without any guidance. If it were that simple, it wouldn’t be mental illness.

May the Santa pile you presents,
May the Krampas pass you by,
May 2020 resolve quite quick,
And not leave you high and dry.
May 45 slink into the sunset,
May congress save their breath,
But when 2021 comes into town,
It’s the sting of health.
Ugh, why don’t health and breath rhyme better?

If you would, please, no political messages for…or against, any US presidents.

**** I’m probably acting against my own request, but- I would’ve liked it that Mr. Tr. had learned that apologies are ok, + that you don’t…in my view, fire someone from the govt. for making silly faces at you, or for other small actions. [that’s sarcasm , there, folks].

Thanks for the season’s greetings.

For a book that explores how messed up [the spelling is] in some English words is messed up, please read the book-
The tough coughs as he ploughs the dough by Ted Geisel [sp?], aka Dr. Seuss.
Best wishes, Dudes.

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