Warning Signs of Poor Mental Health

What are the warning signs of mental illness? Dramatic changes in behavior Personality change Mood swings Inability to concentrate and cope Bizarre behavior and speech Reckless and uncontrolled behavior Duration - Persist over an extended period of time Affect quality of life Friendships, social life Fearful, anxious, withdrawn No longer enjoy life

What are some of the mental illnesses that affect young people? MOOD DISORDERS – depression, bipolar disorder THOUGHT DISORDERS – schizophrenia, bipolar disorder ANXIETY DISORDERS – examples: phobias, social anxiety disorder, panic disorder, obsessive compulsive disorder EATING DISORDERS – anorexia, bulimia MOOD DISORDERS – Jessica was originally diagnosed with depression, but in her early twenties she began to have periods of mania alternating with depression and doctors diagnosed bipolar disorder. It’s not unusual for mental illness to evolve and diagnoses to change over the years. THOUGHT DISORDERS – These are illnesses characterized by hallucinations and delusions when people are actively psychotic. Remember John Nash, the brilliant mathematician in “A Beautiful Mind” obsessed with numbers. According to his biographer he once believed that aliens or foreign governments were communicating with him through the New York Times . In our middle school lesson we tell the story of a teenager, Brian, whose desire to avenge a minor wrong at camp turned into a paranoid obsession of such intensity that it took over his life and he finally had to be hospitalized. ANXIETY DISORDERS – Phobias are the most common kind of anxiety disorder and our elementary school lessons introduce the concept of mental illness by asking kids to share their phobias, for example fear of spiders or fear of heights. And in our soon to be published middle school lessons we tell the story of girl with OCD who is always late to school because she has so many obsessive rituals to complete before she can leave the house. EATING DISORDERS – Although we don’t deal with eating disorders in much detail in our lessons in our high school plans we talk about Jessica weighing only 79 pounds when she was hospitalized with anorexia in 8th grade.

Severe mental illnesses are NOT: Anybody’s fault A character flaw Hopeless! ANYBODY’S FAULT or A CHARACTER FLAW– They are not caused by poor parenting or weak character HOPELESS! - These illnesses present difficult challenges, but help is available.

So … What is Resilience? Resilience is the capacity to adapt successfully in the face of threats or disaster. People can improve their capacity for resilience at any time of life. Being resilient doesn’t mean going through life without experiencing stress and pain. People feel grief, sadness, and a range of other emotions after adversity and loss. Resilience develops as people grow up and gain better thinking and self-management skills http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WnH45nKEEgU