I’d be a liar if I said that I was happy all the time, but one thing I have learned how to do is to reach out to a select group of people who I trust to confide in when things aren’t going how I’d like. In the past few weeks I’ve seen a few people I care a lot about going through some tough times and while it’s certainly their right to internalize their struggle it’s painful to watch them hurting.

When trying to discuss the problem it seems that a common theme among some is that they feel that it’s not OK for things to not be perfect. For some reason they’ve gotten it in their heads that if it’s not good news that it isn’t worth sharing with another person. They feel like they’re bothering someone by discussing how they’re unhappy or that things aren’t going well.

I’m not a mental health professional but I can say from experience that keeping hurt inside doesn’t help, and in many cases can make things worse. It can be scary to open up, even to someone you trust, but it’s OK to not be OK. The people who know you and care about you can tell when something’s wrong and you aren’t fooling anyone by pretending that things are fine when they’re not. No one is trying to push you to open up when you’re not ready, but know that when you are, there is someone willing to listen.