This is a guide I wrote for Menhera as a way to inform and point to sources for anyone who is interested!
Mental health will be discussed, though in little detail, and there are brief references to self harm.

What is Menhera?

Menhera is primarily an internet slang term to connect people who seek mental wellbeing. It originated on 2chan's mental health board as what basically amounts to slang for "mental healther," and has since evolved into "a subculture centered around a certain style of vent art as well as fashion featuring it".

Art & Fashion

Where do art and fashion fall into this? Art and fashion are simply two forms of self expression. Of course, there are many ways of self expression, ones that aren't art or fashion, but vent art is often tied closely with Menhera since art therapy has always been encouraged as a healthy way to cope within Menhera communities. Cute vent art is common, as "cute people aren't immune to suffering," and a lot of people find comfort in that. It is not meant as a way to glorify the issues portrayed in the art, rather, it is often a way to cope with these issues. As for fashion, it is a way to literally wear your heart on your sleeve.

↓ Everything below is a slightly more detailed explanation of things for those interested a little further than surface level. ↓

More on Fashion

Menhera fashion mainly requires some kind of mental health theme to it, especially vent art prints, and is generally supposed to be comfortable for the wearer. It usually consists of a top with some kind of big vent art print (often oversized), printed legwear or some kind of tights, medical accessories, subtle bondage gear, and comfortable flat shoes (often platforms). Light makeup is also common. Nothing over the top, usually simple everyday makeup with lots of blush under the eyes (byojaku) to accentuate the feeling of being fragile. DIY is encouraged. Wearing anything gory, triggering, or overly costumey is frowned upon when it comes to Menhera in fashion.It should also be noted that Menhera fashion does not have a specific color palette or gender. Though the fashion on the surface may appear to cater towards feminine styles, masc outfits are absolutely a thing. For masc outfits, usually the printed thigh highs are replaced with skinny jeans/joggers/baggy pants, the byojaku makeup is darker under the eyes, and dark colors are overall more common.

From "Kei Club 3 Kowai to Kawaii Autumn 2019"

Menhera fashion is often associated with:Yamikawaii - "sick cute", edgy, corrupted, dark, and depressing cuteness, with dark colors. Generally an aesthetic/adjective first, used commonly with casual edgy oversized outfit styles. Does not nescessarily require anything mental health related, but such motifs are common.Yumekawaii - "dreamy cute", fluffy, dreamy, pastel, and fantasy cuteness with an underlying darkness, seen as lighter counterpart to yamikawaii. Also an aesthetic/adjective first, used commonly with casual oversized or magical girl inspired outfit styles. Evolved from Fairy Kei. (more on fairy-kei tips)Marekawaii - "nightmare cute", created due to copyright issues with yamikawaii, open to interpretation.Medikawaii - "medical cute", pastel medical motifs.Gurokawaii - "grotesque cute", mix of frightening and scary imagery with kawaii (Gloomy Bear is the most popular example).Mizuiro - (often labelled as tenshi kaiwai) sky blue colorway trend, often associated with Jersey Maid and a y3k cyber aesthetic. (more on paleblueramune)Girly Kei - (often mislabelled as Jirai¹) trendy and cute frilly girly fashion (more on girlytips and girlyholic).Sabukaru - (sometimes translated as subculture or subcul), the japanese equivalent of "alt" or "hipster". Not a fashion or aesthetic, just slang for someone who doesn't follow what's mainstream.

* Note that some of these are not considered standalone fashions, and are primarily aesthetics. For more complex outfits that don't fit the Menhera fashion guidelines, those can generally be referred to as "Menhera-inspired" instead, and may fall into a related aesthetic such as Yumekawaii/Yamikawaii/Medikawaii.

I would also like to mention Kuua Oyasumi as a famous influencer, model, and artist often credited with popularizing Menhera. From what I understand, she usually does not align herself to any specific fashion and wears what she likes freely. Here are some pictures of her:

Since Menhera as a fashion does not have a specific palette, it can be categorized within several aesthetics, depending on the outfit. Primarily pastel colored Menhera outfits are usually labelled as having a Yumekawaii aesthetic, while primarily dark colored Menhera outfits are usually labelled as having a Yamikawaii aesthetic!

Stigma

"Menhera" is sometimes used as slang for someone, especially a woman, who is "troublesome," an "attention whore," "cute but psycho," or a "yandere." It is important to remember that people like this are people, people who might also seek mental wellbeing, and it is dangerous to gatekeep in what way or how much someone is suffering to consider their problems as real problems. As such, "Menhera" should not be used as a way to turn people's issues into a word for an archetype of people you don't like or find toxic. However, the term "Menhera kei" (Menhera-type) is more strongly associated with the negative steriotype, so it is best to avoid adding "kei/系" after menhera. Mental health is a broad category, so it's not fair to apply a negative steriotype to anyone who seeks mental wellbeing.

Of course, it's also important to note that Menhera is inherently pro-recovery. There is not one single path to recovery and recovery doesn't look the same for everyone, but doing things that might trigger others (like posting real images of self harm) opposes the entire point. Usually people who do this and associate it with Menhera are just misinformed.

Menhera-chan

When referring to a "Menhera-chan", there are 3 main mangas known as the "Menhera-chan" manga.The first is "Menhera Shoujo Kurumi-chan" from 2018, known for the LINE stickers. It is about a cute girl with yandere tendencies. I have not read it so I cannot write much about it besides the fact that it is generally not seen in a positive light in the Menhera community for being a potentially offensive steriotypical portrayal of mental health in women.The second is Menhera-chan by Ezaki Bisuko. It is a satire manga, and a whole can of worms. This is the character most commonly associated with "Menhera" online. It cannot be talked about without mentioning the artist. Ezaki Bisuko/Morishige Uchida is... a terrible person¹. He is most known for attempting to hijack and copyright "yamikawaii", but he is also an anti-feminist, mysoginist, ableist, scammer, self proclaimed shotacon, art thief, NFT enthusiast, Menhera hater, harasser of his own fans, and more. There is so much that it is almost comical, he is truly a shitty person with many haters.Though art can be separated from the artist, in this case a lot of the artist himself bleeds through in some Menhera-chan comics. Of course, it is okay to like this Menhera-chan, as she is a comfort character to many, but it is important to understand she is a satire character created by a terrible guy, so it is best to not give him money or support. As for the manga, it began in 2014, and it is about a group of cute girls who self harm in order to transform into magical girls to fight the evils of the world.The final and most "obscure" Menhera-chan is from Menhera-chan by Toko Kotoha, who passed away in 2018. It ran from 2008-2010, and was written in hopes that people would see the character Menhera-chan and feel seen and understood. It is a slice of life manga about a small group of friends who come together and support their friend who is struggling with her mental health.

TLDR;

Modern Community

On the surface, it may be difficult to find online Menhera communities. Unfortunately, a lot of Menhera tags on large social media such as Twitter and Tumblr are frequently spammed with unrelated vents, self harm pictures, porn bots, and worse. However, there are some small moderated communities here and there. There is a Tumblr community, a Discord server, a Facebook group, and a Deviantart group. There is also a post on guidelines for what is okay to post in Menhera tags on social media.There is also a Menhera Discord server associated with Japanese Vtuber Yoasa Yami, and it's a good example what the modern menhera community online is like in Japan. They occasionally have online meets to discuss mental health and make friends. However, they have a Japanese speaker only rule, so please do not bother them if you do not speak Japanese!

Where to buy?

Menheratic has a great list of brands that sell Menhera clothing here. You can search on Taobao manually too, the search terms 病娇, 病少女, and 药少女 might help. Etsy also has a lot of great Menhera stuff by small artists. I might compile my own list of Taobao shops here someday when I find the time.I want to note that ACDC Rag is one of the most well known brands that sell Menhera stuff, but it is not on the list because they have been caught stealing/copying art several times, cannot stop collabing with the problematic Ezaki Bisuko, and are pretty expensive compared to other stores. It is okay to own stuff from them, especially since a lot of people don't know better, but it is best to not buy directly from them if possible.Another well known brand not on the list (possibly because of past Ezaki Bisuko collabs), Listen Flavor, is crazy expensive, so it might be more affordable to buy secondhand on sites like jp Mercari.A word of caution for Taobao, please avoid buying from these shops (scroll to the bottom), such as Sheep Puff and To Alice, as they may use forced labor. Be aware of resellers such as Devil Inspired as well.

Learn more

I highly encourage anyone who is interested in learning more about Menhera to check out the now defunct blog Menheratic's list of resources. They also have a youtube channel. A lot of their information is sourced from menhera.jp, an also now defunct Japanese site all about connecting Menhera.
There are also a few tumblr posts and blogs dedicated to information and news about Menhera in English. This post by the menhera info archieve has some additional information, and I highly reccomend checking out their blog as well.
Puvithel is a good speaker on Menhera. menhera-tips is another good blog, though now unused.Many of the hyperlinks on this site contain more information as well, so check them out if you are interested.

Some things may lack a source because it is likely from a deleted post or article.I'd also like to note that I've only been into Menhera since 2021, something that has been around since roughly 2001, so there is a whole 20 years of Menhera lore I was not present for. I've done my best to learn as much as possible, but if I have missed anything or gotten anything incorrect, please feel free to reach out.If you have any questions or want to correct anything, please DM me on Discord @menheramar.