I despise toxic positivity and I especially despise toxic positivity around my mental illness. Toxic positivity shrouds itself in “helpfulness” and yet hides a shiv beneath it. Toxic positivity comes in forms like, “Yoga will help your anxiety,” or “Meditation will calm your feelings of depression,” and when you scowl, it is then followed quickly by the words, “I’m just trying to help.” Well, here’s the thing, positivity may have its place in the world and in mental illness, but when positivity crosses the line and becomes something that actually hurts instead of helps — that’s toxic positivity and it has no place around serious mental illness.

People Reject the Idea of Toxic Positivity Around Mental Illness

I recently posted an image to Instagram and Facebook that said, “Toxic positivity not welcome here.”

As with so many of the things I post, I didn’t think it was a big deal or controversial. As I have been many times before, I was wrong. While some people knew, instantly, what I was talking about, others chimed in with extremely unhelpful comments like,

  • “Attitude is everything.”
  • “Positive thinking can never hurt when fighting any illness.”
  • “It’s hard to accept these things [being told to eat well, exercise, etc.] when we would like to wallow, but they’re true.”

There are two words that spring to mind when I read these things. They are “fuck” and “off.”

(These words aren’t directed at these people but, rather at toxic positivity in general.)

Yeah, you’re probably already offended, and that’s okay. But what the people who make these statements do not gather, it would seem, is that I, and many like me, have been doing this for decades. I have been maintaining a “positive attitude” for more years than many have been alive. I’m still as sick as all get out and it’s like this for some of us regardless as to some magic positivity metric. Oh, and telling sick people they’re wallowing or that they “want to” wallow is extremely insulting and dismissive. If I wanted to wallow in my bipolar disorder I wouldn’t be working so hard at maintaining any degree of wellness.

I suspect we tend to get this treatment because we have invisible illnesses, invisible disabilities. If you could see our suffering, you would stop suggesting that we are “wallowing” and not positive enough and understand we are simply living with a ball and chain the size of a small planet dragging us down.

And why did people reject my objection around toxic positivity and mental illness? Well, because they don’t want to believe they are toxic for one; and two, for all their caring, they apparently don’t have what it takes to actually stop and listen to the person they supposedly care so much about.

What Is Toxic Positivity Around Mental Illness?

You can experience toxic positivity around anything, but in my case, the toxic positivity that gets me is around mental illness. I have seen this over and over and over again. I will quote Jessica Cummin, who originally posted the above-mentioned image on Instagram:

“Toxic positivity often comes in the form of pseudo woke people who think good vibes, veganism, meditation, alkalising(?!) etc will make things easier. It’s gaslighting statements that in effect blame you for your illness and imply you’re not doing enough and you’re the reason you’re ill. It’s ideas that mind over matter changes everything and to be honest it’s toxic, dangerous and totally invalidating . . . We’ve all come across one too many instances of toxic positivity and it HAS to end. The idea of speaking badness brining it into existence is simply not how the world . . . works.”

@thechroniciconic via Instagram

Exactly.

The reason toxic positivity gets my hackles up so dramatically is because it is assumptive and, indeed, blaming. Someone, let’s say, Positive Patty, simply assumes that because I’m still as sick as I am, I must not have a positive attitude — thus, if I would just “turn that frown upside down” I would get better and it is my fault that I don’t get better. And then Positive Patty feels better about herself because one, she must have more positivity than me for not being as sick (or sick at all) and two, she deigned to help the plebeian(s) who doesn’t understand the value of a positive mindset.

Yeah, yippee for Positive Patty; she sure did a good job helping someone out today.

So, basically, toxic positivity is anyone who piously tells you what you need to do to get better — and yes, it’s often about your “attitude.” People say things like,

Toxic positivity affects the mentally ill when others try to tell them how to "fix" their illnesses. But mental illness and toxic positivity do not belong together.
  • “Have you tried going gluten-free?”
  • “You need to cut out processed foods, wheat, milk product, etc.”
  • “You need to meditate every day.”
  • “You need to get off of all those medications.”
  • “You need see a holistic practitioner, swami, yogi, etc..”
  • “You need an exorcism.”
  • “You need to believe in Christ, pray more, etc.”
  • “You need to take vitamin D, choline, vitamin C, etc.”
  • “You need to stop talking about your bipolar all the time.”
  • “You need to look at things in a different way.”

And so on and so on and so on. There is no end of things that would fix me.

It’s amazing I’m still stick after receiving all this great advice.

Why Is Positivity So Toxic Surrounding Mental Illness?

I could write pages and pages about why positivity — which people think of as “good” — is actually toxic for people with serious mental illnesses when used in the wrong ways. In short, toxic positivity actually makes the person with the mental illness feel worse or it makes them abandon real, medical treatments for woo-woo-jade-egg-in-you-vagina treatments. And that doesn’t just hurt people, it can actually kill them.

So let’s look at an example. Positive Patty says: “I practice yoga every morning and I’m fine,” or, less pointedly, “Yoga would help your depression.”

From my perspective, Positive Patty can go piss up a rope. She doesn’t know me or my story and thus can’t possibly know what I need. She also doesn’t know how much yoga I’ve tried over the period of my illness and its effect (or lack thereof). What she’s saying, though, is if I did something as simple as yoga, I wouldn’t be so sick. This suggests that I’m not actually trying to get better, because if I was, I would be better — like her.

Another example: Positive Patty says, “You can control your illness with diet if you just get off of all those pills and look at things in a positive way.”

Oh my, can Positive Patty just drop dead over that one. Positive Patty obviously doesn’t understand the medication literally keeps me alive and she clearly doesn’t understand the science between bipolar and diet. (FYI, after much study, there is still no diet that is believed to help bipolar disorder.) And while positivity has its place, telling someone to be more positive is like asking a person without legs to run. It’s not reasonable in the least.

Messages to Give Positive Patty Around Mental Illness and Toxic Positivity

There are many motivations a Positive Patty might have. She might really be trying to help and just doing so in a really bad and destructive way. She might also be trying to proselytize what she considers to be the truth based on teachings such as those of antipsychiatry. She might be trying to generalize her own experience onto yours. Whatever her motivations, though, she is harmful. She is toxic. She won’t want to hear this, in fact, she likely won’t believe it, but it’s true.

When you run into a Positive Patty, and believe me, you will, you might try saying:

  • “I appreciate that has helped you, but it doesn’t work for me.”
  • “I understand that is your belief, but I prefer to go with science.”
  • “You may be trying to help, but I’m finding your advice harmful and blaming.”
  • “I know you care, but I would appreciate you keeping unsolicited advice to yourself. I’m working with professionals to get better.”

I think it’s best to give Positive Patty the benefit of the doubt and believe that she really is trying to help while asserting your own boundaries and saying that what she’s doing just isn’t helpful for you.

Yes, my initial response to the people denying toxic positivity on my page was quite harsh, but that’s because I’ve heard it over and over again and I’m tired to being blamed for my own illness and I’m tired of people telling me to do things that aren’t scientifically reasonable and I’m tired of people assuming that what I’ve already tried to deal with bipolar disorder isn’t enough. I’m also tired of people telling me that I’m not “positive” enough. In short, I’m very, very tired.

I have an illness that tries to kill me on a daily basis and yet people think they can judge me and how I handle that illness when they are not psychiatrists or psychologists and, more specifically, are not my psychiatrist or psychologist. Put simply. these people are not behaving reasonably and do not know what they are talking about. Every person’s journey with a serious mental illness is different, but what I know is that working with a psychiatrist (and often a psychologist) on medically-validated therapies is the way to get better. Listening to people in your family or on the internet or in a support group is not.

Ignore toxic positivity around mental illness and don’t allow it to make you feel bad or question choices you have carefully made with your doctor. Recognize this “positivity” for what it is: harmful. Dismiss it. Listen to the people who are trained to help you and know the science. And realize that not everything works for every person and you don’t need to justify that, or your experiences, or your treatment decisions, to anyone.