Are we now expecting to have mental health problems?

Doodledog makes a lot of sensible points. I think some people use poor 'mental health' as an excuse to get away with not having to do things they don't like or to cover up for bad judgements they have made themselves, and this has a knock on effect on the public perception and tolerance of mental health problems.

Things like drug taking, alcohol abuse, getting into needless debt, diving into one bad relationship after another and so on are likely to be a significant cause in being detrimental to having good mental health, alongside overuse of social media. None of these things, I believe, are compulsory so are unlikely to illicit little sympathy from the general population, who has learnt to adapt and just build up their own resilience to get on with life's problems.

I have met so many people, both professionally and socially, with severe challenges mentally and physically who seen happy, or at least have accepted, life's limitations; it seems to me it's the ones who have the capacity to change their lives who do all the moaning.

So sorry Joelsnan and of course Annie

If the O/P was speaking of people claiming they had mental
health problems why start with three suicides

There are definitely those people who suffer from clinical depression and of course women who have experienced the most awful post natal depression, the worst excesses of menopausal symptoms, that have thrown them off kilter, sometimes for a considerable amount of time, I'm not sure you have to live that to not understand how horrific such phases are. I would never want to underestimate anyone else's difficulties and don't doubt the severity of such episodes.

I think where the lines become blurred is calling "the blues" which most people have experienced, mental illness. The teen years are a time, given the fact that hormones are raging, poor self esteem, self doubt and a raft of other factors conspire to make some depressed, I certainly was at times, but for many it's a phase the cycle of life which most emerge from without becoming mentally ill.

However, into that mix I guess you have to say smoking copious of weed and other mind altering substances aren't going to help. and often have lasting effects. We also live in an unfortunate age where many are affected by the vagaries of whatever is going on in own individual social media world, particularly if they are susceptible into not being able to distinguish "the real world" from the manipulatively false one that prevails on such sites and family breakdown is of course more prevalent today than it was in the past.

A brave post Marydoll

I know what the OP is trying to say.
There is a vast difference between true mental illness and what a lot of people talk of as mental illness.
Society has led a lot of the younger generation (in particular) to believe that their lives should be full of happiness and contentment with all their wishes and desires fulfilled, when life is actually like being in a rowing boat in the middle of the ocean, sometimes smooth, sometimes stormy and changing all the time. Those who have been taught to row with the waves fare better. Sadly many nowadays have not been given these skills and in many the feelings they have of sadness, anger, inability to cope, frustration etc., are just normal emotions however they do not recognise these as such because they have never been exposed to real life.
As mentioned at the outset, this is very different to true clinical mental health issues, which I sadly lost my son because of.

Dottygran I speak out about my darling daughter not for
sympathy but in hope it will help some try to understand
mental illness , if so something good will come from her torture.

Marydoll spoke of post natal depression, I ached for her, I
was admitted to a physciatric unit after the birth of my younger daughter, there was a young mother there who had
thrown her baby against a wall, thank God the little mite fell on the sofa, she thought she had given birth to ‘Rosemary’s
baby’.

Whilst I was in the unit my husband had to move house to
another town, he was police officer, we were transferred to
another town to save me from facing neighbours because I
had been ‘in there’, we didn’t want to move , I didn’t give a
fig about facing people.

I had severe post natal depression, when my darling daughter
was diagnosed with bipolar someone said ‘she must have
inherited it from you’ ! This was said only 2 years ago,

Still so much ignorance about mental health illness .

Sorry, long post.

I developed MH issues as a young person. It wasn't lack of resilience then and it isn't now.

I find the term 'M/H bandwagon' offensive. You can't self diagnose and prescribe yourself treatment for a MH condition no more than you can any long term physical condition. Just because an illness or condition is becoming more recognised and accepted by the general public doesn't make it a fashion or a bandwagon.

Annie, I am going to stop posting now, as I have clearly upset you and wish I had kept me big gob shut. It is the self diagnosers that I refer to.

Please forgive me. I would never say anything to upset you or anyone who really does know the difference between real and percieved MH issues

Annie, no no no, that's exactly the point I was trying to make, there ARE many people who suffer terribly with mental health, I grew up with it, and now my son suffers terribly. But not everyone who claims to, does.

I have read so many of your posts, and know how your Darling Daughter died, and my heart has and does go out to you, I don't know how you cope.

My post was NOT aimed at people with genuine MH problems, I of all people really DO know the difference. My son once described how he felt to me, it said it felt as if one or both of his children were about to die.............

Well said vampirequeen

Dottygran you work with several ? Yet don’t know a mental
health illness has to be diagnosed, not self diagnosed.

I do not know why there is so much discussed about mental health/mental illness these days maybe it is because as a society we are seeing it more and more. One of my experiences in regard of mental illness relates to my cousin, and she presented with mental issues about 35 years ago, she was a very attractive young woman of 25 years old at the time, unmarried and no children. There had been no indications at all during her life that she had any problems.
One day she walked out of a well paid job and two days later went walkabout on the local common in middle of night in her nightie. She was sectioned as my aunt did not know what to do. To cut a long story short many medications were tried out and also two more sectionings happened. Later my cousin got the injection once a fortnight from mental health professionals which seemed to be something that worked. My cousin never worked again as her mental capacity seemed burnt out. She is now just over 60 years and still goes out window shopping and takes walks and thankfully she is stable and on her medication. She is a chain smoker and this has ruined her beautiful attractive good looks and she now looks about 75 years old something which upsets me a lot when I see her, but life is precious and she is still here so that is something to be thank-full for.

Annie ?

So my darling daughter who suffered bipolar for many years
only needed to develop resilience and she wouldn’t have jumped from a bridge and die ?

Mental illness is not a choice, is not having a ‘I’m fed up day’,

Little wonder people still don’t speak out about their illness,
reading some posts, all they need is to boost their self esteem
and develop resilience.

Those who know least judge most , thus it has always been

All those of you with M/H issues, and I understand and empathise, I am lucky, my late mother and son suffer terribly from depression, are missing the point that the OP has raised. Of course you have an illness, but not everyone who claims to be depressed has.

Sorry, I know this will not be a popular view, but the OP has been very brave to open this debate and I agree, many young people have not had to develop resilience and jump on the M/H bandwagon when things get tough. I know. I work with several

Are you suggesting that all I need to do is 'develop resilience to be able to cope with the ups and downs of life'? So I'm weak not ill? Depression is an illness. Would you say that a diabetic just has to develop a resilience to sugar or someone with kidney failure needs to develop a resilience to bodily toxins?

Am I angry about your post? You bet I am. I have a debilitating disease that affects every aspect of my life. I'm not weak or lacking in moral fibre. I have a chemical imbalance in my brain and the symptoms affect the way my mind works.

Well put, Lizbethann. I too have pondered on the same issue. We all need to develop resilience to be able to cope with the ups and downs of life.

I also think it's a positive thing that mental issues can be discussed more openly, and that help may be available - if hard to come by in too many cases.

The only reason it's more common is that we're not so ashamed to say we have mental health issues any more. We can be open about our illness to an extent although it could be better. No one commits suicide just because they think they're depressed. The survival instinct kicks in. People commit suicide because they believe that the world would be a better place if they weren't in it. I didn't succeed (thank goodness) but at the time I was convinced that I was doing the right thing for everyone. At that point your thinking is so warped that you can't see how it will really affect people.

Here we go again with the binary approach to everything. I like the phrase 'living with' or 'living well with'. It is possible to live with depression. Depression is not being a bit fed up. The more open and honest we can be about health, the better. The OP is right to air her thoughts.

Alexa low self esteem is not the reason for suicide.I have had very low self esteem my whole life and never felt the urge to jump from the bridge 10 miles from here where suicides are a regular occurence.Perhaps you have never felt the despair where there seems no way out,so you and I are lucky .

Sadly I've known a few people who did who were treated or being treated for mental health issues ,including PND when they decided they couldn't go on.

Families supported them,health workers "thought she was doing well" "no one expected" him to" they had so much to live for" .all things I've heard at funerals of young people who jumped from that bridge .The first when I was in my 20's so over 40 years ago.

Its not possible to see whats going on in a head when the person is bright and cheerful every time you see them ,masking the hopelessness underneath .
I have a daughter who has bouts of depression who has attempted to end her life in the past ,who tells me she sometimes wishes she was "brave enough" to end it now but the hurt she would cause her children stops her .

I completely understand her feelings and I talk to her endlessly to make her see that she cant give up on life however limited her life is since her illness.I doesn't help when doctors tell her there is NO HOPE of a cure or even a relief from her pain
Dont judge ,thats the first thing you need to do, it IS an illness ,just because they aren't hooked up to chemo ,or wearing a cast or writhing in pain on the floor doesn't make it less of an illness.

Lizbethann55 Real depression is VERY different from feeling sad about something. Unless/until a person has actually experienced it, you won't know. I know.

“Small-minded people blame others. Average people blame themselves. The wise see all blame as foolishness”
― Epictetus

Lizbethann, i agree with your original post.

I think the trouble is that people who want to end it all are despairing for one reason or another. Some cannot believe the bad trouble will ever end, they could be terminally ill, and they may have good reason to believe this, so it is not mental illness.

The sort of despair that comes from low self esteem is a genuine mental illness and is probably on the increase especially with the demise of religious 'salvation'. There is a great need for people who have low self esteem to be counselled by proficient counsellors, or have friends who will help them to laugh at themselves. People with low self esteem are often lonely people.

Reading the O/P again.

‘That sometimes feeling low, unhappy, lonely , guilty, depressed, a failure etc etc etc were actually part of normal everyday living and life just as much as feeling happy, fulfilled, contented etc. So shouldn't we be learning that feeling negative emotions are not a sign of illness but a sign of being alive and that they will probably pass’

And if they don’t pass ?

I am sure suicides were covered up more in the past, people certainly had easy access to drugs that would kill them, laudanum etc. Also I suspect a lot of mental illness was referred to as eccentricity, not a word you hear so much now.

I agree with a lot of the comments above. I don't know about expecting to have mental health problems, certainly it is discussed more openly and that can only be a good thing. Drugs do not help and are often used as a way of coping with how the person is feeling.

I know from personal experience how very difficult it is to get the correct diagnosis for a loved one, it has taken years for me to get help for my daughter, literally years and I am worn out with it to be honest. It affects the whole family.
There are so many factors involved.