Post-pan­dem­ic, men­tal health con­cerns and burnout have sky­rock­et­ed. “Sui­cide is the fourth lead­ing cause of death among 15-19 year-olds,” ac­cord­ing to PA­HO/WHO. In the work­ing world, near­ly six times as many em­ploy­ers re­port in­creased men­tal health is­sues among em­ploy­ees post pan­dem­ic - post-trau­mat­ic stress dis­or­der and burnout be­ing among the most com­mon. A CDC study found the per­cent­age of the pop­u­la­tion re­port­ing that they felt de­pressed has quadru­pled.

That may just be the be­gin­ning. Men­tal health ex­perts have pre­dict­ed “a tsuna­mi of psy­chi­atric ill­ness” in this post-pan­dem­ic era.

Oc­to­ber 10 –

World Men­tal Health Day

Our cog­ni­tive health is vi­tal to our over­all health and well-be­ing. Yet one in eight peo­ple glob­al­ly are liv­ing with men­tal health con­di­tions, which can im­pact their phys­i­cal health, their well-be­ing, how they con­nect with oth­ers, and their liveli­hoods. Men­tal health con­di­tions are al­so af­fect­ing an in­creas­ing num­ber of ado­les­cents and young peo­ple. Men­tal health is­sues in teens of­ten go un­di­ag­nosed and un­treat­ed.

World Men­tal Health Day is ob­served on 10 Oc­to­ber every year, with the 2023’s theme be­ing, “Men­tal health is a uni­ver­sal hu­man right” plac­ing the fo­cus on pro­mot­ing every­one’s men­tal health as a uni­ver­sal hu­man right. The Day pro­vides an op­por­tu­ni­ty for all stake­hold­ers to bring aware­ness on what more needs to be done to make men­tal health care a re­al­i­ty for peo­ple world­wide.

Im­prov­ing Ac­cess to Men­tal Health Care

World Health Or­ga­ni­za­tion shared, “hav­ing a men­tal health con­di­tion should nev­er be a rea­son to de­prive a per­son of their hu­man rights or to ex­clude them from de­ci­sions about their own health. Yet all over the world, peo­ple with men­tal health con­di­tions con­tin­ue to ex­pe­ri­ence a wide range of hu­man rights vi­o­la­tions. Many are ex­clud­ed from com­mu­ni­ty life and dis­crim­i­nat­ed against, while many more can­not ac­cess the men­tal health care they need or can on­ly ac­cess care that vi­o­lates their hu­man rights.”

How do I know if some­one has a men­tal health prob­lem?

Some­times it will seem ob­vi­ous when some­one is go­ing through a hard time, but there is no sim­ple way of know­ing if they have a men­tal health prob­lem. Some­times you may not know. It’s more im­por­tant to re­spond sen­si­tive­ly and with em­pa­thy to some­one who seems trou­bled than to find out whether or not they have a di­ag­no­sis.

Al­though cer­tain symp­toms are com­mon with spe­cif­ic men­tal health prob­lems, no two peo­ple be­have the same way when un­well. You may no­tice changes in their be­hav­iour or mood if you know the per­son well.

Five tips for talk­ing about men­tal health

1 Set time aside with no dis­trac­tions

It is im­por­tant to pro­vide an open and non-judg­men­tal space with no dis­trac­tions.

2 Let them share as much or as lit­tle as they want to

Let them lead the dis­cus­sion at their own pace. Don’t pres­sure them to tell you any­thing they aren’t ready to talk about. Talk­ing can take a lot of trust and courage. You might be the first per­son they have been able to talk to about this.

3 Don’t try to di­ag­nose or sec­ond guess their feel­ings

You prob­a­bly aren’t a med­ical ex­pert, and while you may be hap­py to talk and of­fer sup­port, you aren’t a trained coun­sel­lor. Try not to make as­sump­tions about what is wrong or jump in too quick­ly with your own di­ag­no­sis or so­lu­tions.

4 Keep ques­tions open end­ed

Say, “Why don’t you tell me how you are feel­ing?” rather than “I can see you are feel­ing very low”. Try to keep your lan­guage neu­tral. Give the per­son time to an­swer and try not to grill them with too many ques­tions.

5 Talk about self-care

Dis­cuss ways of de-stress­ing or prac­tic­ing self-care and ask if they find any­thing help­ful. Ex­er­cis­ing, hav­ing a healthy di­et and get­ting a good night’s sleep can help pro­tect men­tal health and sus­tain well­be­ing.

For more in­for­ma­tion: www.who.int/cam­paigns/world-men­tal-health-day/2023

Of­fer­ing a life­line

You may al­so feel a sense of cri­sis, but stay­ing calm is im­por­tant. It is cru­cial that one pays at­ten­tion to the per­son con­fid­ing in them. You don’t have to agree with what they are say­ing, but by show­ing you un­der­stand how they feel, you are let­ting them know you re­spect their feel­ings. Try not to take con­trol and al­low them to make de­ci­sions. You will have your own lim­its on the sup­port that you can pro­vide. In of­fer­ing a life­line, you may wish to lean on pro­fes­sion­al med­ical sup­port. Try to help them cre­ate a sup­port net­work of oth­er friends, rel­a­tives and men­tal health pro­fes­sion­als who can help them too.

Re­mem­ber that if you be­lieve they are in im­me­di­ate dan­ger or have in­juries that need med­ical at­ten­tion, you must take ur­gent ac­tion to en­sure they are safe.

Learn the Warn­ing Signs

Ed­u­cate your­self on the warn­ing signs of de­pres­sion and sui­cide to sup­port those clos­est to you. These can in­clude feel­ing help­less or a bur­den to oth­ers, in­creased drug use, changes in mood and sleep­ing habits, say­ing good­bye and giv­ing away pos­ses­sions.

Things you can do to sup­port some­one who may be con­tem­plat­ing sui­cide:

• Ask–Don’t be afraid to ask if some­one may be think­ing about sui­cide. Check-in with friends, fam­i­ly and co-work­ers. Ask if you may be wor­ried.

• Lis­ten–Be pa­tient and non-judg­men­tal when per­sons share thoughts and feel­ings about their pain.

• Sup­port–En­cour­age per­sons to seek help be­fore they ex­pe­ri­ence cri­sis. Ask how you can sup­port them dur­ing their dif­fi­cult time.

For lo­cal emer­gency and cri­sis sup­port:

Life­line: 800-5588/ 866-5433

TOLL FREE : 220-3636

In case of an emer­gency (sui­cide at­tempt) : Call: 990, 811, 999

St. Ann’s Psy­chi­atric Hos­pi­tal, St. Ann’s Road, St. Ann’s : 624-1151-5

Free Cri­sis and Emer­gency Ser­vices - www.Find­carett.com