No one in my family talks about mental illness. Especially my mother. She never told me her brother was a drunk or that my dad has frequent panic attacks. All throughout my life I was talk that mental illness was something to be kept private and quiet. Over the last 4 years I've gone through several boughts of depression. I never asked for help because I was taught that it was something you silently deal with and don't mention it. I was taught that to talk about it was attention seeking and that self harm wasn't a cry for help but a cry for attention. I told myself for years that if I talked to anyone about what I was going through was just a phase, just part of being a teenager. In reality it's not a phase. It's a life long disorder. It's something I will live with for the rest of my life. It's something that I will carry with me forever. I will have the scars for the rest of my life. But I will no longer be ashamed. Let's start talking about mental illness not as if it's a cry for attention. But as something that needs to be handled with care and treated with love and support.