I don't disagree with you fundamentally. Online self-diagnosis is rampant. Mental health and the addictions field is becoming a commision-based, for-profit business that's now selling subscriptions to get meds and see a counselor remotely that 1) may not be adequately trained or 2) makes their living on how much they can sell services. We heard "more awareness about mental health" as "Quick! Everyone make up the fastest, easiest way to drum up business."
Diagnosis is not a simple skill. It takes years to learn to do well and with acumen. First, there's separating the "common traits" for the actual criteria to meet the threshold of a mental disorder. Then there's the gathering of all supporting information regarding lifestyle, childhood, etc. Then we work to come up with the closest diagnosis possible. This requires considering context, pattern, history and overlapping characteristics that can also be found in other disorders. Then any closely related disorders or medical conditions must be ruled out. That renders a diagnosis, but even then that diagnosis may be altered to fit into a "billable" category.
And what I want so much to tell kids who are applying all kinds of labels to themselves that, once diagnosed, that becomes part of your health record for good. When you're asked on a job application if you've ever dealt with mental health issues, you must answer "yes." All new doctors will have access to it and health insurance may not cover treatment, something you'll need if prescribed meds. Once a label like this is affixed, it does not come off. That's fine if that label actually fits, but it'd be a shame to be labeled with an anxiety disorder because you were a nervous teen.
Incidentally, a "soft science" only means research are less rigidly required to follow the scientific method in some instances. This is true because while medicine and geography work with standards of numbers, much psychological work is qualitative, exploring the "why" as much as the 'what.' That gap is closing with the advent of new research.
Mental health requires research in the area of gender studies and diversity. We are well aware that men often get overlooked because they don't share their symptoms nearly as often. This is a societal issue, one of male socialization.
All science changes on a constant basis. That's what learning is. They're proving old theories wrong with quantum physics, we now know cholesterol is as much a genetic factor as is diet. And we understand it's not bad spirits infecting the brain of a "touched" person.
I would suggest that no advice of any manner at all be followed until one can properly vet that site and person. Until then, we're making strides in focusing a mental health in earlier age groups, increasing the outreach available and undertaking new experiments every day. This isn't a hill to climb, it's a whole world to traverse. A whole world which your primary doctor, incidentally, studied for a semester. They are physicians, they are not experts in mental health unless they so specialized. Even then all they'll do is either refer you or drug you. See a qualified person trained in mental health.
