Today is World Mental Health Day which is observed every year in order to create awareness among the people about mental health issues and sufferings. As we know that this is a disease which is not much talked about in our country and among the people. It’s 2016, and we are still afraid of going for psychiatric help, just because of what people would say?
We have been arrogant about the entire issue of mental illness but the truth is, we just don’t know about it properly. One who is suffering from mental illness is not mentally challenged, there are many issues that we avoid on day to day basis just in the name of them being mere problems.
Anxiety, depression, schizophrenia, bipolar mood disorder, trauma, eating disorder and personality disorder are different types of mental illness issues from which a huge amount of our population suffers. While anxiety is often confused with being anxious and eating disorder with dieting, we need to understand that these problems are not a one-day thing, they are here to stay and make one suffer a lot.
Mental Illness Issues In India
We are a growing nation, our population rate is high and it is growing at a pace that one can never imagine. All this also affects the increase of growth of other problems, and one of them is mental illness.
While we consider Dementia an old age sign, we need to understand that it is affecting a large number of people and its results are deadly. The number of people who lost their lives to dementia would drastically increase by 82% in the year 2025 and more than 10 million cases of Dementia are reported every year in our country.
Anxiety is something that every Indian student suffers from, while we accept it or not. The kind of burden that the kids are under is something that we cannot escape from. There are many kids who go through suicidal tendency, but things like these are not talked about because of the stigma attached to them.
It was a big step taken by Bollywood celebrity Deepika Padukone in accepting depression and its effects. She admitted that she has been suffering from clinical depression and is on medication for this. Many people, after this, started speaking their minds and admitted that they need help, which is an absolutely great thing.
Help That One Needs
We all know that any illness requires a doctor and the same is with mental illness issues, Psychiatrists are in constant need for the betterment of millions of people in the country. However, the ratio of doctors to patients is absolutely absurd, we have 300 doctors for every 1,00,000 patients.
But due to the need of the hour, there are many organisations that are there for those who need help and want someone to get them out from this pothole of a disease. Many of these organisations are not-for-profit and simply want to help.
One can also go for various self-help groups (if the case is not very critical), as talking to someone who has been through something that you currently feel would simply give you a sense of connectivity. These groups talk out the problems that every person in it is facing and that has been proven to work for many.
Talk to someone, anyone, be it your family or a friend. Whenever you feel that you are not worth anything, just remember that you’re way too much for people who love you. You don’t need to escape your feelings and need to be saved, it is your right and in the end, it is beneficial for you only.
At last, all we want to say is that if you know someone who has been suffering from mental illness, please help them. These people need your help, they are going through decisions and sufferings that no one should.
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10 October 2016
Jyotsna Amla