Mental Health Awareness Fighting the stigma surrounding mental illness.

Depression Anxiety Self Harm Schizophrenia Bi-Polar disorder

Depression  Overwhelming negative feelings about yourself and the world around you.  Those feelings will stop you from doing things you would normally enjoy.  Loss of interest in friends family and hobbies.  Overwhelming feelings of worthlessness.  Suicidal thoughts and actions.  Feeling isolated from everyone and everything.

Anxiety  An attack can occur without any reason, usually caused by over thinking about a situation or problem that may not even have happened yet.  More than feeling a bit nervous or anxious about a new or unknown situation.  Feeling sick, dizzy, fast breathing, panic attacks, overthinking, obsessively worrying about something and being consumed with constant negative thoughts.  Anxiety can lead to a lack of confidence, angry outbursts, avoiding situations and withdrawal from friends and family.

Self Harm  Not about committing suicide.  A way of releasing negative feelings like guilt, anger or isolation that a person finds hard to express another way.  It’s not just about cutting or scratching; behaviour like drinking to excess, drug taking and other risky behaviour can be considered a type of self harm too.

Schizophrenia  It’s not simply ‘hearing voices’, during an episode sufferers will hear, see, smell and even taste things that aren’t there.  Feelings of paranoia, fear you are being controlled by someone or something else or even that you can control others.  Strong beliefs in unusual ideas, e.g. conspiracy theories.  Become withdrawn from society.  Poor memory.  Lack of emotion and motivation.

Bi Polar Disorder  Extremes of depression and manic behaviour.  In depressive state the low feelings are physically and mentally crippling.  Symptoms of depressive state include: social withdrawal, depression, suicidal thoughts and actions.  In a manic state sufferers will act out of character, they may be over confident, lose inhibitions, make poor decisions both personally and financially putting themselves and possibly others at risk.

Who has mental health problems?

The reality is mental health issues can effect anyone at any time.  1 in 4 British people will experience a mental health problem in any one year.  450 million people worldwide have a mental health problem.  1 in 10 children and young people aged suffer from a diagnosable mental health disorder - that is around three children in every class.  Around 1 in every 12 children and young people deliberately self-harm.  There has been a big increase in the number of young people being admitted to hospital because of self harm. Over the last ten years this figure has increased by 68%.  More than half of all adults with mental health problems were diagnosed in childhood. Less than half were treated appropriately at the time.  Nearly 80,000 children and young people suffer from severe depression  95% of imprisoned young offenders have a mental health disorder. Many of them are struggling with more than one disorder.

Famous successful and living with mental illness…

What do you do if you feel you are struggling with your mental or emotional health?  Speak to your friends, family, mentor, anyone in the support department or your teachers, asking for help is the first step to feeling better.  Make time for yourself, get outside have walk, watch your favourite film do things that make you happy.  Know that it’s ok to not be ok sometimes.  Come along to drop in sessions in GR4 at break on Tuesdays for a chat and to get some practical tips on managing your mental and emotional health.  Access websites such as ‘Young Minds’

What can you do to help?  Understand that having mental health issues can be a lonely and isolating place, many people don’t admit to having mental illness because they are scared of how other people may judge them; so be kind, think before you speak, are you really ‘depressed’ or just having a bad day they are very different things!  Educate yourself about mental illness, know the signs and symptoms, it could help you or someone you care about one day.  Try not to use derogatory terms to describe peoples behaviour or illness.  Fill in the pledge forms that will be sent to Mentor Groups pledging to not use offensive and derogatory terms and to do one thing that will help improve your mental and emotional health and help end the stigma surrounding mental health issues.  Change how you speak to, about and react to people that may have mental illness and encourage other people to do the same.