Mental Illness has a label just like the label in your shirt – except it is hidden. No one speaks of having a mental illness – they don’t want their friends or co-workers to know there is something about them that sets them a part.
With mental illness disorders being common in the United States and internationally. An estimated 26.2 percent of Americans ages 18 and older or about one in four adults suffer from a diagnosable mental disorder in a given year. When you see staggering numbers like this you have to scratch your head and ask yourself – Are they the normal or am I?
As a mental health nurse I have listen to the hundreds of stories from families and patients themselves – the home life for these families are far from normal, calm, or picture perfect. Living inside the home with someone who has been diagnosed with a disease that takes them out of control of themselves, or watching them responds to internal stimuli is not what a mother dreams of when they look at their newborn baby.
I have to wonder how many mental illness cases is true mental illness from the DNA structure. The world is surrounded by pills, alcohol and drug mixtures.
The United States spends $113 billion on mental health treatment.
I overheard someone mention they had a strong headache after lunch. I offered my Peppermint essential oil that I use for my own headaches, and the response causes me to step back shaking my head, wondering how our world has become a instant fix society.
They did not want the natural essential oil that would help them – they wanted a loratab – which is a narcotic.
Our society does not want to feel pain – they have a pill for that. They do not want to be tired they take a pill for that. They want to sleep deeper than normal…they take a pill for that. When they are upset, grieving, going through a rough patch in their life they reach for a pill to numb them from feeling the emotions that go with life.
If it was one pill it would not be so bad, except one pill leads to another one to help the side effects of the first one…the cycle continues and the condition get worse due to new side effects that pop up.
Don’t get me wrong there are truly times you need medication however, did you know every day in the US, 2,500 youth (12 to 17) abuse a prescription pain reliever for the first time. Prescription drug abuse causes the largest percentage of deaths from drug overdosing. Of the 22,400 drug overdose deaths in the US in 2005, opioid painkillers were the most commonly found drug, accounting for 38.2% of these deaths. That number has since gone way up
According to the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University, teens who abuse prescription drugs are twice as likely to use alcohol, five times more likely to use marijuana, and twelve to twenty times more likely to use illegal street drugs such as heroin, Ecstasy and cocaine than teens who do not abuse prescription drugs.
Why do people take drugs?
People take drugs because they want to change something in their lives. Just a few of the reasons.
- To fit in
- To escape or relax
- To relieve boredom
- To seem grown up
- To rebel
- To experiment
In the beginning they think that the pill or the drugs are the solution, in the end the drug becomes the problem. As difficult as it may be to deal with your problems – in the long run you’re better off looking at them with a clear focus and sober.
People are creating bigger problems for themselves, shattering their brains ability to think clear without delusions – and walking through life in a fog.
When I hear a client say after a long clean stretch of being drug free they would continue if they walked out the door that day – it is heart breaking to know the choices they are making are not solid choices that will carry them very far in their life.
People – We need to talk about mental illness – we are surrounded.
Angela was voted 110th Leading Moms in Business she is also proud for her achievement of being the first member of her business to build a solid Silver 2nd level Team Performance and over 30,000 in volume without using the phone. She is setting a model of how to build relationships online, through social media, blogging and email.