How do I find out if I have a mental illness?

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Caesar of Bread

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Hi y'all.

I was wondering if I may have autism, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, anxiety, or depression. How do I find out?

Thanks,
Caesar of Bread (you can call me Alex if you want)
 
First, DO NOT try to learn more about any affliction on social media. There are county health departments that can refer you to competent diagnostic hands. If you're young enough to be in schools, colleges and public schools have counselors. Finally, you could talk to your family doctor and get a referral to a psychologist. There is help out there, and people who care about you. Lean on them.

One caveat: I understand you're still rather young. It's common to feel downright crazy sometimes while you're growing up, so try not to convince yourself of anything until you meet with a professional.
 
kid , a hint just for once . It will happen when it will happen . Seeing it as some sort of race , being a second rank , being a loser that nobody will look at ... So what ? Be yourself and watch all those trophy wives of future times drift by . You will end up with someone and whatever ...

second hint . Forget this one , now that you are living in the supercharged US . Still , it is a good thing . Be strong enough to "wait" instead of trying to be Superman and if that doesn't work , trying to be the Weakman so that the thoughtful girls will take pity on you .

third hint . Cool that you have given up on gender change stuff . Remember that when you think you have some deficiency because ____ and it will magically go away in one single change .

fourth hint . If everything fails , the post above .

fifth hint . Don't tell me ı don't know how to count . Am a professional in holding grudges .

sixth hint . Jimmy Jimmy why did you crash up your new car ? Is it because it didn't take you too far ? Yeah , some song before your time , remember the post above .
 
Talk to multiple doctors. See how many different disorders you can collect, like pokemons. Take the diagnoses with a grain of salt & don't be too quick to jump onto a drug regime and remember at the end of the day your mental health is up to you (people can help & offer assistance but no one knows what you're going thru & no label can do justice to your human experience)

If you have to ask if you have depression you don't have depression. Like getting punched really hard in the stomach you'd know it.
 
If you have to ask if you have depression you don't have depression.

:nono: This is not helpful advice. It's like saying if you have to ask if you have cancer, you don't have cancer. There are many illnesses that don't have visible symptoms (at first), and ignoring them could lead to drastic situations later.


@Caesar of Bread: There used to be a social group that was invitation-only, and fairly strictly moderated; there was a depression support group there, and it was so helpful to those of us who were part of it. We knew we weren't alone, and could share experiences and discuss treatments that either did or didn't work. That group is gone now, with the rest of the social groups (forum migration; XenForo doesn't support social groups), and so is the spinoff forum we went to after that.

Because nobody on staff here is trained in such fields - not to mention it's unethical to diagnose and treat someone you have never met, especially if they're underage - please don't ask for diagnoses here. Nobody here is competent enough to tell you that you do or don't have something. All we can do is share our own experiences, but this is an area of discussion that often gets shut down.

The best advice any of us can offer is that you see whatever doctor(s) may be relevant, talk to your parents and/or other close adult you trust.

I think there actually is an "Ask" thread for at least one of the conditions on your list. I KNOW there's one about Aspergers.

That said, I've gone through some of what you've listed (it's an ongoing thing). If you ever want to ask about something or just vent a frustration or two, feel free to drop a PM.

Best of luck. :hug:
 
Depression is not like cancer. The whole thing about depression is it feels really, really, really bad. If you're just a little down (or confused) it's not depression (altho you can probably get a prescription & some drugs if you ask around enough). If you have to constantly seek outside yourself to know how you feel (or have trouble w understand emotion in general) probably autism is the most likely diagnosis of the ones on that list.

But the randos on the internet are right that it's not for randos on the internet to tell you what's what you're going thru.
 
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Your general practitioner is a good place to start, they can refer you to a psychologist who can help you.
 
If you have to ask if you have depression you don't have depression. Like getting punched really hard in the stomach you'd know it.

Literally everyone I know who's had depression including me is like "depression? No, i'm lazy and this is my fault" constantly
 
Literally everyone I know who's had depression including me is like "depression? No, i'm lazy and this is my fault" constantly
Depression has nothing to do w laziness. It's a debilitating despair. Malaise or being unmotivated is not depression, it could lead to depression tho. Society is set up so people feel generally bad about themselves, that doesn't mean you have severe depression and need to be diagnosed (altho, I agree why not see someone irl who may be able to give you insight)

And iirc OP is 13 and impressionable and if he can't tell anxiety from schizophrenia from depression it's likely he's detached from feelings totally hence getting multiple opinions and focus on trying to understand how you feel yourself before rushing to have someone else put a label on you.

If you've seen OP's other threads he's clearly looking for/trying to understand his identity and I find the idea that mental illness as something you shop around for as an identity rather disturbing.
 
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1. the things you may have as outlined in the OP are very, very different from each other, although naturally a lot of them are in the same spectrum. if you're confused whether you have all of them... i'm uncertain that you do. but you know yourself better than i do.

2. at your age, your brain gets a lot of emotions it's not used to handle; contrary to others, i think the hormonal aspect of it is overstated and unfortunately often used to dismiss real things as juvenile concerns (if it were just hormones, i've had hormones since i had a memory and beyond), but i believe the novelty of these emotions is still a thing that you're not used to handle, regardless of whether you're a healthy teen or not. most people get depressed during their lifetime, most people have periods or spurts of anxiety, most people get social cues they mistranslate or don't understand, and particularly during your teenage years, even as a neurotypical, figuring out what this is and how you react to it is a normal part of growing up. like, not intuiting what a social situation is all about and figuring out years later that you completely misread everything is not unique to autism, it's part of the social calibration you go through.

3. as others have said, don't google your way to it, and don't rely on this forum for it. i'll add that even respectable sources use words differently than outside their sphere. Eg this https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/topics/depression defines one symptom of depression as "Persistent sad, anxious, or “empty” mood" among other things (many relevant things, but i'm picking out just one sentence here). the problem with psychiatriac speak is that a lot of the nomenclature is something we all feel sometimes (it's a big part of the reason it's so hard to translate these issues to people without these issues). when professionals mean persistent, sad, anxious, etc, they mean it, and if you don't have it and are not acquainted with what it "really" looks like, you can mistranslate for yourself and self-diagnose in unfortunate ways. on the other hand, if you do have it, and are acquainted with what it "really" looks like, the reveal of what it means can be a tool for you to get resources and/or treatment.
(sidenote for this point, i'll add that of course there are plenty of people that realize what they've felt all along is a thing after a bout of googling, but the point is that the medical language is very precise, even if psychiatry shares a lot of popular nomenclature when describing the illnesses. as a shrink, you need to translate the medical nomenclature "feeling sad" to common english "feeling sad", and one is a magnitude of severity worse than the other)
it's complicated, really, but i'd suggest just:
see a doctor about it (and even then, if you have something, may not be picked up.)

4. if you have something, getting a monicker for it/having it defined/getting diagnosed is, in itself, useless. what it can serve you is getting a sense of belonging, getting access to treatment (you don't get schizo pills if you don't have schizophrenia), and a shorthand in social situations for other (understanding) people if you have issues in some neurotypical spaces. all of these things can also work against you; you can get an innate sense of being sick and wrong, you can lose access to other aspects of life, and people can dismiss you by default if they know you have some mental ailment.
but the diagnosis? between yesterday and today, after you got the word attached to you? you're the same person, but you have a word attached to you.

basically,
i suggest you see a doctor and share your concerns,
and know that the diagnosis is just that. it's a pathway to many other things, but it won't change a damn thing in itself. ;)
 
Depression has nothing to do w laziness. It's a debilitating despair. Malaise or being unmotivated is not depression, it could lead to depression tho.
???
narz this is hard to articulate but i'll try
yes what you said here is true
but the point is that some people with depression don't know the facts about what it is
the forum people are telling you that no, actually depressed people don't automatically know they're depressed, since there's indeed a difference between just feeling down and being depressed. some depressed people don't know what they're feeling is abnormal, since they only have themselves for reference.
when pushed with lexicus' point (which was indeed that people can't tell laziness from inability even within themselves, so no, they don't just grok it, even when diagnosed) you just went and defined what depression was, and... like. lexicus knows what depression is. he's not trying to define what it isn't. he's exemplifying the experiences of people. you understand that there's a difference between perception and reality, right? and that defining what depression is just describes reality, not how the people in question understand that reality?

i agree shopping around for mental illnesses is wrong/disturbing/whatever, but "if you're depressed, you know it" is just wrong
edit and ftr i'm glad you're also on board with the "go to a doctor" train. it's always, always a good idea to do it, if you're authentically worried.
 
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depressed people don't know what they're feeling is abnormal, since they only have themselves for reference.
Dealing with depression made me feel vastly worse than I'd ever felt before. If I'd felt the same as I always did I wouldn't have been depressed. Depression is not a down mood, or a dissatisfaction with life, it's a radical departure from the normal ups & downs of life. It's kind of like being in love, if you're not sure you're not in love. If you feel normal you're not depressed. There's nothing vague about it. Again being bored or unmotivated or whatever is not depression. I understand lots of people self-diagnose as depressed & that it's very easy these days to get a diagnosis in order to get meds if that's your aim but that doesn't water down what depression actually is.

you understand that there's a difference between perception and reality, right?
You understand you come off as condescending?
 
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Dealing with depression made me feel vastly worse than I'd ever felt before. If I'd felt the same as I always did I wouldn't have been depressed. Depression is not a down mood, or a dissatisfaction with life, it's a radical departure from the normal ups & downs of life. It's kind of like being in love, if you're not sure you're not in love. If you feel normal you're not depressed. There's nothing vague about it. Again being bored or unmotivated or whatever is not depression.
you did literally the same thing again. defining what it is without distinguishing it from experience. are you trolling?

you actually hit it on the nail here, though, maybe i can try and explain again:
If you feel normal you're not depressed
so ok.

depressed people have depressed as their normal, that's literally the whole difference distinguishing it from just feeling down. as such, they sometimes can't tell, since they sometimes don't know what normal is supposed to feel.
that's the whole point of it often being unhealthy by virtue of being a prolonged state.

people can think they're depressed when they're not, and they can think they're not depressed when they are. what you're doing - explaining what depression is or isn't - does not factor into whether people know they are depressed in any way whatsoever.
 
Moderator Action: Thread is permanently closed. Cheers-lymond
 
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