As of 2024, the My Therapist Says Instagram page has over eight million followers. What started off as a group chat between four girlfriends has evolved into a supportive community with many laughs and even advice. The founders of the page, Nicole Argiris and sisters Lola, Gina, and Nora Tash, even wrote a book: "My Therapist Says: Advice You Should Probably (Not) Follow."
The girls describe their page as a place to share "original memes about struggles with anxiety, growing up in the social media generation, and figuring your life out in general." The core message they want to share with the world is that "No matter who you are, dealing with all the tribulations of life, you're never alone and never as 'crazy' as you think."
The four friends, who all grew up in Toronto, Canada, have been in therapy for many years. In their group chat, they often would share advice with each other, starting with the phrase, "Well, my therapist said..." That's what inspired the name of the Instagram page.
"Our therapist, of course, said no such thing, but we thought that it legitimized the advice to the point where we would have to take it," Lola Tash said in an interview with The Daily Mail in 2020. "It was always with the best intentions that we were giving each other advice."
The girls say their goal is to destigmatize mental health, "finding the humor in the mistakes their mental health journeys have led them on." And many experts agree that the more we talk about how we're not okay, the less stigma there is around it. Therapist and author Nicole Arzt echoes that sentiment, saying that even sharing memes can be a great way to open up about your struggles.
"Mental health issues are often wrapped in shame," Arzt told Bored Panda. "That shame often says, 'I'm alone in this. Nobody else understands. Something is deeply wrong with me.' While memes don't exactly 'fix' that real pain, they can provide a sense of shared camaraderie. There's such a powerful validation in just knowing you're not alone and that your struggles are not solely yours."
Arzt provides therapy sessions for mental health professionals. She even runs the Psychotherapy Memes Instagram account, so she's not a stranger to the ways the internet jokes around about their mental health. She says that humor can sometimes even be helpful during therapy sessions.
"Humor is a great way to build and maintain rapport. Therapy is a vulnerable process," Arzt explains. You're sharing some of your rawest stories and deepest pains with another person, and that can feel scary! Humor sometimes creates a necessary lightness amid all that heavy work."
