Stigma is important because it causes many people to delay seeking help and getting treatment. People who are stigmatized are made to feel that they don’t have the same value in their community as other people. Thus, stigma is harmful it like racism in that it promotes institutionalized forms of discrimination, it also reinforces and intensifies the suffering of the disease. To have positive impact about mental health in my community is the change of the real problem it is worth solving. I need to understand what determines mental health .The World Health Organization (2013) action plan conceptualizes mental says mental health “a state of well-being in which the individual realizes his or her own abilities can cope with the normal stresses of life, can work productively and fruitfully, and is able to make a contribution to his or her community” (P.6). Unfortunately, mental health has been reduced to an ICD code and a diagnosis. But it is much more than that. Mental health is determined by the individual and the risk factors they possess, making each case unique. This predicates that each diagnosis requires careful analysis of the whole person, not just the standard questions that will lead to a textbook diagnosis. The change I will make in mental health to change from white couches and “tell me how you feel about that” to putting together the pieces of a complex puzzle called human life. I will also change 21st century, notion that is lost. Instagram models have portrayed a grossly false sense of reality, setting an incongruous example of what life should be like. Now imagine a formidable child growing up with that perfect picture in mind, which will never be attainable because it is masked by filters and Photoshop. Let’s travel down the rabbit hole of issues that can create; anorexia, bulimia, addiction, to name a few. Now take the same child who has a predilection toward mental health issues because their dopaminergic neurons are not functioning or they don’t have the necessary serotonin in their synaptic clefts to be happy all the time (because really, who does). That child is now at risk for more debilitating mental health disorders like bipolar, schizophrenia, depression, anxiety. The list goes on and on. Let’s flip the switch now, because thus far I have only given examples of first world problems. Depression, anxiety, and PTSD, I imagine, are all rampant among refugees who are denied asylum. Some have seen their entire families killed, but they don’t have the luxury to lay in bed for 14 hours a day because they must get up to survive one more day. I would promote change by attend town halls, community partial programs, youth programs and get involve with the conservatorship process to help the clients in my area and county. Lobby the court to promote change and social stigma around mental health.
Author – Ava Gillett – Lewis
