romanticizing mental illnesses

1.9K 68 23
                                    

DON'T DO IT

Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.


DON'T DO IT.

Mentall illnesses should not be glamorized. It is a real problem people deal with. Do not make it out to be something it isn't.

If your OC suffers from some sort of mental illness like PTSD, Depression, Anxiety, an eating disorder, or anything else classified in that category, SHOW THEM STRUGGLING WITH IT.

Most mental illnesses, if not all, affect a person's everyday life. It is usually not a minor thing, especially not in Teen Wolf.

In Teen Wolf, Stiles Stilinski deals with anxiety and other assumed mental illnesses. He is usually open about it to his friends when he is not okay and uses his sense of humor as a way to cope. Stiles even admits in season two that he "ignores the problem until it goes away". Throughout the series Stiles is shown to have panic attacks and minor anxiety attacks.

Scott McCall shows signs of PTSD from losing people close to him and all of the crap he's gone through throughout the entire series! He feels guilty when he's unable to save people and trusts people too easily! He takes it out on himself for the wrongdoings of other people and when things don't go as planned. Scott is shown in two specific scenes where he doesn't allow himself to heal because he feels guilty. For example, when he thought Derek died or when Liam wounded him in season five.

Isaac Lahey was abused by his father for a long time. In multiple episodes it implies how he is uncomfortable in small, enclosed spaces due to his father locking him in a freezer. This even triggers his claws and eyes. While him, Scott, and Boyd are all influenced by wolfsbane, he imagines he is back in the freezer. In season 3, he mentions on different occasions how his father abused him and uses it as sarcastic input.

This is realistic. It portrays unhealthy coping mechanisms and behavior that many people can resort to or have without even noticing it!

If you decide to write your OC with a mental illness, do not have their love interest being the only one that can "make it go away".

I see plenty of fan fictions where the OC has serious mental health issues and it's completely disregarded once they meet their significant other.

People have struggles and have doubts about themselves. Recovering from a mentall illness or traumatic event will not just take a kiss or reassurance from the OC's love interest to go away.

It can take at LEAST up to a year of therapy and professional help (and that is very rare in such a short amount of time). Incorporate this into the story.

Show the OC facing struggles even the love interest can't help with. Maybe your OC can have flashbacks of traumatic experiences that hold them back from helping the Pack.

Do your research! If you do not deal with the illness you are writing about, envelop yourself into websites and maybe ask someone who deals with it how they've learned to live with it or overcome it.

- paris, leavethecities

SCOTT MCCALL 「 WRITING TIPS 」Where stories live. Discover now