Why Mental Health Is Important
Mental health is just as important as physical health, and the two truly tie into one another. Mental health issues are one of the leading causes of disability in America, with an estimated 18.1% (or 43.6 million) adults in the United States dealing with mental health conditions in any given year. About 4.2% (9.8 million) adults have a debilitating severe mental health condition. In fact, neuropsychiatric disorders are the leading cause of disability in the entire United States.
Mental health is not a condition that just develops overnight. Knowing whether or not you’re vulnerable to mental health conditions means knowing your risk factors. When you start to notice that your mental health status is changing, you can take preventative measures to ensure that it doesn’t get worse.
Your mental health affects how you think, feel, and act. And it can impact the people around you. While we have the entire month of May dedicated to mental health awareness, it’s never too soon to educate yourself on why mental health is so incredibly important.
Suicide Rates and Risk
Unfortunately, suicide rates shift to an upward trend when mental health is neglected. There’s also a ripple effect that’s created by the suicide of a loved one. Suicide touches everyone at some point during their lives. Trauma and grief leave lasting impacts on those who lose a loved one to suicide, and that certainly impacts their mental health, too.
In the United States, the suicide rate rose by 25.4% from 1999 to 2016. Increases occurred in every state except for Nevada. In just 2018 alone, there were 1.4 million suicide attempts nationwide and over 48,000 deaths by suicide. This makes it the tenth leading cause of death overall in the United States.
So, who does suicide affect? Statistics show that men are 3.7 times more likely than women to commit suicide. The highest suicide rates among ethnicities in the U.S. are American Indian/Alaska Native individuals followed by non-Hispanic white people. The highest suicide rates by age occur in men ages 65 and older. Veterans are 1.5 times more likely than non-veterans to commit suicide. Individuals living in rural areas are more likely to commit suicide than those living in the suburbs or urban areas. LGBTQ+ adults and youths are also more likely to commit suicide.
When people’s mental health is neglected — either by themselves, those around them, or a combination of the two — suicide becomes more likely to occur. It hinders our ability to be happy, healthy, and overall well-adjusted. Suicidal ideation takes away your energy, causing struggles with work, home, school, and social life. Even an indirect threat of suicide is something that needs to be taken seriously.
Mental Health and Physical Health Correlate
There is an incredibly strong link between mental and physical health. When someone has a mental health condition, people tend to blame the brain for being faulty. The truth is that your body is an entire system linked together by detailed and complex mini-systems that all have to work together. Neurotransmitters happen to be at the core of these systems, and they do not merely exist within the brain.
Mental health conditions are just as much a disease as any other your body can incur. Focusing just on your physical health most likely will not improve your mental health — and vice-versa. Instead, what needs to exist is balance.
Take, for example, anxiety and stress. These two conditions will wreak havoc upon your physical health. When you worry, your body releases stress hormones that quicken your pulse and breathing, elevate your blood pressure, and boost your blood sugar levels. When left untreated, this can eventually lead to problems with your muscles, heart, blood vessels, and more. The human body will literally start shutting itself down as a response to stress.
Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms
When things go awry and your mental health suffers, you might be tempted to find ways to self-medicate. Many people turn to drugs, alcohol, and other addictive behaviors (such as gambling) in order to cope with the things going on in their lives. But this only turns things from bad to worse.
Even without drugs or alcohol, we humans are still liable to use other unhealthy coping mechanisms and to do so without realizing it. Some people will avoid anything that’s not positive. This might seem like an emotionally healthy thing from the outside, but it’s a mentality that ignores reality. Some folks might also choose isolation as a way to cope. Sometimes, isolation can be a helpful short-term measure, but all too often, it becomes prolonged. Cutting all contact with loved ones ends up doing more harm than good for most people since humans are, by nature, social creatures.
Overanalyzing and worrying as methods of self-defense are unhelpful coping mechanisms, too. While it’s natural for us to want to avoid fearful stimuli, extreme avoidance and agonizing actually show that you’re lacking control, usually over a particular feeling (versus a real, fearful object).
Awareness Can End the Stigma
As already touched upon, there is a stigma that has been attached to mental health for hundreds of years. Even 50 years ago, people were being involuntarily institutionalized for everything from a “female disease” to an opium habit. This stigma did not shut down when the institutions did in the 1980s and 1990s.
The good news is that there is less stigma, and this stigma will continue to dissipate the more we understand mental health and its importance in our lives. Erasing the shame and guilt that has long come attached to mental health conditions means that people will be more likely to reach out and get the help they need.
When you experience shame as a result of this stigma, you’re more likely to engage in destructive behavior. And that just leads to an erosion of the self. Instead, by embracing mental health and learning about it, you can empower yourself to heal and become your more authentic self. It’s okay to accept the fact that you have mental health struggles. Accepting this can lead to the commitment to make some positive — and realistic — changes for yourself.
Mental Health Impacts All Aspects of Life
Your mental health touches upon every single aspect of your life. From your life at home with your family to your life at work, your mental health plays a role in your perception of the world around you and how you respond to it. How you cope with life and its many unexpected challenges hinges upon your mental health status.
When you let a condition go untreated, you’re more likely to see a domino effect. Lack of treatment can lead to depression and hopelessness, anxiety, stress, feelings of guilt and shame, a sense of worthlessness, and a feeling that you lack control. And this, for many people, has culminated in suicide and suicide attempts.
Relationships suffer. Work and school performances suffer. Social withdrawal leads to total isolation, which only serves to further harmful thoughts and feelings. You might lose interest in the things you used to enjoy. You might struggle to complete important tasks on time. You might have difficulty concentrating or lack the energy to do daily chores. You might even experience unhealthy eating habits.
By reaching out, you can learn how to cope once again. You can become healthier in all aspects of your life, although this will take time and effort. You can rebuild your relationships and start off on new adventures. You can regain control and start doing the things you used to love. You can begin to find meaning in your everyday life. And you might just serve as a great support system and beacon of hope to others going through their own mental health struggles.
Ways to Reach Out
When struggling with mental health, many people don’t reach out to ask for help. They might feel ashamed of or embarrassed by their condition. Or they might also fear rejection and judgment from others. However, reaching out and asking for help is important, which means accepting the mental health stigma. Increasingly, society is becoming more attuned to mental health and its importance, thereby lessening the grip its stigma has held for many years.
Reaching out is something that takes a number of different forms. Finding the right counselor is certainly a great way to get help. A lot of services now offer on-demand visits, and you can choose whether you want to see someone via an app like Zoom or Skype or if you prefer seeing a counselor in person.
You can also connect with other friends and family members to discuss your mental health. Whoever you trust to have your back, get in touch with them and let them know what is going on and that you just want their support. Support is necessary for how we navigate life’s choppiest waters.
Are you or someone you love struggling with mental health issues? If so, don’t be afraid to reach out to the National Mental Health Hotline at 866-903-3787. Not only can we answer your questions, but we can also listen to your concerns and provide you with resources and direct you onto the next step that you need to take.