Functioning with a mental health illness

The more I get into the world of mental health the more I become convinced most people broadly fit into one of two categories: non-functioning or functioning.

The first group is the one which probably receives the most attention and there is the most awareness around - it's the group who may not be able to work because of their mental health issues, they may be unable to hold down a relationship or any regular commitment such as volunteering, they withdraw almost completely from society due to the impact of their illness. 

But there is also another huge group of people who are what I've come to term 'functioning' because far from withdrawing, they seem to become more involved the more impact their health has on them. I have definitely always been in this bracket and I think that makes it much harder for others to see there is a mental health issue present or to understand it once it does emerge.

When your life's so full anyway and then you take on more and more in an attempt to mask your illness, it becomes your way of living that you pile more and more into your schedule and limit the amount of time you actually have to sit down on your own and confront the fact you're poorly.

People kept telling me 'you'll make yourself ill with all this work' but they didn't realise I was actually already ill and using that to mask it. When I was eventually admitted on to the ward, it was almost a relief to grind to a complete stop and do nothing. It was also a shock to the system to do a complete 180.

I feel whilst any stigma-reducing or awareness-increasing around mental health is valuable, we need to start thinking more about both groups of people. Yes it's important to look at the 'non-functioning' group and how to get them more involved in society but we also need to be aware of the huge numbers of people who from the outside might look alright - with a job, home, stable relationships etc - but in reality are struggling under the huge weight of the burden of mental illness.

School - where good mental health starts

When you spend a large portion of your life thinking about mental health, you come across all sorts of statistics. They never fail to shock or move me but sometimes one sticks out and stays with me for a long time. One of the biggest ones for me is the fact 50 per cent of all mental health issues emerge before the age of 14 and 75 per cent before 25.

Just let that sink in for a while. 

While we all know it's true (how often do you speak to someone and their mental health was a problem right from their school days?) and I myself am in that bracket, it's still a pretty staggering figure. And it makes it all the more puzzling why next to nothing is done in schools on mental health. I appreciate it's hugely dependant on which school you went to and I don't have firsthand experience of schooling in Redditch so really can't comment on what they are or aren't doing here; however it just isn't good enough things are done on such an ad hoc basic. Essentially it's luck of the draw whether your school will be good at dealing with mental health or not.

To me school is a place where you learn how to live in the real world. In theory your guide ropes tying you your parents or carers are snipped away slowly until you can stand without support. This not only requires you to learn educationally, but also to learn some life lessons too. Even if you think of it as being a 'sausage factory' churning out identi-kit corporate suits who have five degrees and all the business know-how you could ever want, these people are still that - people. They will have relationship breakdowns, traumatic events and plenty of stress to deal with, even if they're not affected by a diagnosable mental health issue.

Our formative years are exactly the time to be giving young people the tools the know how to deal with issues which will arise throughout their lives. We'll never eradicate severe mental health issues and there will always have to be a system set up to deal with those at that end of the spectrum but is is clear by talking openly and offering coping mechanisms we can make a change in the way the next generation tackle problems going forward.

I'm not for a minute suggesting untrained teachers should be responsible for this on top of the workload they already have but what I am strongly suggesting is we are doing a disservice to our children by sending them off into the big, wide world with a string of A grades but no emotional resilience except that which they've had to teach themselves.

There seems to be a fear which arises from the stigma surrounding mental health that we can't mention it to children - as if they may spontaneously combust at the mere mention of the topic. Of course sitting down pre-schoolers to have an in depth discussion on suicide is wholly inappropriate but age-appropriate sessions could and should be incorporated into school life so that it becomes normal to talk about mental health and wellbeing.

Every child experiences it - whether through their own issues or those of a family member or friend - so it's simply unacceptable to shy away from discussing it with them. It saves money in the long term if fewer children end up entering the system later on and more than that, it is our moral responsibility to guide them - not only educationally but also emotionally. We are failing the next generation if we don't.