I did have this fear...until my first hospitalization happened...after that, it didn't seem to matter to me so much since everyone pretty much already knew after that. Before that, I felt I HAD to be perfect and that included staying out of the psych hospital. I guess I was lucky too in that there were not open beds in the nearest actual psych hospital when I needed to be hospitalized and I was sent more to a sort of halfway house/crisis house sort of place which in retrospect I now realize was quite a huge step up from an actual psych hospital so the whole experience all around wasn't as bad as I had feared.

I still get uncomfortable with the thought of people I don't really know knowing about my bipolar and mental illness, such as H's friends or work acquaintances, but H tends to be of the view that he's not going to lie or be secretive about it and often does tell these people. Which really, I don't even know why I care since most of these people I haven't even met in person at all, but IDK, it still does have a way of making me feel ashamed about it. Ugh.