At seventeen, I realised how many of my friends had crippling depression that left them worn out every single day. I began to realise that I was one of the only emotionally stable people in my friend group. 

At eighteen, I was crying every day. My heart started racing when I got even slightly nervous, and I started wanting to be alone and I did not want to go out anymore. 

Most of my teenage years was full of checking on how my friends were doing, trying to support them in any way I possibly could, and worrying about them every single day. When I asked them, 'why dont you try counselling? I can drive you there, I can go with you. No one has to know, and for the first time I will even go into the session with you.' And every single time, I got a huge list of excuses. 

'I can't imagine talking to someone I dont know about my problems. How can I trust them, I dont even know them. They will judge me because they dont know me'.

'I am doing okay by myself, as soon as I feel like I am not coping I might think about it'

'I dont need that, my friends are helping'.

'I dont want my parents to find out, it would make life so much harder if they knew about my mental illness. They would worry if they knew how bad I was.'

Again and again I would say, how do you know that if you haven't tried it? Do you really have something to lose? These are professionals, they are literally trained to keep your struggles confidential and they are trained to not judge you even if they dont know you.

Out of my friends, only one ever went to counselling. And it helped her more than her friends, her own coping strategies and it was not what she thought it would be. 

And when I hit eighteen, and got hit with anxiety- I went straight to counselling. I knew I wasn't struggling with suicide, but I went anyway. I did not want to waste time like I saw all my other friends doing. I wanted to be as mentally healthy as I could be so that I could help others be the same way. 

So here is a few things that counselling is not.

Counselling is not lying down on a couch with your eyes closed and a psychologist asking you about your dreams. Most of the time, a counselling room has a couple of couches, is clean (but does not smell like a hospital) and the counsellor will ask if you want some water, tea or coffee. It is not like in the movies, it is simply a coffee date with a person who can give you more tactics and skills in fighting your mental illness. 

Counsellors will never judge you. If you ask a counsellor about his/her life or struggles you will usually find that they have a mental illness themselves. And they also see a counsellor. Most mental health professionals at one point or another end up being diagnosed with a mental illness. Or they have recovered from one, so now they want to help other people get through what they have gotten through. The counsellor has a past as well. The counsellor has toxic thoughts as well. The counsellor is a normal human being with struggles as well, they are not gonna judge you for your struggles. 

Your parents do not have to know that you are going to counselling. In Australia, if a teenager goes to a doctor, you can request a number of free counselling sessions that are usually offered by HeadSpace https://www.headspace.org.au. You do not need your parents permission to go to a doctor and receive these free counselling sessions. If you need help, jump online and do some googling. And take a friend with you, you never have to go alone. In Australia, legally you are allowed to go to a counselling session without your parents knowledge. 

Counsellors will not tell anybody your secrets. Under Australian law, a counsellor is not allowed to even tell their wife or husband, family or friends anything about your situation or your name. They can be fined and fired as a result of incriminating behaviour like this. There are only two ways a counsellor is allowed to speak about you. Firstly, most counsellors have a supervisor and at the end of everyday they have a one-on-one debrief with their supervisor to protect their own mental health. In this debrief they may be worried for you and may need to ask the supervisors advice. In this situation they are only allowed to describe their personal worries, they are not allowed to use your name or actual places. Secondly, if a counsellor thinks you may harm yourself or another person they are legally required to notify authorities. But that does not mean that they go into great detail explaining your secrets. And this is only for emergency situations and does not happen often. 

Your privacy is protected legally in Australia with hard laws. 

I have to be really bad before I see a counsellor.

When I was eighteen I started having very very mild symptoms of anxiety.  I went to counselling for a whole month before I had my first anxiety attack. But do you realise what this allowed my counsellor to do? She worked on preventative measures, helping me deal with things before they turned into a problem. When I had my first anxiety attack I knew what to do straight away. Yes I got worse before I got better, but I knew that I was doing everything I could do prevent and help my mental health. Plus, you need less sessions with a counsellor if your working on preventing yourself from getting worse. Once you have a really crippling mental illness, its hard to know where to start working on things. But if you work on it as soon as I realise you have it, then that way your keep up with your mental illness and fighting it before it even tries hurting you. 

The thing with mental illness is, is that it always, always gets worse. It never just randomly gets better or easier. And the people who go to counselling and fight it with the tools they get from that have a high rate of living a healthier, more fulfilled life. Do you really want to cheat yourself from having that?

You have to tell a counsellor everything. You never, ever EVER have to tell a counsellor all of your past, all of your secrets and all of your mistakes. Is there one thing that is bothering you? Then tell them about that one thing. Allow yourself to get comfortable with your counsellor before you tell them everything. The very first session for any counsellor is simply to get to know you. They just ask you about yourself, do you live with your parents, what do you like to do, do you have a job, do you have any dreams etc. They understand it takes time, and if you have a big secret that you have never told anyone, you dont actually have to tell them. And a counsellor will never force you to say anything. In my counselling classes at university we are taught that our job is to sit and listen. Listen to what you want to say. We are taught to let you talk about the subjects that you want to talk about. We are taught to ask you, 'why did you want to come today? What do you want to talk about?' A counsellor will never force you to open up, or tell secrets. 

So please, before you say a resounding no to seeking mental health help, think about it. Its your mental health, its your life, are you going to live it the best you can?

A counsellor is just a professional your gonna have a cup of coffee with and tell them about your struggles so that you can get some tools to fight with. Thats all it is. No need to overthink, it is simple. 

Keep struggling <3