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The silent struggle: Why many men still avoid talking about mental health
Mental health and therapy are discussed more openly now than they were only a few years ago, but men are still less likely to advocate for themselves once the subject becomes personal.
Therapists and researchers have tracked the reluctance for years, and what worries them most is how long men hold out even as emotional distress starts interfering with daily life. And none of the national data suggests men are struggling any less.
Key takeaways
- Men experience anxiety and depression at similar rates as women, but are less likely to receive counseling or therapy.
- Cultural expectations around toughness, independence, and emotional control can make it harder for men to recognize distress and ask for support.
- Untreated mental health concerns can affect relationships, work performance, physical health, substance use, and personal safety.
- Younger generations, athletes, and public figures are helping normalize conversations about men’s mental health, though stigma and misinformation remain barriers.
- Online therapy and flexible scheduling can make care more discreet and convenient, but affordability, provider availability, and long wait times may still limit access.
BetterHelp’s 2026 State of Stigma Report surveyed 2,000 U.S. adults in March 2026 and found men and women reporting anxiety and depression symptoms at nearly equal rates.
Yet CDC data gathered from 2021 through 2023 found 33.2% of males with depression received counseling or therapy over a 12-month span, compared with 43% of females. And much of the hesitation begins with what boys and men are taught about handling emotional pain on their own.
Why men have historically avoided mental health care
Often, men try to push through mental health struggles alone, and the habit usually starts long before adulthood. Michael Addis, a psychology professor at Clark University, studies how boys and men learn which emotions they are allowed to show and which problems they are expected to solve alone.
Boys learn early to tie emotional control to growing up, so a scraped knee or a real scare tends to draw an order to toughen up instead of an invitation to talk. But over time, those lessons harden into adult rules, and independence becomes the yardstick a man measures his own worth against.
Culture keeps that lesson going into adulthood, and as Addis told the Christian Science Monitor, “we tend to hide the emotional and physical vulnerabilities of men.”
He points to the public praise handed to men who come across as stoic and invincible. Addis also traces part of the reluctance to a culture that has treated asking for care, whether for depression or physical pain, as feminine.
So speaking up under those rules can feel like risking the respect of family members and close friends. And years spent hiding emotion may leave some men with little practice naming sadness or fear.
As Addis explained, men may feel anxious about activities treated as feminine, and “seeking help falls under that.” The effort to appear invincible can then keep emotional suffering hidden, leaving even close relatives unsure what a man is carrying.
And with those feelings left unnamed, the National Institute of Mental Health notes that depression among men often surfaces as irritability or physical symptoms, leading many to discuss bodily problems with a doctor before mentioning emotional pain. By adulthood, staying silent may feel safer than admitting they need support from someone else.
The cost of staying silent
Leaving mental health problems untreated can change far more than how a man feels, since the strain often follows him home and into his working life. Danesh A. Alam, medical director of Behavioral Health Services at Central DuPage Hospital, says men often minimize symptoms and “push through negative feelings.”
Alam also warns that “the longer depression goes untreated, the more severe the episodes can get,” leaving some men with weaker concentration and less ability to manage ordinary responsibilities.
At home, irritability may replace conversation, while withdrawal can leave a partner or child unsure how to respond. The same strain may follow a man to work, where missed deadlines or absences begin affecting how others depend on him. The World Health Organization estimates that depression and anxiety cost 12 billion working days worldwide each year.
But physical health can also suffer, with the American Heart Association linking depression, chronic stress, and anger to poorer cardiovascular health. Some men then use alcohol or drugs to dull emotional distress, adding another health risk while the mental health problem goes untreated.
If the distress continues to worsen, a man may reach a point where his safety is at risk. And national suicide data shows just how severe that danger can become, with the CDC reporting that the male suicide rate was nearly four times the female rate in 2024. However, there are many other factors that may drive someone to suicide, and silence is only one piece of it.
Younger generations are changing the conversation
Compared with many men from earlier generations, Gen Z has grown up hearing mental health discussed as part of everyday life. The advocacy group Active Minds reports that Gen Z talks about mental health more openly than any generation before it, and the group credits that openness with helping families who once stayed silent become more willing to ask for help.
Still, greater comfort with the subject has not removed the fear of being judged once a young man speaks about his own distress. Athletes have done a lot to ease that fear.
Michael Addis, the Clark University psychologist, points out that athletes may be the last men to have their manhood questioned, which puts them in a rare spot to admit they struggle without losing respect. Once one of them says out loud that he lives with anxiety or depression, Addis notes, it gives men of every background room to say the same.
Miami Heat veteran Kevin Love has become one of those voices after writing in The Players’ Tribune that mental health is hard to talk about in sports since showing weakness in a sport built on toughness is treated as something to be ashamed of. But Love now runs a foundation aimed at helping athletes manage the pressure he once carried alone.
Interestingly, much of this conversation now happens on social media, where young men may learn words for what they are feeling and hear from others who have faced similar struggles.
But the same platforms also carry advice from people with no clinical training. An analysis of popular TikTok videos found that 33% of the mental health advice was misleading, leaving young men to separate reliable guidance from personal opinion while trying to understand their own mental struggles.
What makes support more accessible today
Given how much pressure men still feel to hold up a tough exterior, getting help is far easier now than it was even a few years ago.
Walsh University notes that even the thought of being seen inside a clinical waiting room may keep someone from seeking care. But teletherapy removes that concern by allowing someone to meet with a licensed counselor by video or phone from a safe place.
The same technology also makes appointments easier to fit around daily responsibilities. Walsh reports that telehealth sessions may be scheduled outside regular business hours, giving shift workers and men caring for family another way to attend.
NAMI, the country’s largest grassroots mental health organization, directs men toward therapist locators and crisis resources, allowing awareness campaigns to lead toward qualified care.
But safe places and flexible hours do not remove every barrier. Research with men who had left mental health services found that long waits made returning harder, while participants also called for lower costs. While there are many factors that may deter men from treatment, cost is often an attributable factor that deters many men from seeking care.
Takeaway
Seeking help is not a sign of weakness, and now more than ever, men are seeing that stepping forward early changes what happens before distress turns into a crisis.
Naming a problem while work and home life still feel manageable takes more nerve than pretending nothing is wrong, and it gives a man time to understand what he is feeling before his choices begin to narrow.
This story was produced by BetterHelp and reviewed and distributed by Stacker.
