The awareness of mental health and life in today is everyone's responsibility, this is no longer about mental illness that we just see as ordinary people suffering from a mental illness on the street or a mental hospital but everyone has access to mental illness, no matter our circumstances. poor, famous, rich, having a good spiritual life, whatever. The high suicide rate, the loss of our sympathy & compassion for others, that's what we see now, all starting with restless souls. And began to question ourselves that perhaps it also contributed to the cause of someone experiencing depression.
QOTW # 24 for this week, the month of mental health awareness collaboration @ecotrain @ocd @naturalmedicine @hivebuzz challenges us to elaborate on everything related to Mental health awareness, what is mental health, how is a pandemic and increases mental health sufferers significantly, what's methods can we take to quickly realize that we are not okay, etc. Anyone can join in on their opinion about how important mental health awareness. For more complete information, please follow the following link here.
Intermezzo
Talking about the topic for QOTW #24 this time about Mental Health awareness reminds me of the movie "Eat Pray Love" starring by Julia Roberts and released in 2010. And I watched it again for the umpteenth time a few days ago.
Adapted from Elizabeth Gilbert's inspirational novel of the same title. The true story of Elizabeth Gilbert's struggle who tried to clean up her almost messy life, panic, sadness that led to depression because of things that were so complex that she didn't even know how to describe them. Actually, if it is said to be brilliant, Liz's life at that time was like a star. At the age of 30, an American woman with a fairly successful career, a good married life, only one possible spiritual journey to her heart that she doesn't have, until one scene she prayed to God and said that she was sorry that she had never tried to know Him , but she wanted to get a clue to her inner troubles at the time. Finally Liz had to choose a divorce for her marriage. The stress of the divorce as well as her love affair with her new boyfriend, which seemed flat, made her fall into depression. Liz tried to get up in her own way until finally Liz decided to go to visit three countries, namely Italy, India, and Indonesia (Bali) and the new story began. I call Liz Gilbert's story part of mental health too. How Liz realized to immediately fix what was wrong in her life, namely self-acceptance, trying to forgive herself, not needing to listen to bad things that other people said about us and starting to maintain the balance of life between the world and the spiritual. In her journey, Liz meets various people and gets insight into the positive side of life, providing valuable life lessons for Liz. The complexity of human nature that does not revolve around just good and bad. We need to protect ourselves from the evil of our irrational thoughts, because if bad thoughts are not filtered out they will make us feel inferior, to live uselessly, and to feel sorry for ourselves for a long time. Our minds will be closed and we will not be able to see many good things that maybe we can do at that time.
When you are in trouble, try to move on, remember that something new, different, and more valuable, we deserve.
"I think I deserve something beautiful"
For a more extreme story about the dangers of mental health, check out the 2010 film with title Black Swan, starring Natalie Portman. Tells the story of a young ballerina Nina Sayers. Nina begins to experience hallucinations and anorexia due to the pressure of the ballerina's tough struggles and competition. She was very ambitious to get the role of Black Swan, she always had a bad idea that her friend Lily was very ambitious to grab her role as Swan Queen. This film indirectly depicts the effects of ambition that is not matched by a stable mental state. Until the end of the film, we are made not aware that all the bad things that happen to Nina's life are part of her hallucinations until finally she actually kills herself beyond the limits of her consciousness.
And true stories about the dangers of mental health that are often presented in our daily life on social media, some Kpop Artists who committed suicide due to depression some time ago. Because of the bullying by their fans on their social media comment columns. And there are many other stories that can be a lesson for everyone to start caring about all the issues about mental health awareness. We see terrible tragic stories of mental health. It is time for everyone to be truly aware of the importance of maintaining mental health.
Mental Health And Modern Life Today
Modern life provides all its conveniences with the rapid development of technology at hand. But all this is accompanied by various problems that arise, especially regarding mental health. In this modern era, mental health is the core of serious problems that must be sought for solutions, the role of each individual to carry out self-awareness about this. It is no longer a stigma, a taboo thing to talk about under the pretext that people with mental disorders are interference from demons or people who are far from religion, etc. And those with mental health need to be shunned, shackled or isolated. Mental health medically is a problem with our brain function.
Mental health is basically influenced by events that occur in a person's life, thus leaving a big impact on a person's personality and behavior. Nowadays, it is common to cause depression such as domestic violence, pressure on work, sexual harassment, addiction, bullying, etc. If these mental disorders are not handled properly and immediately, mental illness will arise which will affect one's personality as well as the way a person manages stress, it can even lead to acts of hurting oneself or hurting others physically. Many of us see terrible cases such as suicide, massacre, etc. which are none other than all originated from depression.
Increasing mental health awareness for individuals is important to continue with the introduction of early stage mental crisis intervention education. For example, when we feel depressed, do not convict ourselves that we are hopeless. But we must try to contemplate ourselves taking the time to find what causes it, trying to find solutions.
Recognize mental health symptoms from the start for better stress management, here are some common symptoms:
• Frequent hallucinations, delusions and excessive fear.
• Loss of ability to concentrate.
• Worry excessively and always feel bad about yourself.
• It is difficult to deal with stress on everyday problems.
• Withdraws from associations and prefers to be alone.
• Frequent thoughts of hurting yourself or others.
• When angry, we often takes out things or even hits anyone who is near us.
• Often feels that we hears strange noises in our mind and believes them to be orders.
• Frequent unexplained pain in certain body parts.
• Frequent fights with family or friends.
• Moods change drastically, causing poor relationships with other people.
• Feeling sad, meaningless, helpless, useless, and hopeless.
• Extinguish any problems with smoking and drinking excessive alcohol or even taking drugs.
• Often feels confused, anxious, worried, scared, angry, forgetful, offended, etc.
• Difficulty sleeping, excessive fatigue, feeling weak.
Apart from symptoms, identifying the causes of mental health is also important. The following are causes of mental health that are common today:
• Have had a head injury.
• In the family there are members who suffer from mental disorders due to genetic factors.
• Experiencing domestic violence.
• Sexual harassment.
• Trauma due to past / childhood abuse.
• There is a disturbance in brain function.
• Experiencing the loss of someone closest to you.
• Divorce
• Experiencing discrimination in association.
• Economic problems, accounts payable, bankruptcy from business, unemployment, fired from work.
• Living in a conflict area.
• The influence of anti depressants, alcohol, cigarettes, drugs.
• Isolated socially, and feels lonely.
• Trauma has been in a war, had an accident, and was a victim of crime.
• Postnatal depression.
• Stress due to stressful work problems, failure in a relationship, etc.
Mental disorders are categorized into many conditions, here are categories of mental health disorders that we often encounter in our lives today:
• Anxiety Disorders, Sufferers often feel anxious in response to an event or object, feel excessive fear and worry, characterized by cold sweats, faster heart rates, dizziness, difficulty concentrating, difficulty sleeping. An example of Anxiety disorder is a phobia of something.
• Mood Disorder, or better known as affective disorder. Patients with this disorder will feel excessive sadness and joy excessive. Sometimes emotional shifting or fluctuation from feelings of happiness to feelings of extreme sadness. Included in this group of disorders are bipolar disorder, long-term depression, premenstrual mood disorders, depression due to physical illness.
• Psychotic Disorder, psychotic disorders including severe mental disorders. Someone will easily hallucinate such as hearing, seeing, and feeling something that is not there. It is also easy for sufferers to have delusions by believing in things that have never happened and making them afraid.
• Eating Disorder, this disorder is related to eating behavior which is often fatal. An example of this disorder is anorexia, which considers itself overweight when in fact it is not, so it forces itself not to eat. Bulimia nervosa, eating large quantities which are then forcibly expelled by regurgitating them. Binge eating, many eating behaviors cannot be stopped.
• Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder- OCD, a person with this disorder always has thoughts or obsesses over one thing repeatedly, for example washing hands or limbs many times in intense time for fear of exposure to germs or fear of dust, people wiping glass or table over and over, etc.
• Impulse Control & Addiction Disorder- ICAD, a disorder that cannot resist the urge to take an action that sometimes endangers oneself and others. For example addiction to porn videos, addiction to sex, addiction to shopping, addiction to alcohol and drugs, kleptomania, pyromania (igniting a fire anywhere and causing a fire).
• Personality Disorder, a personality disorder about thought patterns, feelings and behaviors that are different from most people. For example Borderline personality, namely fear of abandonment, mood swings, impulsive behavior, instability. Anti-social personality disorder, actions such as not caring about other people's feelings, like manipulating for personal gain, not feeling guilty about bad deeds to others, etc.
• Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder- PTSD, a mental health disorder caused by feeling traumatic about an event. For example, sexual harassment, bullying, someone who has died, natural disasters, wars, etc. These bad memories cannot be removed, which makes PTSD sufferers tend to feel emotionally numb.
• Dissociative Disorders, people with this disorder tend to forget about who they are, their identity and the environment in which they live. This disorder is usually caused by prolonged stress due to trauma to an event that one has experienced or witnessed happening to others. An example of dissociative disorder is multiple personality identity disorder.
How Important Self Care & Self Love For Fight The Mental Health
"To fall in love with yourself is the first secret to happiness." - Robert Morely
Self care sounds tough but it's our strength to help fight depression. Realizing how much we are worth ourselves from all the problems we face. Physical, spiritual and emotional are all interconnected and mutually supporting aspects. Taking care of all aspects of yourself can improve your overall health, both physical and mental.
Self care in general is an activity to make ourselves feel special with the aim of increasing our welfare. The mental health conditions experienced by a person are definitely different, that means they need different things for self-care. When our self-awareness increases, there will be positive effects on our body as a whole, both psychologically and physically.
Self-care activities that are suggested by doing things that are beneficial to ourselves, reflect the way we take care of ourselves at the most basic level. For example, maintaining bedtime, drinking enough water, doing regular exercise, walking in the morning, eating nutritious food, meditating, always smiling & thanking, doing yoga practices, helping each others, etc.
The concept of Self love is more to "ME TIME" doing something we love, such as pampering ourselves to a beauty salon, watching movies, eating at a restaurant, traveling, etc. The point is doing fun things for yourself. Being alone does not mean loneliness, time is needed to be able to feel inner pleasure. With this time method we can get rid of the negative energy that is within us. So in addition to being busy working, and maintaining rest time, we also need to physically do fun things so that our psyche is happy too. Forgiving the mistakes of others who make mistakes in our life is also a concept of self love, it will bring a sense of peace in the heart instead of always keeping anger. Self love aims to keep our hearts dynamically. Appreciation that grows from actions that support physical, psychological, and spiritual improvement.
Social Media And Mental Health Awareness
Social media and our lives today are like staple foods that we must consume. Not only adults, babies, children, parents have wide access to social media. Social Media connects people anywhere and anytime, the plus side of social media gives everyone the space to develop communication skills, make friends, pursue areas of interest, and share thoughts and ideas. But the downside for some people social media is like addiction and also a trigger for depression.
A research report in the journal JAMA Psychiatry says "adolescents who use social media for more than 3 hours per day are at high risk for mental health problems, especially problems with internalization or self-image."
On social media, everyone displays the best side of their life which is sometimes inversely related to the reality of their life, it can even be a trigger for other people who feel their life is not so good and feel that their self-esteem has decreased. Many women feel they look bad when they see how people look on social media. Every day comparing our lives with the lives of others can trigger mental distraction in our souls, increase our jealousy in the lives of others, and it can lead to fatal actions in order to have what other people have.
FOMO, Fear of Missing Out is one of the phenomena that has become toxic to us personally on social media. Afraid to miss the news what is happening right now. Notifications that keep ringing force us to repeatedly access social media. FOMO can be fatal to increase our sense of dissatisfaction as well as feelings of anxiety. Some people lightly argue "that is the risk of playing social media, if it is disturbed just stop" if negative things like this are allowed for reasons of justification and are commonplace it is not possible to become a more serious problem. For example, someone who is subjected to insults on social media is considered a normal risk, and the person being insulted becomes depressed and commits suicide or the person who receives the insult turns to insult someone else, can this be said to be normal? Hi ... where is our conscience?
Maybe we should start limiting our access to social media too intensely. Breaking the cycle is not easy, but at least we can start scheduling access to social media at certain time intervals. Using social media in a smart way and ensuring that it has a positive impact on our lives is an effort to fortify ourselves from the negative impact of social media consumption on mental health, especially in adolescents and children who need a lot of direction to use social media wisely.
My Story For Fight Mental Health Illness
This life is places for problems have deal, I know that! Everyone has different physics powers when dealing with problems. Was immersed in a deep depression as a result of an event in my life a few years ago, and the same symptom came a few months ago when I was trying to accept the loss of someone who really meant a lot in my life. When I felt depressed, even looked in the mirror as if there were terrible faces there so I didn't dare to look in the mirror, there was a time when I even talked and laughed myself and the most terrible thing I ever tried to kill myself. How the fear and anxiety I felt had such a profound impact on my psychology and physique. I became quiet, cried a lot, I no longer paid attention to my body health, had difficulty sleeping, had difficulty eating, my body was neglected, and I was easily irritated. My family took me to visit doctors and hospitals, and limited to meeting many people out there, not because of embarrassment but how their words that were like a sharp knife would hurt my soul more, that's what the family is trying to protect. I try to get up, of course, with great support from my family. Within 5 months I was finally free from this terrible thing. For now I always try not to get too caught up in the bad things that are happening in my life. I try to move forward and accept the reality that must be faced. Think positively that every problem always has a solution. Crying is sad because it's a human thing. Trying to be closer to God and always taking time for spiritual things. Writing is a space for me to be able to control the stress I face, maintain communication with my family, gardening is a great alternative to heal my soul, spend time at the week for walking in the park, watching movies, cooking my favorite food, shopping at the end of the month, reading books, helping others, etc. I try to love myself and emphasize that my life is more valuable than anything else. I must said grateful for my life.
Herbs And Alternative Therapies To Overcome Mental Health Problems
Antidepressants are drugs that are often given by health practitioners to reduce symptoms of mental illness, because of their effect on improving the balance of chemicals in the brain and neurotransmitters responsible for mood and behavior. But in some cases these drugs become addictive for sufferers, which for a long time worrying everyone about the side effects of chemical drugs, especially on the liver and kidneys.
Alternative and herbal therapies are often questioned by sufferers, so that there are no side effects. But in the medical world alternative therapy and herbal medicine have not yet met a synchronous point and are still considered weak in scientific terms. For example, alternative therapies that we know today such as the dzikir ruqyah method, meditation, yoga, mantra recitation, prayer recitation, light therapy, massage therapy, acupuncture, etc. have a certain local cultural and religious background so that it cannot be said to be maximal for the wide population.
In cases of mild and moderate levels of anxiety, insomnia, depression, you can slowly use herbal therapy on a daily basis, here are herbal alternatives that can be used for daily use:
• Kava plant (Piper methysticum) is one of the most researched herbs for anxiety disorders and has good scientific evidence to calm, reduce anxiety, help with sleeplessness, for muscle relaxation and pain relief. In high doses the Kava plant can have a euphoric effect.
• Turmeric, The curcumin content in turmeric has been clinically proven to be able to overcome health problems both physically and mentally. Turmeric helps to balance the body's metabolism and helps the process of protein assimilation in the body. Turmeric acts as an excellent anti-inflammatory to reduce the potential for anxiety and depression. Turmeric is also able to improve cognitive and protective features that are useful in cases of dementia and Alzheimer's.
• Ginger, has a calming effect and its high content of antioxidants is beneficial for physical and mental health. Helps stimulate blood circulation, provides a warm effect and as an analgesic to treat pain in nerves. Ginger is able to overcome depression by improving our digestive system, relieving sluggishness, and increasing metabolism in the body.
• Lavender, bergamot, rosemary, aromatherapy oils are believed to reduce anxiety when inhaled with their gentle aroma.
• Consume foods that contain Folate such as nuts, beans, dark green leafy vegetables, sunflower seeds, avocados. Studies show a link between low folic acid levels and depression "500 micrograms of folic acid a day is associated with improved mental state."
• According to Biological Psychiatry, "low levels of zinc in the blood are associated with anxiety and depression." Nutrition Neuroscience recommends consuming 25 milligrams of zinc daily for 12 days to reduce symptoms of depression. Zinc can be obtained from red meat, seafood, nuts, seeds, spinach, mushrooms, garlic, egg yolks, dark chocolate, yogurt, Swiss cheese, etc. Meeting the daily needs of zinc will increase omega 3 fatty acids in the body which function for healthy brain function.
• Basil leaves, the antioxidants in basil leaves are good for improving brain function while preventing hallucination symptoms.
• Ginseng, has antioxidants that are good for dealing with symptoms of anxiety and hallucinations.
• Tea Tree Oil, comes from the Melaleuca tree. Contains anti-inflammatory, anti-viral, and anti-septic. Provides many benefits for physical and mental health by providing a calming effect on the brain.
There are still many herbal healing therapies from A-Z that help relieve symptoms or help the healing process for people with mental disorders that we can learn from. Combining alternative therapies with biomedical therapy to get maximum treatment results, it is necessary to consult this with the doctor who treats the patient. One caution in using herbal therapy is its interaction with drugs given by doctors, it could be that therapy X is not compatible with biomedical treatment Z so that it could be fatal. So it is wise to decide on alternative therapies besides the medical therapy that the doctor has given.
Thus my article this time about "It's Time To Care & Understand About Mental Health Awareness" not only for us personally but also for our family, loved ones, friends, etc. Balance between life world and spiritual services that we must take care of for our physical and psychological health. I am not saying that people who are very close to God are people who are free from mental disorders, because in fact we also find things that they justify such as killing, terrorism etc. in the name of religion, even though for people who do not acknowledge God, it is very contradictory and that is the real mental disorder, when love and care are die for each other.[]
| References |
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| What's Mental Health |
| Why Self Love can lead the Mental Health |
| Why Self Care is vital for mental health |
| Herbs For Mental Health |
| Social Media and Mental Health, benefits, Risk, Opportunity |
