I TOLD my doctor at a recent appointment that I didn’t think I was ready to come off my medications. He said, in a matter of fact way, that he didn’t think it a good idea either.

“In fact”, he said, “you might want to consider the idea that you could be on medication for the rest of your life.”

This was the moment that the reality and prognosis of my mental health issues hit me. Until fairly recently, I had always considered these antidepressants and hospital appointments to be a phase – if a rather long one. Now I’m trying to adjust to the idea that I could still be on these pills as elderly man.

I’m 32-years-old now and I guess a lifetime of mental health treatment should have come as no surprise to me. I don’t remember ever having been happy. The occasional joke or compliment might lift my spirits for a minute or two, but my mood is firmly rooted in negative territory.

There was not much mental health awareness when I was a young boy, although I imagine such services were even scarcer for generations before me. Some of my earliest memories are of walking around the primary school playground in a state of panic and confusion. I was always convinced that I had done something wrong. I couldn’t see any obvious reason as to why my mood would be so low and I must have internalised the depression as guilt and shame.

After a childhood tormented by low mood I made an appointment at 16 to see my general practitioner. Thus began my life as a mental health patient. In the course of those years I was hospitalised, referred to all manner of clinical departments, and put on pill after pill. I am now on my 15th antidepressant.

As my youth slowly dies away I am saddened at never having been healthy enough to realise my potential in a career I would have loved. The number of fulfilling relationships I have had is much fewer than it might have been had I not had so much instability and emotional baggage.

The health services do what they can but they are understaffed and often based on outdated modes of psychiatric care. I get the impression from the doctor that it’s almost down to me now. They have done almost everything they can for me.

My life right now is pills, appointments, and an uncertain outlook for the future. Then again, none of us lives with any certainty. If I can leave any legacy I wish it were that it is possible to survive despite crippling mental torment. The fact that I rarely show my feelings outwardly means I have had to battle through this anguish with very little support from the outside world.

I believe that the rise in mental health diagnoses is not the result of people being less tough or society too soft. This is what happens when as a country we spend generations with a stiff upper lip and a mocking attitude towards ‘the mad’. Sooner or later we had to rise up as a people and say enough is enough. We won’t any longer hide our emotions or let them worry us into an early grave.

I hope that there is a brighter future ahead for me. If you know anyone who may be suffering then encourage them to talk. If they want talk to those closest to them then ask if they will speak to a nurse. Not everyone is comfortable disclosing their inner feelings to close family, as counterintuitive as that may seem.

We can stem the suffering from mental illness but first we have to get people to treatment. Let’s as a society dispense with ridicule and prejudice towards those whose minds are in turmoil. To see attitudes move in that direction would improve my life too. It’s often said that we are defined as a society by how we treat the most vulnerable amongst us.