Life is tough — but we can aLL learn to help ourselves
For decades it was an issue shrouded in secrecy and shame, something to be feared, ignored or ridiculed. Today, mental health is rarely out of the headlines.
But we have reached a critical point: continuing to ‘raise awareness’ of mental health — the goal of recent public campaigns — has become a double-edged sword.
Indeed, so ‘aware’ are people, we risk driving more and more of them to seek help when they don’t actually have a mental illness.
GP surgeries and mental health services — as my colleagues and I know only too well — are being inundated with people struggling to cope with everyday difficulties that can make all of us feel sad, anxious or low.
So what we need to do now is concentrate on enabling people to help themselves when it comes to their mental health.
Which is why I feel so passionately about Public Health England’s (PHE) new initiative Every Mind Matters — not least because I was involved from its conception.
It launched this week with a three-minute TV film by Love Actually director richard Curtis. Among the cast are Gillian Anderson, Glenn Close, Nadiya Hussain and Freddie Flintoff, and it is narrated by the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge and the Duke and Duchess of Sussex.
The focal point is a speciallydeveloped website that provides access to the first preventative mental health resource of its kind in the world.
Approved by the royal College of General Practitioners, the website takes users through a series of questions to build a personalised action plan.
The predominant message is that taking care of our mental health is as important as good physical health. And when we’re struggling a bit, there are easy things we can do to get back on track. The website shows users how to build simple change into their lives: such as ‘reframing’ unhelpful thoughts, breathing exercises and increasing physical activity.
SOME
cynics have suggested the new campaign is a surefire way of labelling everyone with a mental illness. Actually, it’s the precise opposite.
From the beginning, PHE was keen to ensure the campaign didn’t medicalise people and further overwhelm mental health services.
The aim is to strengthen mental resilience so people can live more fully in the present, feel and function better, enjoy more positive relationships, and be better placed to manage difficult times without resorting to their GP or mental health services.
Take the young man referred to me recently: he’d been prescribed antidepressants after breaking down in tears in front of his GP. I discovered he was grief-stricken over the death of his mother. I immediately stopped the medication. Crying because your mother has died is normal and I’d be more worried if the patient had not showed his emotions.
That’s not to say his situation wasn’t deeply challenging for him, but it wasn’t pathological. Life can be difficult, frustrating, disappointing and uncertain — and that’s when we need mental resilience.
We know prevention is better than cure and the opportunity for early intervention provided by the Every Mind Matters website will help reduce the risk of deterioration into full-blown mental illness.
In the long-term, I hope this campaign will ease the pressure on health services as people distinguish between the need for ‘self-care’ or seeking clinical help.
In the 20 years that I’ve worked in mental health things have changed beyond all recognition. This is a very welcome next step.