Navigating Mental Health in America: Early Intervention, Support, Destigmatization

Early Detection for Prevention

Dimalanta 1 Sharlyne Dimalanta Yeager English 3 AP 24 February 2019 Mental Health In America Mental health has been an ongoing, devastating topic that needs more attention. At times, it has resulted in suicide and violent outbreaks, which have caused heartbreaks in the families and friends involved. Society needs to acknowledge behavioral changes in hopes of early intervention, prevention, and treatment. Early detection of warning signs and symptoms plays a huge role in preventing unwanted actions. By not recognizing the warning signs of a person with mental illness, it becomes a failure to acknowledge the situation’s seriousness and provide a course of action to help. An article exclaims, “Children spend most of their days in school, where they are likely to exhibit learning and behavioral challenges” (Gruttadaro, 24).

Schools have the ability to take steps to address the need for early identification and intervention. During one’s childhood, school is the place where kids spend nearly all of their time, which allows access for teachers to find any unusual behavior. Programs need to arise to help educators learn to identify early warning signs of mental illness. Some signs include distinct changes in school performance, negative moods, frequent outbursts, opposition to authority, etc. Once people learn of mental identification, they will be able to provide assistance further.

Building Supportive Communities

The community should be aware of how to approach one with a mental condition and the possible treatment needed. Helpers often notice behavioral changes that suggest a mental health Dimalanta 2 problem or the beginning of an illness. “When considering their potential involvement, participants often spoke in terms of whether they ‘could’ or ‘should’ help” (Rossetto et al.). Various factors come into whether a person should help, such as their relationship with the recipient, the helper’s feeling of responsibility or capacity to help, and the danger and safety concerns for the recipient. In other cases, those simply knowing that a person was anguished influenced their choice to automatically help. Most instances where the receiver was helped were shown to have beneficial outcomes in their circumstance and well-being.

Such outcomes were receiving professional help and recovering, ceasing the unsafe behavior due to intervention, or the management of the mental condition. The feeling after successfully helping a person with a mental condition in any way is worth the time to approach. Society should be educated about bullying and the lasting effects it may have on children’s mental health. Being tormented by bullying raises the risk of depressive disorders that will need psychiatric treatment later in the years. The National Committee for Mental Hygiene’s “goals were to improve attitudes toward mental illness and people with them” (Edwards, 14).

One of their focal points should be the decrease of bullying among students. Bullying can affect one’s health, both emotionally and physically. It can lead to physical injury, emotional and social problems, and possibly death. School faculty must rapidly and consistently respond to bullying behavior. Doing so sends a message that it is not tolerated. The community can help students prevent bullying by talking about it and constructing a safer environment. Bullying demonstrates harmful effects on mental health, which should motivate schools to intervene prematurely to grapple with the issue. A support system must be established in order to provide a positive environment for Dimalanta 3 healing and understanding.

Having support from those around increases the chance of students suffering from a mental condition to feel safe enough to talk about it. An article, Government should invest in helping people, not guns, states, “We must invest in creating a more supportive and educated network and resources everything from stress and anxiety to bipolar disorder or schizophrenia to name a few.” Schools can assist students to feel more comfortable and seek help.

Nurturing Supportive Schools and Breaking Stigmas

They can emphasize the available school counselors and psychologists that may provide guidance and coping skills. In serious cases, students require more rigorous mental health services and support systems in which schools should be willing to collaborate with outside sources. Schools should advise students of the importance of sharing concerns with a trusted adult and should take charge of communicating with families about mental health concerns. Notifying the population of the occurring issues leads to a stronger support group amongst friends, families, and staff. Overall, addressing student mental health with support creates a more optimistic and productive school atmosphere for everyone.

Although society is aware that we must help those with mental conditions, social stigmas are still in place, as well as debates over gun control. The ongoing issue doesn’t have the attention it deserves, and yet society is distracted by other nonentities. Others have admitted that a “stigma continues to be a major barrier for youth seeking the help they need, and this often leads to students struggling in silence’ (Gruttadaro, 24).

In society’s supposed effort to understand the reason for such activities, we stigmatize and remote those who live with mental illness. Isolating these children does not provide a supportive community for the child to open up and is the opposite direction of caring for mental health. Another misdirection is the debate over gun control. Rather than discussing this controversy, people need to be fixing the Dimalanta 4 issue regarding mental health. Most adults say they want what’s best for their children, so why not prioritize their health? As said frequently, the young are the future.

Mental health should be one of America’s top priorities relating to social welfare. Communities need to be educated and involved in recognizing any behavioral changes in order to provide early assistance which may prevent the worst from occurring. Efforts in educating school staff members and the community may provide a better surrounding and increase the chances of early intervention and the road to recovery. The community needs to rid of the upheld stigma, but it’s okay to come out of the darkness and get succor.Dimalanta 1 Sharlyne Dimalanta Yeager English 3 AP 24 February 2019 Works Cited Edwards, Douglas J. ‘Ringing out hope: for 100 years Mental Health America has been working to improve the well-being of all citizens.’

References:

1. Behavioral Healthcare, vol. 29, no. 6, 2009, p. 14+. Academic OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A204146225/AONE?u=j079901003&sid=AONE&xid=0341 b474. Accessed 26 Feb. 2019.
2. Gruttadaro, Darcy. ‘Out of the darkness: making student mental health a priority: together, educators and families can recognize and treat student mental illness.’ Principal Leadership, Apr. 2015, p. 24+. Academic OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A450505504/AONE?u=j079901003&sid=AONE&xid=7bf4 10b7. Accessed 26 Feb. 2019.
3. Nierenberg, Cari. “Childhood Bullying Can Have Lasting Effects on Mental Health.” LiveScience, Purch, 9 Dec. 2015, www.livescience.com/53034-childhood-bullying-lasting-mental-health-effects.html. Rossetto, Alyssia, et al.
4. ‘Developing a model of help giving towards people with a mental health problem: a qualitative study of Mental Health First Aid participants.’ International Journal of Mental Health Systems, vol. 12, no. 1, 2018. Academic OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A551190492/AONE?u=j079901003&sid=AONE&xid=e6d9 1105. Accessed 26 Feb. 2019.
5. Government should invest in helping people, not guns.’ UWIRE Text, 13 Oct. 2015, p. 1. Academic OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A431516348/AONE?u=j079901003&sid=AONE&xid=edce 5559.
6. Accessed 2 “How Does Bullying Affect Health and Well-Being?” Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, www.nichd.nih.gov/health/topics/bullying/conditioninfo/health.