I think a big part of the problem is that people really don't understand, it's beyond their comprehension. Heck, there are some aspects of my own mental illnesses that I don't understand, so how can I expect someone else to?

If you suffer from depression and they see you live a decent life, what have you got to be depressed about? Snap out of it! Look at all of your blessings (which is good advice) BUT we'd LOVE to snap out of it! They cannot comprehend that taking an alternate route to work will screw up your whole day. Things that are huge in our life do not even make a blip on their radar. I don't think they can understand it until they've lived it.

I've go through stages of high functioning and what I call hybernation. My last hybernation was the longest and lasted 5 years. So I can see how someone that does not know me can look at my hybernation period as being "lazy". They cannot comprehend how I could literally go months without seeing my own downstairs. My comfort zone is my bedroom, I can go months moving only the 15 feet to the bathroom.

I started a job this week, something I'm VERY proud of. I was able to get it because my children have worked there for years and the store manager hired me without an interview, I will not have to deal with customers. I deal with mental and physical issues every single day. I can't answer how or why I can go to work this week and last week I had to prepare myself mentally for hours just to do the simple task of driving my son to school.

It doesn't help that there is the myth of the magical medication out there. "Oh, my brother was depressed and started taking X and is just as good as new!" Yeah, I've tried A-Z and none of them seem to work for very long. Shall I get addicted to Xanax or deal with overwhelming terror every minute of my life?

But you see this type of discrimination with different physcial injuries too, particularly back injuries. My husband has had three ruptured disks due to an accident at work and has surgery for them. He's a foolish, stubborn man, so he was off work a grand total of 10 days for the surgery. STILL when he over does it and his injury acts up, they give him a look over his shoulder as if he's not there like "right". I want to scream "he is injured, you can see it on his MRI!!!!"