Mental Health - Personal Experiece Essay

Mental Health

Imagine your society blamed people for being diagnosed with cancer, claiming it was their stupid life choices that laid the path for such a terrible disease. Sounds horrific, right? Imagine this as well as that shame, on a person who is fighting for their own will to live.  This happens not to those suffering from cancer, but the victims of mental illness. The point of this is not to make mental illness seem scary but to show that it is a serious problem that is commonly missconsepted  to be taken seriously by our society.

Mental Health… I recently lost a friend to crippling anxiety and depression. I never understood why he never liked to be around people all the time and why he would always force a smile from a dull face. We would talk often and before he passed he and I were talking about what it feels like and I was left with something that has never left me. He described his issues as the thing that made him physically sick to look in the mirror at himself to the point he found himself doing anything to make himself feel like someone else. I found out he had self-hate syndrome.  This is a mental illness that causes yourself to is simple terms to act as a bully to yourself and that you see yourself as someone that’s less than human.  This goes to show the magnitude of mental illness.

Now think of the 5 most important people in your life? Well chances is that at least one of them might be dealing with mental health issues. According to a 2015 study that found that one in five suffer from some form of mental illness. Yet people who suffer from these health issues are constantly and obliviously stigmatized and ostracized by our society. This further increases the difficulty of them being able to not only admit their ill but also increases the difficulty of being able to handle it.

 Sadly, these numbers are worse with teens Overall, about 20% of teens have a diagnosable mental health issue. This includes many different conditions, but the core message is clear…. That is that teen mental health issues are very common. About 11% of teens have a mood disorder, 10% have a conduct disorder and about 8% have an anxiety disorder. Twelve per cent while 4.2% of 13-17 year old reported having thought about suicide, had actually made a suicide attempt. Females had higher rates of suicidal ideation than males.