Faking Mental Illness For Views On TikTok

#tiktok #healthy

[emmalynn]

I feel bad for the people that actually do have a mental illness. My friend has severe OCD and it bothers me so much to see those people organizing their desks and saying, ‘I’m so OCD’. When I hang out with my friend she constantly checks and relocks the doors and windows because she’s scared someone will break in. It’s not a joke.

[luvskywlker]

As someone with ADHD, I absolutely hate it when my classmates fake having it, it’s very obvious that they are faking it and honestly it’s offensive. Some of them also fake having anxiety, something that I’ve had to deal with in the past, even as a young child. It’s horrible that people have begun to make mental illnesses that actively ruin peoples lives into something “fun and quirky”, and honestly it’s sickening.

[lilianhandy]

I have manic depression and anxiety, and seeing what I struggle with reduced to Wattpad and bad Netflix romcom "character quirks" really hurts. I've been an inpatient at a psychiatric hospital w/ wonderful people who actually suffer from these so-called "desirable" quirks. I hate seeing what I and my former fellow patients go through be used for clout.

[lenjavick]

Medical student here: this is a disservice to true psychiatric patients. I just got off my inpatient psych rotation and it’s soul crushing in many ways. Only thing I’ll critique is that the vast majority of these kids do not have factitious disorder (what Munchausen’s is now called). Most likely these are all behavioral with no true psychiatric diagnosis which makes treatment extremely difficult because they will not respond to medications or therapy

[MabelWPines]

I have diagnosed DID. I was diagnosed in 2019. I am an adult. They typically technically aren't really allowed to diagnose until you're over 18 bc that's when they can figure out your symptoms properly. It's a really difficult disorder to live with and I wouldn't wish it on anyone. I don't talk about it with anyone unless they ask, and I keep all of it to myself. You cannot 'switch' to an alter on demand. Switching means that your body/mind has been exposed to an extreme amount of stress, and to protect yourself from further harm, your brain does a thing. It is not a fun disorder. I cannot remember anything when I come back from a dissociative episode. Sometimes it's hours, sometimes it's days, the longest I've ever gone was 2 months. I hate that it's becoming a trend to fake this stuff bc DID is already heavily stigmatised.

[Aroaceicon-rzep]

I have a classmate who fakes autism, they say they have it and make up excuses about not being diagnosed. They literally show no signs of autism except for when they loudly explain how they don’t like a certain texture and then continue to touch it later on with no reaction apparently forgetting all about their “autism” that they so loudly proclaimed to the class

[taesoo]

i was diagnosed with ADHD at 8 yrs old. back then, it wasn't a very well known disorder and i was actually taken seriously when i talked about it. but slowly people started picking it up and began turning it into the "quirky disorder." ADHD isn't quirky guys, it made me an outcast, it was the root cause of many of my failures in academics, it was one of the reasons why i had to drop out of college. living everyday feeling like a disappointment to your friends and family because of a disorder you can't control is so hard, it's not fun. if you think you have ADHD, get a proper diagnosis; don't go around saying you have ADHD without being diagnosed because you're just gonna further stigmatize the disorder.

[bec]

Went through a severe traumatic event that left me with crippling PTSD in 2019 and had been in pure survival mode for 5 months until I couldn't take it anymore and finally asked for professional help where I was immediately diagnosed with PTSD among other pre existing conditions. Seeing young people joke about these disorders makes me so angry because I would never want someone else to go through what I did and be left with a CHEMICALLY ALTERED BRAIN for the rest of their life that they have to re learn how to perform basic coping skills. It's not funny the way these people abuse mental health. I have to live with my trauma and sometimes that's really hard, harder when people joke about it. PTSD jokes used to cause me triggers. I could be triggered any time of day anywhere. The night terrors. Loss of concentration. Years of therapy.

And the worst part is that I feel the most depressed when these symptoms affect my personality traits. I don't want to be known just for my symptoms. I want to be known as myself- regardless of trauma.

_Mental illness is not a personality trait_

[applebottomjeans]

Some people fr think getting their phone taken away is trauma 💀

[thatmagicmutt]

DID alters sometimes don’t even know that there’s other alters. They tend to never talk to each other either, as it’s practically impossible. People with DID can’t just “turn off” their alters at work or in public places, that’s not how it works. I’m still learning more about this disorder and many others, but this is most of what I know about it right now and I hope this helps people under a bit more about it :3

[ThatSqueaky]

Oompa is the tiktok lore-master at this point

[MyBelovedDaikon]

Why do people even fake having stuff like ADHD?! I remember being bullied for not being able to focus in class. Teacher calls on me and I almost never was paying attention. Autism is also a difficult disability. I know a lot of worse ones though.

[bongripper]

if someone is faking mental illness irl or online, they most definitely do have a mental illness.... just not the one they claim. they also dont seem to realize they're perpetuating the stigma surrounding said illnesses. also the age of diagnosis for DID is 18

[KittyPepperPhd]

Why isn't anybody happy being an average, mundane, run-of-the-mill person? Nobody needs to have a gift or a diagnosis to be "special". "Special" can be extremely lonely. We don't have to be special or perfect, we just have to be brave enough to be ourselves.

[Lcke]

I think one of the basic principals of DID is not understanding that the other "alters" are there unless they had some form of communication with the "host". I don't think they'd be aware of a switch either.

[sagatheshapeshifter]

I remember having a high school friend who would say things like, "I'm so OCD" when she'd organise her desk, or say she had ADHD when she forgot to study. She had depression, bipolar disorder, and other things, according to her. I never gave it much mind until I discovered I'm autistic as an adult. Growing up, the people around me never gave much stock in mental illnesses unless it was severe, so all of the symptoms I noticed as a child went unnoticed by everyone else. Being told I'm autistic answered a lot of things and made so much sense to me and my girlfriend at the time. I told this friend, because I still talked to her, and she immediately shot the notion down. "You're not autistic, " she said. Her reasoning, "Because I can just tell you're not."

[pilapila]

People are incredibly misinformed. They read a single symptom that vaguely resembles something they did one time and assume they have a mental illness. They absolutely will not seek medical attention they just want to say they have it. I've dealt with anxiety for years. I had to drop out of college. Anxiety isn't just being nervous about a test or an interview, that's normal. I couldn't function at all. I couldn't go to class, I couldn't leave my dorm to eat. I'd be in my dorm room physically shaking even though I was alone and I was fully aware that I was okay and that nothing would happen to me. You say everything will be okay but I know that. My brain doesn't care.
Instead of seeing what the symptoms actually are you just redefine the illness then claim you have it and it does hurt people who actually have it. If I tell someone I have anxiety it's no big deal bc it's something everyone has right? It's normal we all have it so I should just get over it right? I can't get taken seriously bc you water down the meaning so much that it's almost nothing

[caracrow]

Hi! I am diagnosed with schizoaffective disorder. It is a combination of both schizophrenia and a mood disorder (mine is depression). And the whole joke of walking into a room and saying “Am I hallucinating?” Made me laugh so hard (cause I’ve said those exact words) 😂 Thank you for being inclusive about people with schizophrenia and understanding that sometimes it is hard to understand what is reality and what is a simple hallucination. Love you papa oompsi ♥️

[Pigkle]

This is actually a big issue. As somebody who has a mental illness, this shouldn't be something others can take take advantage of just for popularity or attention. It not only makes it hard for others to understand somebody who actually suffers from it, but it makes them feel like their mental disorder is what defines them. I sometimes wish people would just grow up.

[talia_neah]

DID presenting itself for the world like all of these TikTokkers are claiming negates the entire point of the disorder. DID is formed out of extreme need to shield a person from abuse/trauma, typically in early childhood. These people are making a mockery of this incredibly rare illness for clout.