Why is it so hard to ask for help, and how do people get past it?

Several things compound: the belief that you should manage alone, worry about being a burden, stigma that is still substantial in Indian families and workplaces, and the practical difficulty of describing something that does not have clear words. What tends to lower the barrier is starting smaller than the full disclosure — telling one person one true sentence, or speaking to a GP about sleep or physical symptoms rather than opening with mental health. People also consistently overestimate how negatively others will react; research on this gap is fairly consistent, and most people respond better than expected.