All the signs were out to get me. The capital letters and exclamation marks, in lurid eye-grabbing colours, on each billboard I passed felt threatening. Like the words themselves were about to jump out of the images and grab me. I would be suffocated by the loop of a Y, the soft circle of an O. I crouched down on the cold concrete curb, hiding between two parked cars. I was gasping for breath, terrified of the rush of panic suddenly pulsing through my body. I thought I would just sit there for a while, until I felt ‘safe’ again. Then, once I did, I would push through, and keep walking to my weekly therapy appointments—after all, I had to. I had been on a downward spiral for weeks. And now this. Surely all signs I needed therapy. Except…prior to that moment, I had never had a panic attack. I had always considered myself pretty ‘well’ when it comes to mental health. So why, I questioned later, once home and feeling back inside my body, was I putting myself through this? The answer: because I felt that it was my obligation. That if I gave up, I would have failed somehow. After all, everyone could benefit from therapy, right? Right…?
‘Why even happy people need therapy’; ‘Six reasons why everyone should go to therapy’; ‘Even if you think you are ‘normal’…you need therapy’. It took just a simple Google search to find pages and pages of articles, all of this ilk and all touting pretty much the same message. Over on Twitter, it seems (according to many, many Tweets) everyone from Ted Lasso to Trump supporters need therapy. On Instagram, there are memes (‘Get in, loser, we are going to therapy’)
