Two years ago, Max Stolfe was in a dark place. He had just transferred to a new college in New York, and he was struggling to keep up with the workload. He had, by his own account, one friend. After years in and out of therapy, he didn\u2019t have much to show for it, and no one to turn to with his hopelessness. So he did the only thing he could think to do: He posted on Reddit.<\/p>\n
\u201cI’m not sure if this is a rant or a cry for help,\u201d he wrote, explaining that he felt like \u201cno one really cares about me,\u201d and \u201cI don’t know what to do.\u201d<\/p>\n
Over 2,000 miles away, in Canada, Ryan Stroeder logged onto Reddit. Stroeder barely knew how to use the site\u2014he had, until that point, only used Reddit a few times to comment on threads about motorcycle repairs\u2014but when he saw Stolfe\u2019s post on his home page, he knew he couldn\u2019t ignore it.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt had been sitting there for like 12 hours, which is an eternity in internet time,\u201d Stroeder says. \u201cNo one had given this guy any advice.\u201d And so, he wrote back, as if simply to say, \u2018I\u2019m here for you\u2019:<\/p>\n
\nThe internet has long been a place to unload our problems and confess our darkest secrets\u2014and those admissions haven\u2019t always been positive. Reddit, in particular, has earned a controversial reputation as the birthplace of threads like r\/thefappening, devoted to 2014\u2019s infamous leaked celebrity nudes, and r\/thedonald, which spawned the now-closed subreddit that recently drove an armed conspiracy theorist to investigate the so-called Pizzagate rumors. But increasingly, online communities are taking the place of IRL therapists for people to divulge\u00a0and deal with\u00a0their mental health. Even the darkest places, like Reddit, can surprise you with its displays of humanity.<\/p>\n
On Reddit, groups like r\/mentalhealth provide spaces to share garden-variety psychological problems; r\/anxiety responds in real time to anxiety attacks; r\/gettingoverit offers support for trauma, depression, and doubt. There are groups for eating disorders, for suicidal thoughts, and for people who are simply feeling stuck\u2014made up of thousands of regular users who respond to queries in real time, with real support.<\/p>\n
\u201cPeer support can be very effective,\u201d said Dr. John Torous, the co-director of the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center Digital Psychiatry Program, which researches the intersection of technology and mental health solutions. Torous says the most effective mental health apps all have some kind of human element. In other words, technology can make mental health care more accessible, but it isn\u2019t perfect. \u201cI think the trick is that, sometimes, it doesn\u2019t have the structure or the certainty of professional help.\u201d<\/p>\n
His cry for help had been sitting there for like 12 hours, which is an eternity in internet time.<\/p>\n
Still, the DIY approach has its benefits: Research has shown that young people, in particular, are reluctant to seek professional help. Reddit therapy, on the other hand, is free, mostly anonymous, and always at one\u2019s fingertips.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe know that\u00a0right now, less than 50 percent of individuals with mental illness are receiving treatment for their mental illness,\u201d said Adam Haim, the technology lead at the National Institute of Mental Health. \u201cIf you look at online communities, there\u2019s definitely an opportunity to identify signals of concern\u201d\u2014changes in language that may indicate a manic episode or a suicide threat, for example\u2014\u201cand then triage very quickly.\u201d<\/p>\n
Reddit, in particular, seems promising. Last year, when the site turned 10 years old, there were close to 73 million posts\u00a0and 82 billion page views, along with\u00a0millions of users who are there to act as a safety net when someone posts a cry for help. One study, presented at the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence\u2019s annual conference on blogs and social media, found that comments in subreddits, like r\/depression and r\/mentalhealth, were \u201csurprisingly high quality\u201d and provided more emotional support and prescriptive advice than both Twitter and Facebook. The researchers, from Georgia Institute of Technology’s School of Interactive Computing and Arizona State University’s Department of Computer Science, concluded that Reddit can \u201c(fulfill) unique information and social needs of a cohort challenged with a stigmatic health concern.\u201d<\/p>\n
There\u2019s something incredible about the internet being able to help people, but I guess to me, it still seems uncharted.<\/p>\n
Like others I spoke with, Stolfe says\u00a0he turned to Reddit because he didn\u2019t want to burden his friends or family. Plus, he wasn\u2019t sure if he was just going through a rough patch or if he was struggling with something more serious, like depression. \u201cLooking back at it,\u201d he says, \u201cwriting that post was the first indication that I couldn\u2019t handle (my problems) by myself anymore.\u201d<\/p>\n
Subreddits like r\/suicidewatch are full of posts like this: \u201cI really think I should tell someone I want to kill myself, but I have no one to talk to \u2026 This post would actually be the first time I’ve told anyone I want to kill myself.\u201d Because people are more likely to divulge sensitive information in online support groups than in IRL ones, spaces like Reddit can actually be the first step in getting someone help.<\/p>\n
Erin, who asked that we not use her last name,\u00a0started posting on r\/suicidewatch after struggling with depression and suicidal feelings. \u201cWhen I came here, I wasn\u2019t looking for help\u00a0or someone to tell me how to fix things,\u201d she told me. \u201cInstead I needed to be heard. I needed to be able to say that I wasn\u2019t ok and that I didn\u2019t know any way to be okay. Someone read my post and they didn\u2019t try to fix me.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cReddit is a terrible place to be doing any kind of crisis intervention,\u201d said Erin, who is now a moderator for r\/SuicideWatch, r\/depression, and several other mental health-related subreddits. Since most redditors aren\u2019t psychologists, replies on desperate posts can be a grab bag of consolation, trolling, and prescriptive advice. Sometimes, she told me, people will post well-intentioned replies\u2014writing things like, \u201cIt gets better,\u201d or \u201cYou should try X\u201d\u2014that can end up doing more harm than good.<\/p>\n
Moderators have tried to mitigate these replies with guidelines. On r\/suicidewatch, for example, there\u2019s a sidebar that states the rules: no judgment, no abuse, no trolling, and most importantly, no diagnoses:<\/p>\n
\nStroeder, whose reply to Stolfe\u2019s post has spawned an entirely new subreddit, Non-Zero Days, for people who are feeling stuck in a rut, says he still receives messages every day from people who read his original exchange with Stolfe. But he doesn\u2019t see himself as some kind of messiah or as someone who is particularly qualified to give advice.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s not about me telling you how to live,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s just, \u2018Hey, here\u2019s something that works for me and if you want, (you can) interpret it in your own personal way and use it as a tool to improve your own life.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
Since posting on Reddit two years ago, Stolfe started going to therapy. He\u2019s also been opening up more to his friends and family IRL. Now, when something is bothering him and he tells someone close to him, he doesn\u2019t feel as if he\u2019s burdening that person. He says he owes some of that to that singular Reddit post, which reassured him that he wasn\u2019t alone or overreacting to his feelings.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s something incredible about the internet being able to help people, but I guess to me, it still seems uncharted,\u201d he says. \u201cI really appreciate what that post did for me and what the site’s community said to me. People reach out to me even now about it, but (now) I want to turn to someone with professional expertise.\u201d
\n <\/span>
\n<\/span>\n<\/p>\nIllustration by Emily Lin<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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