I won't go too into the details of my own disastrous brain but does anyone else here feel like their sexuality/ gender identity kinda influences your mental illness(s)? For example, I have a very black and white thinking process and sometimes I feel like anyone who doesn't share my exact experiences with sexuality must hate people like me/ can never understand me (I know logically and through therapy that this is not correct but bear with me). Like, I sometimes get very irrationally angry and closed off from straight friends because my mind tells me they must hate me. I also experience intense paranoia that sometimes others are talking about me on the bus/ in class/ whatever and I specifically sometimes feel like they are making fun of me/ are disgusted by me because they can tell that I'm not straight (again, I know that this is paranoia and it's not real). Does anyone experience anything like this?
I feel as if I have more mental problems than my straight peers yes - but my anxiety is especially health related. Every little pain I just assume I'm disastrously ill.
Yes. I'm LGBT, so I was called "weird", at high school. Almost every time I hear/read the word "weird" I think someone is referring to me. If I'm manic, I think people are more supportive and/or open-minded than they really are. I have mixed feelings about it, because that crazy confidence works to some degree.
I do somewhat feel as if my gender influences my mental health. My main worry is that I go to a school with a boy/girl uniform and I have to wear the "girl" one, so everyone perceives me as a lesbian, I guess that just bothers me because they see me as something I don't identify as?? This often makes my anxiety and ocd worse ye
I have dealt with anxiety for essentially my whole life & depression/self harm for the last year, both of which are things that are definitely fueled by my sexual orientation. So much worry/guilt keeping me up at night. I also dealt with anorexia over the last year & I'm coming to realize more and more how much I was using it to avoid facing my sexuality. I think I didn't want to come to terms with the fact that I really had started to develop feelings for a good friend of mine. There was too much pressure from the world around me to start dating boys and I just didn't want to. Obsessing endlessly about diet/exercise can distract from that. After a while my brain became too malnourished to feel any romantic interest (apparently your body isn't interested in making babies if you're starving) and that became another form of self-medication. I'm working through all of those things now, but it is really hard to see how many of these things have been fueled by my feelings for girls
I have depression and anxiety. But I've never felt that it connects to my gender identity or my sexual orientation. In fact, I think that this part of me is the only part about me that was easy to accept (this might not make much sense, but my depression steams from my eating disorder and hating myself). I hope that makes a little bit of sense.
I have generalized anxiety disorder and anorexia nervosa (diagnosed). One of my doctors also thinks I have OCD but that's not official. I feel my gender heavily influences the second one at the least. I can't look in the mirror with feeling disgusted so I immediately tried to control and change the only factor I could. My weight.
This part I can definitely related to, not so much them knowing I'm not straight though. I think that's just my social anxiety coming out. As for my orientation affected my mental illness. It hasn't caused it or anything, but since I started questioning my sexuality, my depression has picked up noticeably. I think the stress of trying to figure myself out really messed me up.