September 7, 2022 – Pooja Mehta is starting to get worried and hear the voices When she was 15 years old.
“I was fortunate to have my parents that are incredibly supportive and they insisted that I get professional help. I was vehemently opposed to the idea, but I listened to it,” says Mehta, who lives in Washington, DC. She was diagnosed with an anxiety disorder with auditory hallucinations.
But her parents were very concerned about how others would receive her diagnosis.
“I grew up in a South Asian community, and my parents made it clear that information about my mental illness would not be well received in the community and I shouldn’t tell anyone,” she says.
In addition to a few family members and friends, Mehta, now 27, did not share her diagnosis.
She realizes that her parents’ advice was to protect her. But she says, “I took it as self-stigmatizing and it felt like it mental illness It is something I should be ashamed of, which has led me to be uninvolved in my care and trying to convince myself that there was nothing wrong. If the patient does not participate in the treatment or health care treatment, it will not work well. “
When Mehta attended university, she had panic attack. She told her best friend in the dorm. The friend told the college authorities that they asked Mehta to leave because they saw that she was a danger to herself and others.
“The first time I told my entire story to people other than the intimate few at home was to a group of college administrators at a meeting where I was forced to defend my right to remain on campus and complete my education,” she says, describing the meeting as an “incredibly hostile experience.”
She and the administrators struck a “deal,” in which she was allowed to remain enrolled academically but not on campus. She returned to her family home and moved to the classroom.
This experience prompted Mehta to start talking about stigma in mental illness He told her story publicly. Today, she has a master’s degree in public health and is completing a congressional fellowship in health policy.
Mehta shared her story in a new book, You’re not alone: NAMI’s Guide to Navigating Mental Health – With tips from experts and wisdom from real individuals and families, Written by Ken Duckworth, MD, chief medical officer of the National Alliance on Mental Illness.
Mehta is one of 130 people who shared first-person accounts of their struggle with mental illness in the book, as a way to challenge the stigma surrounding the disease and educate the public about what it feels like to face mental health challenges.
stark difference
Duckworth says he was inspired to write the book after his family’s experience with mental illness. His father had bipolar disorder, but there was no “social permission” or permission from within the family to talk about his father’s condition, which is shrouded in secrecy and shame, he said.
When Duckworth was in second grade, his father lost his job after a frenzy and his family moved from Philadelphia to Michigan. He remembers the cops dragging his father out of the house.
He says he believed at the time: “Something that can move an entire family hundreds of miles must be the most powerful force in the world, but no one was willing to talk about it.”
His desire to understand his father led to Duckworth becoming a Psychiatrist And learn practical tools to help people with mental illness.
When Duckworth was a resident, he had cancer.
“I was treated like a hero,” he says. “When I got home, people brought casseroles. But when my father was admitted to the hospital for his mental illness, there was no cheer, no casseroles. It was such a stark difference. My father, like me, had an illness Threatening his life and it wasn’t his fault, but society treated us differently. I was excited to ask, “How can we do better?”
His passion for answering that question eventually led him to become the Alliance’s chief medical officer and begin writing the book.
“This is the book my family and I need,” he says.
The ‘silver lining’ of COVID-19
According to the National Alliance on Mental Illness, an estimated 52.9 million people — about a fifth of all adults in the United States — had mental illness in 2020. Mental illness affected 1 in 6 young adults, with 50% of lifelong mental illnesses begin before age 14.
Since the COVID-19 pandemic, mental health has worsened, both in the United States and around the world, says Duckworth. But the ‘silver lining’ is that pandemic “I changed mental illness from a ‘them’ problem to a ‘we’ problem. So many people have suffered or suffer from mental illness that discussions about it have become normal and the stigma has subsided. People are now interested in this topic more than ever.”
That is why he says, “This is a book whose time has come.”
The book covers a wide range of topics, including diagnosis, navigating the US health care system, insurance questions, how best to help loved ones with mental illness, practical guidance on dealing with a range of mental health conditions, and drug use that co-occurs Combined with mental illness, how to deal with the death of a loved one suicide, how to help family members who don’t think they need help, how to help children, the impact of trauma, and how to become an advocate. It includes advice from renowned clinical experts, practitioners, and scientists.
Among the “experts” included in the book were 130 people with mental illness who shared their stories. Duckworth explains that people with mental illness have a unique experience that comes directly from their experience and is different from the experience that scientists and health professionals bring to the table.
tell their story
Mehta became involved with the National Alliance on Mental Illness shortly after her confrontation with officials at the university.
“This event prompted me to start a NAMI class in college, and it became one of the largest student organizations on campus,” she says. Today, Mehta serves on the board of directors of the national organization.
She encourages people with mental illness to tell their story, noting that the Coalition and many other organizations can “create a space to participate in a safe and welcoming environment – not because you feel pressured or pressured, but because it’s something you want to do if and when you feel ready.”
Duckworth hopes the book will provide useful information and inspire people with mental illness to realize that they are not alone.
“We want readers to know that there is a wide community with the same issues and knows that there are resources and guidance available,” he says.
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