World Mental Health Day

Mental health is something that a vast majority of society suffer from but to many people this subject is still very taboo for people to discuss and admit to for fear of appearing vulnerable and weak.. we as a society need to speak out and discuss this more openly amongst ourselves so that we can get the help we need in order to look after our mental wellbeings and treat mental health more seriously.

For example we're allowed to have a sick day for physically visible  illnesses but when our mental health is suffering we're told to 'just carry on and get on with it' even when we physically cannot get out of bed from feeling low and having high levels of anxiety. This issue also is quite taboo in a sense for example, amongst males as many people put pressure for males to have an almost kind of sexist stereotype society give to say that males must be a certain way and must be 'masculine' and this includes being tough and not showing any weakness when in fact no matter gender, ethnicity etc. Everyone feels down sometimes as everyone is human and has the right to experience emotions.

Mental health is something that I have experienced first hand from suffering with.. for example, one condition I have struggled with is anxiety and panic attacks.. my panic attacks started in 2014 when I had just left high school and started my first year of college . This had become quite a big issue for me and taken over my life. And at my worst I had suffered back to back panic attacks every day for over a month. Many people didn't understand my panic attacks and I got a lot of people telling me to "grow up" and to "stop being stupid" which really fustrated me and kind of made me angry. And of course, some idiotic person telling me that I was lying about this somehow although I had visited my GP and confirmed this and reached out to get help and support in overcoming this. Which made me understand why many people never like disclosing this information with friends and peers to gain some support. But then I came to the realisation, should I be mad at these people? or just mad at society?

I feel that we desperately need to get mental Health taught more widely in schools and more awareness campaigns for people of all ages to be able to identify mental health and be able to spot the signs as early as possible and be more supportive to one another and In Order to make this issue no longer taboo.

(Credit to whom ever this image belongs to) 

For more information on mental illness here are some websites that I hope you find useful: 

• Mind.org.uk
• Mentalhealth.org.uk
• Childline.co.uk (UK only for children aged 19 and under)

P.s. Don't forget to raise more awareness by sharing the hashtag 

#WorldMentalHealthDay2017

Olivia x