The #MentalHealth discussion forum (subreddit) on Reddit, moderated by SAMHAA, has passed 100,000 members!
“This past May 9th was my 8th anniversary on Reddit.com.Â
For a few months, I lurked, having moved over from Digg.Â
Around this time our non-profit society, South Asian Mental Health Alliance, was in its second year.Â
The following year, in 2012, I came across a subreddit called, very plainly, “mental health.” Interestingly, it had only a few hundred members and the moderator was MIA.
As I started to poke around, I realized this community had a lot of potential and I wanted to help.
I would sometimes reply to posts with my feedback, or make posts of my own. However, for a while, I noticed nobody had stepped up to take over moderation. I didn’t even know it was possible to do so. Finally, I found the place where you could make a request to takeover as mod.
I never imagined, after taking over as mod seven years ago, that our small subreddit, which had a few hundred members at the time, would one day reach 100,000 MEMBERS!
This community has demonstrated the power of resiliency, peer support, communication, and courage to fight stigma.
r/mentalhealth now boasts 50 to 60 thousand unique visitors a month, with about 4,000 of those daily. It has weathered reddit cleanups of fake accounts, lots of spam, and its fair share of trolls, but it continues to grow.
We are so honoured, humbled, and grateful for the opportunity to host this small corner of the internet where people can rant, vent, share, etc. and most importantly support each other and fight stigma around mental health.” Please join us: reddit.com/r/mentalhealth