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virtualpet
You are right when you say that potentially mentally ill kids and teenagers can understand that something might be off and therefore search for information. But tik tok is no place to speak about those issues. The sense of being part of a group – in this case the ”mentally ill” group, especially Tourette's and dissociative disorders – is too huge to make sure you're not appropriating a disorder you don't have, even unintentionally. Doing researches about disorders with which you might share symptoms is not a problem, but self-diagnosing is. Nothing wrong with saying, ”It is a possibility that I might have X, from my understanding of things I might have similar symptoms”, but it's wrong to affirm you have a disorder while you're only self-diagnosed. Admitting that you have no professional diagnosis will never prevent you from getting help and being taken seriously. However, the moment you self-diagnose and people start to notice it, it might be the beginning of people thinking that you're faking and exaggerating things in order to just have a label, to make an identity out of it, to get attention. That's surely why there is so much ”fake-claiming” on tik tok. I would absolutely love to be able to believe in everyone's well-meaning, but it seems very naive to me to think that no one can lie and use mental disorders for their own profit. If people can do it with physical conditions, they can do it with mental conditions too.
Self-diagnosis can be harmful. Even an adult with professional education about psychiatry is not able to diagnose himself; imagine a kid or a teenager. You don't have the knowledge, the self-reflection and the hindsight required to be able to determine what disorder you might be suffering from. When you think you have a disorder, it's very common that you interpret everything as a symptom of said disorder. Your understanding of your ”symptoms” will always be tainted by the subconscious thought that you may have it – and perhaps you even
want to have it. Having a name to put on something is way more reassuring that being left with absolutely nothing. Having a common label and being part of a group of similar people is reassuring. I can totally understand that, especially when everyone around you appears to have it.
Because social trends are a thing, too. The amount of kids and teenagers suddenly having Tourette's and DID on the internet among other conditions during the lock down – when they only had the internet as a way of socialising – is a solid proof of it. DID is not just something you suddenly discover because you don't have school anymore and you're left with unlimited access to the internet for a few weeks. It's a serious and rare illness born from repeated childhood trauma that often goes unnoticed until well in your thirties, and very often only hindsight from a mental health professional will make you realise that you have it.
Does not having a mental illness mean that everything they go through and feel is invalid and isn't worth being noticed? Absolutely not. Maybe they will be feeling less compelled of claiming diagnosis when people understand that you can be suffering and need help without having a very specific condition. Maybe they will stop self-diagnosing when supporting communities stop being that strict with very specific requirements to be seen as enough oppressed/different to deserve to be validated and welcomed into the community.
Many people go through very messed-up things in their lives, but a vast amount of them don't develop disorders out of it. Humans are as resisting as they are fragile, which is absolutely frightening when you think about it. It's important to understand that it's a little (and very unfortunate) part of the population that develop mental health issues following a shocking event or a series of shocking events. Not getting a disorder doesn't mean that you haven't suffered ”enough” though, it doesn't mean that you don't need help either. The impact it had on you just wasn't enough to become pathological, but despite that you still deserve to get help if you need it.
Both self-diagnosing and fake-claming are harmful in their own ways, I'll give you that. I can see why self-diagnosing is appealing, and I can even admit that it's okay in some circumstances. Most of the time, though, it is not okay. The meaning may not be evil but it's still too likely that self-diagnosed people spread false information about the disorder they appropriated, which in the end hurts rightfully diagnosed people and people that have to resort to self-diagnosing (even though they should just say that they think they share symptoms with X) because they live in a non-supportive family or in a country where access to medical care is difficult.
It also muddies the waters for research and that, that is very bad. As I'm sure you know, the existence of DID is currently debated among professionals. However, having so many kids, teenagers and young adults wrongfully claimed that disorder heavily damages the information and results researchers get.
I really don't think it's a good thing to blindly validate everyone's identity. In the best of all possible worlds, sure, it would be fantastic. But it can't work and possibly bring only positive results to enable anyone to convince everyone that if they say they are X, then they are and there's nothing you can do to nuance that.
Doubt and scepticism are important. Extreme validation and tolerance can cause issues and that needs to be addressed. Now, it doesn't mean that you have to be rude and harass people, but you should still bear in mind that honesty is not a universal quality of Man and people can be malicious to gain profit, even if they paint themselves as victims and can rightfully have genuine problems and therefore still deserve help and empathy.