Académique Documents
Professionnel Documents
Culture Documents
Chloe Heck
Professor Hellmers
Eng. 1201
20 March, 2019
The culture surrounding mental health has always been one filled with unnecessary shame,
denial, and isolation. With no educational programs about mental health that is widespread,
children grow up with no information about it, and ultimately there are great consequences for it
later on. This essay will examine why mental health facilities, resources, treatments, and
information should be more widespread, because currently the extremely negative stigma
surrounding mental health is doing even more damage to those suffering from mental illness.
Physical health has always been viewed as more important than mental health. Bodily
health always seems to come first, and diseases involving the physical form have always been
considered more demanding and important. With suicide rates at an all time high, though, it is
time to consider changing how we behave in response to mental health. The blatant disregard for
the value of mental health that is taught from a young age is what starts this culture of ignorance.
From the time people are children they are told to just suck it up if they’re crying, that nothing is
a big deal and to get over their emotions. Parents may think it hardens kids against the outside
world and what they may deal with there, but really it creates a hateful relationship between a
child and their emotions, which can have a very negative impact. Even just encouraging a child
the wrong way can lead to them developing a complex or phobia. An example of this is the story
of a teenager named Jake. Jake was a very successful student and highly valued his grades and
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achievements. Over the years the praise he received made him terrified of what would happen if
he experienced failure, so he pushed and pushed until he was under simply too much pressure.
As said by Benoit Denizet-Lewis, the writer of the article featuring Jake, “Jake’s parents knew
he could be high-strung; in middle school, they sent him to a therapist when he was too scared to
sleep in his own room. But nothing prepared them for the day two years ago when Jake, then 17,
seemingly “ran 150 miles per hour into a brick wall,” his mother said. He refused to go to school
and curled up in the fetal position on the floor. “I just can’t take it!” he screamed. “You just
don’t understand!” Simply pushing until you have nothing left in the gas tank by ignoring a
mental issue is how many people end up experiencing breakdowns, which can be debilitating and
far more harmful than facing the facts and visiting a mental health professional. It is looked
down upon so much that it seems like a last resort for many, while it should be one of the first
options.
Untreated mental illness can lead to a number of chronic bodily health issues as well. As
stated by this passage from the article “The Dangers of Untreated Mental Illness”, “the mind
copes with stress in different ways. Chronic mental illness can lead to aches, pains, and
gastrointestinal distress that have no physical source. Over time, your aches and pains become
detrimental to your physical health. You may develop serious physical injuries that make it even
more difficult to deal with your mental illness.” Like illness of the body can be a trigger for
mental illness, mental illness can in turn be a trigger of a physical condition. Some of the
subsequent results of untreated mental illness may include risks of many health issues increasing,
such as strokes, heart attacks, and obesity. The mind and the body are very closely linked, and so
issues involving the body are often overlapped with those involving the mind. It should also be
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made apparent that mental illness can also, depending on the disorder, affect how you interact
with people and make it more difficult to do so. The different symptoms and side effects can also
lead to increased stress and a worsening of the symptoms of your disorder, as well as an
It’s not understood quite what the implication of suicide is before it touches your life
personally. Sure, the definition of the word is broadly understood, but the weight and impact of it
is unclear until it is experienced. Afterwards it seems like a taboo sort of thing to talk about. If
someone says that someone they knew died from cancer, a great sadness and understanding is
felt. However, if someone says someone they knew committed suicide, a hush falls over the
room and no one knows what to say. That’s a huge example of the misunderstanding that
surrounds mental illness. No one knows what to say because it seems almost wrong to say
anything. That needs to change. It needs to be talked about so it can be understood, prevented,
and treated before it gets to that point of no return. Like this quote from USA Today says, “It
isn’t easy to acknowledge our vulnerabilities and traumas or accept our limitations. It isn’t easy
to ask for or accept help. But we all have mental health — we have all suffered emotionally and
some of us suffer terribly. We all have moments when we aren’t emotionally healthy. These
moments can be filled with shame and we can suffer alone or we can share our stories with each
other — of struggle, hope and recovery. And we can teach our children how to talk about their
emotional pain as well as their emotional health.” It isn’t easy. It is embarrassing and humiliating
and degrading at time but everyone has things they deal with, and it is time to open up about
those things. Simple things like a short class about mental health and suicide prevention may be
all it takes to get children- and therefore adults- to talk about mental health. Like the article said,
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we all have mental health. It isn’t a weird thing to deal with mental illness. Having one should
not be shamed and ignored. With programs that invite discussion about the topic, openness,
Mental health programs could be extremely beneficial to schools and the human race as a
whole. Prevention is the best way to solve a problem. Now, of course mental illness cannot
always be prevented. The idea that mental health programs could prevent everything is just
outlandish. However, they do present audiences with how to deal with and treat mental illnesses
when they do occur. They will always occur, because no one is perfect and the human brain is
very complex. With that complexity comes the risk of problems and bumps in the road.
Knowledge is power, though. Knowing what to do and feeling like they are not alone is the very
reason why kids would benefit so much from these programs. In an article called “How Does
Teaching Mental Health in Schools Benefit Students?” Glenn Liebman, the CEO of of the
Mental Health Association in New York said “They recognize how prevalent mental health
issues are and want to meld together education folks and mental health folks," Liebman says.
"There is a greater understanding that mental health was too important not to be taught or
discussed." He was speaking about how some people were opposed to mental health being
taught, thinking it was not prevalent or important enough to be taught in schools. However, after
seeing the positive effects it had on the schools who tried out practicing mindfulness and
breathing exercises, it has completely changed the minds of many who argued against it. One of
the main arguments against public education of mental health is just that, that it is not important
enough to inform people about. This is simply incorrect, because the misinformation this spreads
It is not just the mental health programs that could be used to spread awareness. After all,
adults have mental health needs as well. One thing that could be made available is annual mental
health check-ups. It may seem like overkill, but if someone is unwilling to admit to their friends
and family how they are feeling, they may admit it to a psychiatrist because of doctor-patient
confidentiality. Brochures could be made available. Anything but the current silence surrounding
mental health would be better. It’s almost like a game of telephone. The more people whisper to
each other without hearing the original idea the more misinformation is spread. Except this isn’t
some funny game. Instead, no one really knows the truth about topics involving mental health,
People used to be just shoved into mental asylums because others didn’t know what to do
with them. People with mild anxiety, if caught saying the wrong thing, were viewed as crazy and
shipped off to mental facilities, where often they were treated poorly. People assumed that it
didn’t matter, because they were mentally ill, but no one knew what that meant at the time. Even
now when information is as widespread as ever with the use of things like search engines, no one
really knows the truth about mental illness unless they have taken the step to go to a therapist or
(depression and anxiety) are both very common, with depression affecting 1 in 5 people at some
stage in their lives and anxiety affecting 1 in 4 people at some point, on average.” and “Over
70% of sufferers keep their illness or problems to themselves for fear of judgment by society and
peers, which can be a significant inhibitor to raising awareness among the general population.”
The unnecessary torment and suffering people who are too afraid to speak about their mental
illness go through is unreal. The denial hits, and from there mental health goes downhill. The
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stress of not knowing what to do keeps building and building until there is no going back and a
breakdown occurs. Some people never recover from these breakdowns and it inhibits them for
life. To think that could have been helped by just having access to resources in their time of need
is deeply saddening. The way that mental health is looked down upon in the grand scheme of
things is very unfortunate, because these disorders are very, very real.
Suicide resulting from mental illness is the 10th leading cause of death. Considering it is
so high on the list, one would think it would be talked about more, because it seems like it should
be a physical issue on all of those leading causes. But no, it is something no one is talking about,
something that is growing exponentially and by day. Mental illness is not taken as seriously
because unlike many physical ailments, it can come and go. From the book An Unquiet Mind: A
Memoir of Moods and Madness author Kay Redfield says, “There is a particular kind of pain,
elation, loneliness, and terror involved in this kind of madness. When you're high it's
tremendous. The ideas and feelings are fast and frequent like shooting stars, and you follow them
until you find better and brighter ones. Shyness goes, the right words and gestures are suddenly
there, the power to captivate others a felt certainty. There are interests found in uninteresting
people. Sensuality is pervasive and the desire to seduce and be seduced irresistible. Feelings of
ease, intensity, power, well-being, financial omnipotence, and euphoria pervade one's marrow.
But, somewhere, this changes. The fast ideas are far too fast, and there are far too many;
overwhelming confusion replaces clarity. Memory goes. Humor and absorption on friends' faces
are replaced by fear and concern. Everything previously moving with the grain is now against--
you are irritable, angry, frightened, uncontrollable, and enmeshed totally in the blackest caves of
the mind. You never knew those caves were there. It will never end, for madness carves its own
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reality.” Though this is a very long and detailed quote, the implications behind it are true for
many with mental health issues. The problems and symptoms seem to come and go, making it
seem sometimes like it isn’t a big deal in the slightest, but this is simply not true. This quote is
haunting because it defines the very shaky relationship people have with mental illness. The
unsure qualities of a mental disorder are exactly what makes them so unpredictable, turbulent,
Mental health leaves everyone who has had a run-in with its darker side scared. The fear
that it can create can scar a person for life and lead to even more trauma than before. Someone
experiencing a panic attack for the first time might then develop a panic disorder, a fear that it
might happen again. A fear so bad that they live their entire life cowering, afraid irrationally that
a panic attack could grip them once again. It doesn’t just have to be a panic attack, it could be
anything. That’s the scary thing about mental illness, you never know when it could strike. It
hurts people and their friends, families, and even sometimes strangers. Jenny Lawson, the author
of Furiously Happy: A Funny Book About Horrible Things, stated, “When you come out of the
grips of a depression there is an incredible relief, but not one you feel allowed to celebrate.
Instead, the feeling of victory is replaced with anxiety that it will happen again, and with shame
and vulnerability when you see how your illness affected your family, your work, everything left
untouched while you struggled to survive. We come back to life thinner, paler, weaker … but as
survivors. Survivors who don’t get pats on the back from coworkers who congratulate them on
making it. Survivors who wake to more work than before because their friends and family are
exhausted from helping them fight a battle they may not even understand. I hope to one day see a
sea of people all wearing silver ribbons as a sign that they understand the secret battle, and as a
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celebration of the victories made each day as we individually pull ourselves up out of our
foxholes to see our scars heal, and to remember what the sun looks like.” As a result of mental
health not being talked about and treated, people don’t know how they are affecting others.
Something someone says to someone one day could trigger something that causes a downward
spiral in their mental health. It could be anything, and this is because the topic is so taboo in
today’s culture that no one wants to talk about their feelings or look weak in front of anyone else.
The people that make it through horrible mental health issues are just as much of a
survivor as someone has has recovered from a stroke or cancer. Therein lies the controversy,
because many people argue that because they can not see it, because the illness is not tangible, it
is not a real issue. Some even go as far as saying that people are just looking for attention, and
that people make up mental illness. Sure, there is the occasional person that pretends for the
attention, but you could argue that for a physical illness as well. Often you cannot see or feel
cancer, but you don’t argue with people that it isn’t real for that reason. For example, mother and
writer Leah Ida Harris argues that “I am afraid that it is this invalid and shaming narrative that
completely in their “chemically-imbalanced” brains and not at all in the world that shapes those
developing brains and the bodies that house them.” She fears her children will be taught that
because of mental health impairments they are broken and worries this will hurt their self esteem.
However, this should be more closely evaluated, because in today’s world, it is more valuable to
learn about the brain and the issues surrounding it than self esteem. One could argue that self
esteem is the real issue, but self esteem, if it would be hurt by a talk about normalizing mental
health such as this, is not the issue, but something deeper. These school mandated mental health
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discussions and assemblies would not be put in place to shame or single out students, but bring
them together and understand how important mental health is. If you are going to deliver
speeches to children, you must know how to talk to them in general. There is a way to phrase
your words that is gentle enough and simple enough for children to understand, and that is not in
a “medicalized, individualistic” way. As with any piece of writing or speech, one must cater it to
their audience in a way that is straightforward and makes sense to that group of people. It is
invaluable to learn and spread knowledge about mental health, because the longer people are in
the dark about it, the worse the stigma will become. Sheltering children and people in general is
not the best way to protect them. Not just in a sense of them eventually having to be exposed to
the ideas anyway, because that would be irresponsible. However, these ideas should be suggested
to them at a young age because it promotes the understanding and sympathy that human society
needs to have in future years if they don’t want to see suicide rates rising exponentially higher.
Stories all over the internet are coming out about how people were too afraid to open up
about their mental illnesses because of the stigma surrounding the entire culture. With platforms
like YouTube and Instagram where people can share their stories, more and more people share
their stories and create a more accepting environment each time they do so. Seeing idols and
celebrities talk about how they are not perfect and untouchable gives a face to things like
anxiety, depression, and even less common things such as dissociative disorder. One out of every
adult is suffering from a mental disorder they may not even know about, or oftentimes, if they
do, they ignore it to seem stronger. This is an illusion and strength comes from the ability to talk
about your ailments, not hide them. As said by Samantha Williams, a writer and direct result of
the stigma surrounding mental illness, “The difference between living in constant pain and
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gradual self-destruction and living an increasingly positive, productive life can be as simple as
opening up to family or friends about feelings of depression, anxiety, or whatever else troubles
you. Nobody besides you feels that pain, and the only one who can take the first initiative to
getting help is you. That’s why it’s so frustrating to see people who are clearly suffering get told,
“everything will get better,” or “just stop being sad.” The inner pain you feel is as real and valid
as any bloody wound or broken bone, and it’s okay to ask for help.” As a survivor of intense
mental illness and a living result of the stigma and not asking for help subsequently, Samantha
has suffered far more than need be for her mental illness. Not only does her quote provide useful
insight about mental illness, but her herself. It is a shame that these things keep happening to
people, because until things change around the stigma, good people will keep getting hurt
without reason. It’s not just disease, it’s epidemic. The only difference is with a physical
epidemic, there is panic and empathy and understanding, but with this one, people only suffer in
The automatic response of “everything will get better soon” is a hopeless and false
promise. People have told each other that for years and usually the response is something akin to
“no it won’t you don’t understand”. People call people with mental illness dramatic and weak,
and this only builds up how people feel. The feeling that your illness isn’t real, or that it
shouldn’t be holding you back is crippling. It can almost feel like lying, like an excuse, even
though it isn’t true and it is just a result of the stigma forced upon mentally ill people. Even the
phrase “mentally ill” evokes thoughts of people in straight jackets, “crazy” people. People don’t
want that to be them, and so they ignore the signs of mental illness because of denial. But the
Mental illness deserves to be respected and acknowledged, because the people who have
them are often just as scared of the implication as a normal person. It isn’t taboo, it isn’t scary,
it’s human. Mental illness isn’t beautiful. It is an ugly monster with six heads, sharp teeth, and a
gnarly tail to match. But it is a real thing, a thing that needs to be understood. You can’t kill a
monster if you refuse to believe it’s there. It’s a scary thing to deal with alone, but with
understanding comes support and empathy. It’s human to be scared, but it doesn’t have to be a
thing people deal with by themselves, and being together makes things a whole lot less daunting.
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This visual shows just how common the prejudice against mental illness is, as well as
how in manifests in the amount mentally ill people make them uncomfortable. These numbers
are staggering and could be greatly reduced with information and treatment being more
Works Cited
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Anxiety?” The New York Times, The New York Times, 11 Oct. 2017,
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newsinhealth.nih.gov/2016/03/understanding-anxiety-disorders.
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www.health.harvard.edu/blog/anxiety-what-it-is-what-to-do-2018060113955.
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www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/323494.php.
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Harris, Leah Ida. “Why Mandating Mental Health Education in Schools Is a Band-Aid on a
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Lawson, Jenny. Furiously Happy: a Funny Book about Horrible Things. Macmillan, 2016.
Jamison, Kay R. An Unquiet Mind: a Memoir of Moods and Madness. Picador, 2015.