This whole mental health craze...

myshirt wrote: »

What I thought was outrageous was someone called Vogue Williams, who I had never heard of before, she is a model, she broke her leg or fell or something and was on crutches for 2 whole weeks. She was then in the paper saying how this gave her insight into the barriers disabled people face in access to facilities etc etc and how it brings on depression or sadness. Article was accompanied by some shots of her modelling.

This type of thing is really poor.

Maybe it was self promotion but if her experience made her think and evoked compassion for people with long term mobility problems, good for her.

So about this mental health business. It's very obvious online, specifically on Facebook, that some people sometimes wallow in their problems a bit too much for their own good. In the long run I think it is probably detrimental to their mental health. I also think people are confused about the difference between reactive, and clinical depression (for which there isn't always a 'reason').
And finally, for all the publicity and campaigns online, I've never seen anyone make a serious effort to inform and encourage openness about illnesses other than depression.I strongly believe society could do with a better understanding of nervous breakdowns, psychotic breaks for any reason, and incurable mental disorders like Schizophrenia, and diseases like Alzheimers too (not really mental health but it affects that). Not only the illnesses but how the medications affect people.
When people encounter someone with such problems, they just don't know how to handle it, imo. There are anecdotal stories of sufferers being misunderstood to be maliciously aggressive, and incarcerated in prison. If an Alzheimers patient goes walkabout, would the average person know how to help them? And I know a few people whose loved ones with Alzheimers have had nightmarish times in hospital, particularly A & E, because it is so hectic and confusing an environment. I think with all of the focus on mental health awareness, these campaigns could do a lot more to educate all of us. Instead they are vapid and pointless.

padd b1975 wrote: »

First step would be to stop indulging charlatans like "Brezzy".

I didn't know anything about Bressie apart from his singing career until I read his book. I was very interested in his experience of what happened to him. I had no preconceptions or prejudices before reading it.
I can safely say that Bressie's candid account and brutal honesty of the overwhelming impact mental health issues had on his life make for a sobering read.
There is nothing charlatan about this man. His experiences and hurdles are very real and he did readers, especially young people who would be drawn to buy his book a huge service by writing so honestly.
Without doubt it was the best autobigraphical account I've ever read and gave me great insight into the adage that you never know what someone else is suffering even if they appear to have all the material trappings in the world.

As mentioned above, people experience stress and low mood on a regular basis. Stress can actually be a good thing to motivate and push us along and low moods may help us to 'course correct' in our lives. There is no doubt that some of these celebs are over-egging their symptoms and looking for sympathy, but lets not get into the game of comparing people's mental health or wellbeing. One person may become upset at the breaking of a cup, while it may take the passing of a relative to bring about similar levels for someone else. Each person's stress is real to them and is not negated by the level of seriousness of the event.

Saying all that, mental health and 'awareness' has become the new fad celebrity and society associated illness to follow. Before, it was ALS, then cancer and before that it was the blind and wheelchair users. Awareness is critical to a cause but it can undermine and cloud the principal message when so many well known people publicise their 'issues' and encourage their followers to do the same. The serious message of mental illness gets lost in a flurry of social media posts about someone having a 'stressful day' at work or the weight gain after a holiday is really 'getting them down'.

Young people are more exposed to the dangers of escalating mental health issues because of the social media world we live. Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat are life games, games that never stop and games that no matter where they are in the world will follow them to bed and be with them when they wake up. Now that's stressful for a young teen or even younger! 20 years ago people went home from school and work and shut the door on their day... no classmates, no work colleagues and so on. Now everyone knows where you are and what you are doing. You have to play the game all day long. There is a new route to mental illness, especially for the young, and its through social media. Forget about reposting or tagging a 'celeb' that's having a 'crisis' over what to wear to a movie premiere, we need to to continue to warn young people of the perils of living their lives online and subject to every sort of criticism without any sort of filter.

In general of course, we still have the issue of mental health funding, not just in this country but around the world. Our government continues to let down so many people around the country by a continued lack of investment. In some spots, the acute care is excellent - if your lucky to live in that area - but by in large there are long waits for follow up care like psychotherapy and counselling. We are a well off country and we shouldn't have to rely on half a dozen or so mental health charities competing for our good will and spare coins. We should have a proper government policy on tackling the mental health crisis... and it is a crisis. Not celebrities complaining of the stress of moving house, no... actual people in crisis who need real support and not 'likes' or 'thumbs up' from followers for making it through their workout routine and making a nice meal for themselves.

Again, stress and being depressed or in a low mood do not necessarily constitute having a mental illness but continued stress and low mood may indicate something more serious. Any 'celeb' in that scenario should seek out some professional advice and not seek the approval of the masses for sharing their feelings. By all means post how your day or week has gone, how ****ty it's been but don't conflate it with the types of illness which stop people from doing even the simplest tasks.

Persepoly made a good point, above. For 'celebs' and many people on social media its about massaging ego's and artificially inflating their self-esteem. People need validation and can have it in such instant fashion. rejection comes equally as quickly. Thanks heavan's then for the block buttons on many of these sites!

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Permabear wrote: »

This post had been deleted.

The argument goes something like "everone has mental health so we should look after our mental health as we would physical health". Problem with that is that the mind in "mental health" isn't accurately defined and outside of vague suggestions noone can outline what exactly a healthy mind is. So here were are.

Edit: also, whatever a mental health issue actually is, it is bound to manifest itself in someone personality like Richard above mentions. People are very judgy about others everyday - friends, family, colleagues etc. I guess some this awareness stuff kind of addresses that ie. "Don't judge her, she's got mental health issues"

Biscuitus wrote: »

This is what really annoys me. Its called having a brain and feeling emotions. The majority of self diagnosed "depression" can be described as follows:

Owner has to leave dog to go to work.
Dog is sad.
Owner comes home.
Dog is happy.

The dog does not have mental health problems.

Yes it has separation anxiety disorder.

Let me refer this dog to a leading psychologist in the field for this, his blog and a 10% off coupon for his book Snoop at Your Doggy Dogg.

It also sounds like the owner has General Doggyiatric withdrawal disorder.

Murrisk wrote: »

It seems to be a misguided way to get to the bottom of the high male suicide rates. In reality, I think it's trivialising mental health. A man suffering from depression isn't going to be comforted by good-looking, high-profile Bressie drip-feeding his apparent mental health travails to the media in order to fashion a new career for himself.

He spoke candidly on TLLS about wanting to tear his face off. I believe he meant what he said. What's him being good looking got to do with it? Loads of good looking people don't feel too well on the inside.