The answer is yes. Your open dysfunction allows me some permission to indulge in a bit of dysfunction. The capacity for us to be our truer selves in the presence of each other allows us to relax more and be assured we belong in this universe, more or less.

It’s why smoking and drinking are social.

And yeah, when a dysfunction causes too much harm, that is where treatment hypothetically comes in.

< rant >

I say hypothetically because treatment rarely does the job. My experience has developed a symptom management regimen (I avoid triggers and use coping mechanisms or even crisis plans to manage symptoms) and harm reduction, exchanging more harmful copes and behaviors for less harmfulmones that accomplish the same.

There are a lot of problems with the current psychiatric sector, from authority / specimen models to a society that teems with toxic norms that is not regarded in most models, to the capitalist paradigm creating a conflict of interest in actually treating someone to a positive outcome. Therapists are motivated to keep current patients rather than seeking new ones, due to the typically lengthy orientation process.

< /rant >