Media portrayals of hallucination and delusion

[softestbullet]

Kaninchenzero just posted this great piece about media portrayals of mental illness. Excerpt:

Maybe it would be difficult to portray hallucination and delusion the way we experience it. Maybe it would be less interesting to audiences who haven’t experienced them or wouldn’t be recognized for what they are by audiences accustomed to the “the crazy person sees and has conversations with people who aren’t there and they don’t know the person is a hallucination because hey they are crazy right?” Which I’ve also heard.

I am going to tell you about my hallucinations and delusions and I need you (and everyone else reading) to understand or at least to hear some things. It is really damn scary talking about this in public. Seeing things that do not exist and believing things that are not real mark me as seriously mentally ill and carry lots of stigma.

Comments

[jesse_the_k]

Thank you so much for posting this.

I'm struggling with an essay about asking for/receiving/needing and accepting help, and a constant theme is, "We can't all do everything." I'm so glad that you helped me learn more today!

[softestbullet]

Oh, wow, what a wonderful comment. :) I'm glad you found it helpful! I did, too.

[rydra_wong]

Thank you. That's an amazing piece.

[softestbullet]

*solemn nod*

[ingo]

This helped me, although I'm not up to going into detail right now. Thanks for sharing it - and thanks to the author for writing it as well (I don't know how to give feedback on tumblr).

[softestbullet]

I totally understand. :) That's why I just link to stuff, instead of talking about it, most of the time.

To respond to tumblr posts you have to have a tumblr, unfortunately!

[onceamy]

Thank you for sharing this; it's a great resource!

[the_jack]

I wish tumblr supported openID or something, because I'd love to thank her as well as you for posting this.

A point she didn't make, but which leapt right out at me, having recently found out I'm on the autism spectrum and could and should have been diagnosed over 20 years ago (and thus at least potentially been able to get some help or at least some self-help instead of perpetually being confused and hurt when social situations went "wrong") when I was instead labeled with an easy-yet-meaningless throwaway diagnosis... is that, if film or TV *ever* portrayed hallucinations or delusions anything like the way people actually experience them, then people experiencing them might more readily recognise what the fuck is happening to them and be thus better prepared to seek help or self-help.

Sorry for the ridiculously long sentence, there. Sometimes I really can't help myself.