You’re not being kind, you are blaming people for a ton of things that are completely beyond their control, because your own identify is tied to a world-view that has no explanation for suffering beyond “welp, guess you failed at being positive”.
That’s not a world-view, that’s a privileged, self-centered, view.
We have gotten better at discussing some mental health issues, but there’s still so much more to do. It’s still not safe for too many people to even admit they need help with anxiety and depression, even though right now we all need support. There is still a severe shortage of help available, and we still treat other mental health issues with something other than fear.
If not now, when? Those of us who can share our stories, should be doing exactly that. For all the people who can’t. And, maybe even more, we need to remind the world that these issues affect people everywhere, from all backgrounds. It’s not just Hollywood, and it’s not just on poor neighborhoods, it affects plenty of people that we probably come in contact with every day. People we know, people we love, people we work with, neighbors, friends, family, etc. are, or have been, struggling with their mental health.
Maybe once we convince enough people of that, they’ll care enough to do something about it.
Is technology a panacea for everything that’s wrong with mental health care in the US? No. Are they always the appropriate solution? No. But do we need to find some way for technology to step in a fill this gaps when the need has been going unmet like this for so long?
“We have a crisis in mental health care in the United States. Sixty percent of young people with major depression received no mental health treatment in 2017-2018, and one quarter of adults with mental illness reported an unmet need for treatment. In the U.S., 55% of counties have no psychiatrist, psychologist or social worker, and 70% don’t have a single child psychiatrist. Queues for substance abuse care can be weeks long; 70% of those who needed substance use treatment in 2017 did not receive it. To make it worse, many practices have closed or reduced their capacity in response to pandemic health concerns.”
I think, for many of us, we’ve always assumed that when you want to have a difficult conversation, and disclosing your depression can be a difficult conversation, you wanted to set aside a time to have it without any distractions.
What if the distractions would help instead?
Granted, they were quick to point out that the data was collected pre-COVID, so we don’t know if this has held true during the pandemic, and that’s fair. This year has been a whole different ball game for all of us. That being said, however, this is not the first bit of research to point out how we can ease the likelihood, and the severity, of some mental health struggles by simply supporting one another. That feeling that we are not alone in this, that we belong and are connected to other human beings, is a powerful force in our lives, and a powerfully negative force when it’s not there.
We have all the tools we will ever need to stay connected and supportive of each other, all we lack is the willingness to commit to it.
Suzanna’s article below is about domestic abuse as an adult, but I think a lot of it also applies to survivors of childhood abuse as well. Not all of it, but nuggets like this seem very familiar to me: “Looking at the past brings shame, judgment. No one wants to be a victim. It’s embarrassing….
