Just because you accept something does not mean you like it. You are under no obligation to like it. That is why it is called 'acceptance' and not, say, 'appreciation,' or 'birthday cake.' Something is proffered and you allow yourself to take it. That is all.

A diagnosis concerning your mental health can be troubling. Perhaps you had no expectation of such news coming your way. Maybe you were hoping whatever ills you were experiencing had something to do with an inner-ear infection or one of those neurological side effects of covid we've been hearing about.

For others, a diagnosis that involves their mental well-being is a relief. Now you have an explanation. Now you can begin treatment. Now you know.

I know there are people who don't want to know if their brain chemistry is off. There are also people who don't want to know if they have cancer or a heart condition. To these people, I mostly want to ask: 'Why?'

Why not know? Why wander in ignorance and denial? Why deny yourself and those around you the chance to come to terms with why-you're-being-the-way-you're-being? Why don't you want help?

Acceptance does not have to be gracious or grateful. Begrudging acceptance is popular across a range of life situations - from a loan you wish you didn't need to a clinical diagnosis.

Nor does acceptance mean 'lie down and die.' There is, especially for issues of both physical and mental health, acceptance and all-out war. Rage against the disease. Rage against death or delusion. Rage against side effects of terrible treatments and drug regimens.

But first, you say: 'Yes, this is a thing that is happening to me.' Then, to arms!

For many people suffering from everything from dysthymia to dementia, every day is a struggle. Every day brings a battle for balance and normality, often while trying to fulfil obligations of work or to family; engage with people familiar and unknown; often trying to do all things with a smile and without anyone suspecting the inner battle.

This last one is a big deal for most of us. One of the most common references in literature on accepting a new or revised mental-health diagnosis is the part stigmatisation still plays in how we receive and process the news.

The information is one thing: good, bad or indifferent, it's your news and you have to sit with it and figure out what to do with it. I mean 'have to' in the loosest possible interpretation. The truth is, many people do not spend any time with it at all. The information they've received may be dismissed out of hand, disbelieved, trivialised.

We're still so quick to believe that mental problems are not part of our lives. In this equation we are - in no particular order - people of colour, people not from the US or other developed countries, working-class or unemployed people, people with no family or personal history of mental disease. The list is long; much longer than I'm leaning into here. If I've heard so many of these not-us-reasons that it's become painful