Of course, the naysayers had to emerge and utter incoherent ramblings about cowardice and his leftist views that made him unhappy. All of the unintelligent garbage that gets reported needs to be tossed away promptly. Suicide is not an act of cowardice, but a result of depression or other mental illnesses. Robin Williams’s death is a tragedy, but if it can help start a national conversation about depression and mental illness then something positive can come from an untimely death
It seems that many people view mental illness through a stereotype of straitjackets and padded cells. Mental illness encompasses many forms and can be as blatant as someone with agitated, incoherent behavior. It also can have very subtle signs, which makes a person appear to have nothing wrong with them. I understand the symptoms and the impact, because I suffer from severe depression and anxiety. It is a hard condition to understand because it affects emotions. This makes it difficult for those unfamiliar with the disease to comprehend as a real illness.
Believe me, it is just as real as diabetes, cancer, hypertension or any other disease that hides beneath the surface. It requires treatment just the same as diabetics require medication to keep their condition stable.
Depression is as old as recorded history. Years ago people thought of it as melancholia. The prevailing notion would be “he just needs to pull himself up by his bootstraps.” It was an uneducated thought that if you were sad, you would just get glad again. It was a self-inflicted pity party. The more the condition was studied and as medical advances were made, clinicians realized that there are many factors and conditions involved with the illness. Depression has many causes and can stem from genetic predisposition, life events, faulty mood regulation by the brain, and medical problems.