I’ve been going back and forth whether to write this blog post for the better part of the month. May marks Mental Health Awareness Month and, as it comes to a close, I’m finally making myself sit down and get something on “paper” — however short.

When I first realized it was May and began to toss around the idea of a post, I wasn’t in a healthy place and eventually decided against it. Then, a few days later, I found myself in the emergency room and, later, what I affectionately call “the nuthouse” — the behavioral health floor at Norman Regional Hospital — for a short stint.

I think we’re all pretty aware of mental illness. May isn’t so much about drawing attention to the epidemic across America so much as it is ending the stigma surrounding it.

About 44 million American adults suffer from some kind of mental illness in a given year. For about 10 million of those people, it’s serious, debilitating and affects day-to-day activity.

And it gets worse.

Most people aren’t getting the help and treatment they need — about 60 percent of all American adults with mental illness.

If I told you there were six million people in this country with broken feet not using crutches to get around, you’d wonder what the hell was going on and why they didn’t just use the help available to them.

I’ve championed mental health awareness and promised to help end the stigma for as long as I remember, but I haven’t really done much for that cause. In fact, I’ve mostly remained quiet about my stay in the Norman psych ward, which feels kind of hypocritical.

So it’s time to put up or shut up and come clean.

Mental illness isn’t always as easy to spot as a broken foot and arguably harder to get help for. I believe I was 16 years old when I first was affected by depression, but I didn’t help until more than a year later.

I didn’t really understand depression or mental illness in general until I was a senior in high school. I assumed if I told anyone something might be wrong in my head, I’d be instructed to pray it away — not an uncommon fear in the Bible Belt.

Eventually, I worked up the courage to tell my parents I might be depressed. They could not have been more supportive.

OK, the first part was done. After I moved to Norman for school, I found a counselor, who recommended I start medication. I was hesitant, to say the least.

My story isn’t unique. The way I see it, there’s three steps to finding recovery in mental illness and none of them are easy — A) Admitting something isn’t right, 2) Deciding to do something about it and D) Accepting the help you’re given.

That first step took me a long time. It was mostly ignorance and a lack of education in my case, but for many others, it’s about the “power of positive thinking.”

Something’s bugging me but, if I pretend like nothing’s wrong, then nothing will be wrong.

I could point you back to the broken foot analogy here but I really don’t feel it’s necessary to do that. You get the point.

The second step is even harder. In many cases, people view seeking help for mental issues as a sign of weakness, especially in men. We have this image of manliness and toughness and a do-it-yourself mentality already ingrained in us. I don’t need to see a therapist, I just need to suck it up and get on with my life.

And I’m sure women face similar hurdles to seeking help, but I’m not familiar with any of them first-hand.

So then there’s the third step — accepting the help we are given. That’s where I messed up.

I continued to go to counseling for the better part of a year. I even agreed to try medication — twice, might I add. But I eventually abandoned my anti-depressants because I didn’t like the side effects and, quite frankly, I couldn’t come to terms with my mood depending on a pill. It felt synthetic to me. Like a crutch.

I know hindsight is 20/20, but when your foot is broken, use a fucking crutch.

Eventually I stopped counseling altogether, never returning regularly until just recently. Even then, it wasn’t on my own accord.

Police and paramedics showed up to my Norman apartment around 2 a.m. I was alone. I had been talking to my sister on the phone as she sped down down the turnpike from Tulsa after I told her I was in a particularly dark place that night.

I had also conveyed to her that I was in a position to potentially hurt myself.

So I reluctantly boarded (read: was manhandled into) an ambulance and taken to the hospital, where I would remain for the next six days. Let me tell you — there’s no experience that’ll make you reevaluate your entire life quite like being walked through a psych ward for the first time in a hospital gown and bright yellow grippy socks.

During the two years prior to that come-to-Jesus moment, I was determined to handle my depression on my own. Rationalize my way out of it. Numb it with alcohol. Consume myself with work. Lean on my girlfriend and those closest to me.

Spoiler alert: None of that shit works.

Eventually, I started spiraling. Looking back, it’s a bit scary thinking about all those nights I spent sitting on my couch or on my bed, wrapped up inside my own mind and shoveling pile after pile of dirt out of this endlessly deep hole in my head.

Anyone who’s dealt with serious depression or thoughts of suicide will tell you it eventually and inevitably gets so bad that there’s no getting out of it on your own.

No one in that place just wakes up one day and decides to see a therapist or get back on medication. People don’t get help because they see the light. They get help because they feel the heat.

And, sadly, if that rock bottom, hospital-gown-and-yellow-grippy-socks moment never comes, people often choose to end their own lives. That’s reality and it needs to be talked about.

Almost without fail, serious, chronic mental depression has two outcomes — and one’s far more preferable than the other.

So I spent six days in the nuthouse before I was released. I started medication in the hospital and, when I got out, continued taking my pills and started seeing both a counselor and psychiatrist again.

I’ll be honest, it hasn’t been roses and daisies since I’ve started this new round of self-care. The medication and its side effects still suck. My counselor and psychiatrist like to twist the knife a bit as I take a look at all things under the hood that might contribute to my depression.

And, although I’m learning new coping mechanisms, swells of emotion and darkness still come over me just about every day. If there’s one thing I’ve learned in the short time I’ve been out of the hospital, it’s that there’s no magic fix.

Just like any other injury or illness, it’s going to take time to manage the symptoms and get my depression under control. Broken feet don’t heal the moment the doctor puts the cast on — it needs to stay on for a while.

I called my sister that night because I felt alone. I had grown tired of fighting and I didn’t see anyone else in my corner. I was just tired — and I still am.

But that’s the lie mental illness tells us. There’s no one in your corner. There’s no stool to sit on. It’s your responsibility alone to keep your battered and broken body upright. And, even then, it’s useless because you’re just going down for the count soon, anyway.

Mental illness isn’t just limited to depression. Millions of people suffer from anxiety or bipolar disorder or PTSD or OCD or the numerous other conditions out there.

It’s one of the most prevalent and dangerous conditions facing people everywhere. Yet, for some reason, there’s still a certain taboo around talking about it and shame in getting help.

It’s time for that to change.

It’s important for those of us dealing with mental illness on a day-to-day basis to speak out and share their experiences. We need to stop talking about it like a dirty little secret and add a little casualty to it.

And if anyone wants to share their story with me, either privately or publicly, I would be honored to hear it. You know how to reach me.

You aren’t alone. There are others like you. Mental illness doesn’t discriminate and there’s no shame in identifying the problem and seeking treatment.

There’s help out there. There are people in your corner. That light at the end of the tunnel will come back on, I promise. But you can’t fight alone.

Right before I entered the psych ward at the beginning of my hospital stay, my father hugged me and whispered in my ear…

“The only way out is through.”