do you think people with mental illness always need therapy/someone licensed to talk to?

even if they have a support system and friends to talk to openly about their mental well-being?

i’ve always prided myself on being self aware of the struggles i face, and throughout periods of my life i’ve had a good support system to lean on about these things. but is it really ethical or sustainable to only talk to friends about your mental health?
i’m not sure how these discussions came across to friends in the past since i have memory issues, but i think that within recent times i haven’t trauma dumped onto others; the discussions were all willingly had. but i’m unsure if having that support system makes it right to avoid talking to a professional about my issues. i can be very stubborn when it comes to my mental health, and i’ve held the belief in the past that personally there’s nothing good that can come out of therapy. i know what is wrong with me, i’ve learned methods to help me, and i have people i trust to talk to. i don’t know if this is me being self aware or if my avoidance is rooted in wanting to enable my own mental suffering further.

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SomeMichGuy · M

Wow...

The last part is so very full of what you are getting at:

i can be very stubborn when it comes to my mental health

If I understand the community of those with such issues, I think this is a very common--and understandable!--trait. With the stigma with which mental health all too often has been viewed, and the way that it is typically more intimately interwoven with who we truly are than our physical health, this is not surprising. But I think you understand that it can get in the way of using ALL your resources to get further along the path of...finding the end-state which is best for each person.

i’ve held the belief in the past that personally there’s nothing good that can come out of therapy

Traditional therapy does not cure many patients; it cures the need for therapists to have income.

But, while I'm inclined to agree, to say that "NOTHING good can come from therapy" is to put oneself with the "too broad a brush" group, as it uses the universal negative...and people using the "universal quantifiers" of logic (positive or negative) tend to be very wrong unless they are stating tautologies of category definition.

I think one needs to open to the notion that guided questioning might well lead one to new insights more quickly than one might arrive at them, oneself...

After all, it is hardest of all to see one's very own self with true clarity, regardless of what we might tell our Selves.

The utility of a professional friend guiding you would seem to lie in the combination of

• that professional's abilities, and
• one's own readiness to hear / listen to / accept the potential truth of insights which are not self-generated.

Both of these are critical and must be in synch with each other. Perhaps that is too often NOT the case.

i know what is wrong with me

I hesitate to self-diagnose, esp. after seeing so many people on social media get so very much wrong about things external to themselves, it would be a surprise that they could get things right which are internal to themselves (esp. when their overestimation of their knowledge is often critically involved with their failure to get things external to themselves correct!).

While you are a specific individual, not an average of "everyone on social media", it's also the case that we cannot all be positive outliers, in spite of what well-intentioned mothers, etc., in our lives may have told us.

i’ve learned methods to help me

Perhaps. Did you generate all of them yourself? If not, you already know that others CAN be helpful in your quest to be the best you whom you can be.

and i have people i trust to talk to

...hmmm...no doubt, but are you talking with those to whom you need/ought to listen?

This post makes me think of you as someone who is truly striving for honest clarity as you work our your own mental health salvation with fear and trembling; and this last statement proves that:

i don’t know if this is me being self aware or if my avoidance is rooted in wanting to enable my own mental suffering further

All of my gentle teasing about cupcakes full of poison aside--and those remarks were only ever made with an eye to wanting to get you to laugh; not from meanness, but from merriment--I think you have an amazing strength to be able to question yourself with such an unwavering gaze, bringing scientific skepticism right into your own musings about your own mind.

I am in awe of your candid ability to do this. I think you will take advice under advisement with weighting as you see fit; I hope my own scribblings here might merit a number other than zero as you put them on your keen balance.

If I can be of help, please know I will try to assist / encourage you in these endeavors.