Comment by onion_knight | Hacker News Reader

Comment by onion_knight | Hacker News Reader

Mental health issues too often remain untreated among high-achievers who are able to maintain a surface appearance of holding it together. It's a good trend that nowadays we feel able to talk more openly about struggles like this.

I see myself in this article but for me, the word that was the key to find resources to get better was the broader acronym RNT, "Repetitive negative thoughts". Perfectionism themes are one common type of thought for me, but I also have several other categories that don't fit in that frame. Two resources I found particularly useful:

* https://www.amazon.com/Negative-Thoughts-Workbook-Repetitive... "The Negative Thoughts Workbook" A practical self-help book with chapters to work through each common category of negative thought

* https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2672052/ "Constructive and Unconstructive Repetitive Thought" A survey in the clinical literature which I found particularly helpful for identifying the subset of negative thoughts which has been actually helping me. This helped me ease up on the majority of unhelpful thoughts with greater confidence that I'm still preserving the small subset of my thought pattern which has helped me succeed.

I agree. I think there are several reasons high achievers' mental health issues go untreated:

- like you say they maintain a healthy surface because part of their perfectionism is no one knowing about their anxiety / having a good image

- if they do share, often their goals / expectations will be inflated compared to that of their peers such that for others it feels like they're bragging or being ridiculous, instead of taking their pain seriously. I notice this especially with when I share dissatisfaction about my school results - disparate expectations create a true divide.

>what are you complaing for, you're doing great.

dismissive comments at a young age evolve to be tactful but still echo deafeningly from adolescence, in my exp.

I concur. And I'm saving these links.

As a tangent I would add that the damage isn't limited to the perfectionist. At some point one has to consider how the rigidity of perfectionism affects their relationships. It can be a self-indulgence in which one engages at the expense family or friends.

> It can be a self-indulgence in which one engages at the expense family or friends.

It’s even worse if the perfectionism is applied to those around you directly. The thought process is something like “well I hold myself to a high (but maybe poorly defined and changing) standard, so why not hold those in my life to that same standard!?”

Of course it is impossible for anyone to live up to your nebulous and nonverbal “standard”, so you see your close relations primarily in terms of how they are deficient. And because what comes around goes around, you assume others are perceiving you in the same way.

You may actually find yourself surrounded by people with obvious issues like addiction and depression so it easy for you to perceive exactly how much more perfect you are than they are, and of course you remind them of this frequently through backhanded comments that let them know that they are almost good enough to be your equal. It takes a certain kind of person to regularly take that abuse, so your warped reality self-selects for friends that are obsequious puddles or anxious wrecks. Thus begins a feedback loop that reinforces everyones mental health issues, with you being the pump that brings water from the well.

It’s a bucket of fun for everyone!

> The thought process is something like “well I hold myself to a high (but maybe poorly defined and changing) standard, so why not hold those in my life to that same standard!?”

Seems like a lot hinges on your parenthetical.

If Bob has a well-defined and consistent standard that works for him, what's wrong with filtering Eve out of his life with it?

Oh no of course we should all be discerning. But TFA talks about pinning self-esteem to the outcomes of projects in the world. I was describing a situation i saw where an individual’s “projects” were their close relationships. People are not projects to be worked on.

Wrong cosmically? Nothing, prejudice is a self-punishing mistake. Wrong for Bob? Well, he's lost a friend and not gained anything.

I think mostly everyone’s mental health issues go untreated. High achievers and otherwise, maybe for different reasons in different cases. Even people whose mental health issues cause them obvious distress often don’t get treatment.

Yeah, exactly, I think this article or the general consensus in this thread relates to the fact that high achievers' (or other positive-on-the-surface kinds of people) mental health is often overlooked due to the fact that they "don't have any real issues".

Sad to say, it's still a somewhat uphill battle to get diagnosed with something, if you've been able to graduate, can hold a job, and have an otherwise "normal" life.

The first time I went to a psychologist, they couldn't rule out things like ADD/ADHD, but simply ended the examination (after 3 interviews), and concluded with "could be due to traumatic childhood" - which I did not have. In the journal, they noted that I had graduated from University, had a steady white-collar job, no crime record, in a relationship, and other things which ADHD patients would apparently struggle with.

Went for a second opinion, and got diagnosed with non-hyperactive ADHD (previously called ADD).

I believe, in every system, that includes humans, the ability to pause is key.

If you can't stop whatever is fueling negative habits / emotions, even if it looks noble or whatever (learning, art, sport, perf, love) .. it's probably not good.

Regarding negative thoughts - I escape them thinking we all are temporary. People around us forget/forgive the unconscious mistakes we do. So we too need to ignore them for greater good of tomorrow.

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