Prathamesh Themdeo | Jayendra Muley

Any individual on this Earth is born with two fundamental aspects. a physical aspect and mental aspect. Physical aspect deals with the biological structure of the human body. Whereas, the mental aspect of human being deals with emotions, feelings, psychology. As we say ’Human’, it makes the term prone to dysfunction (short term or long term). So, it is important to take care of and repair these dysfunctions timely. Since years, with the advancement in medical health, we have been successful in diagnosing and curing many physical disorders ranging from flu to cancer. However, Diabetes has become a household term. So, we have accepted the fact that this are the diseases that can overpower anybody & anywhere. As a community, we are comfortable to deal with patients of all the diseases except those are contagious and we take preventive measures. Similarly, a human being can get affected on the mental front right? Therefore, it is of crucial importance that we take care of our thinking process, behaviour, emotions, feelings, etc. and when anything of this gets disturbed we call it as ‘Mental illnesses. So, taking care of these human things is called looking after ‘Mental Health’. Now, in the same way, anybody can be physically ill, they can be mentally ill also. Consider a person affected by malaria. Do malaria mosquitoes see the age of the person? Do we call malaria patient a weak person? Do we start shaming the patient? Absolutely NO. Because we all know that, it can happen to anybody at any time. In a similar way, mental illness can affect a person at any age and at any time which is not in the hand of a patient so calling them weak is senseless.

Since centuries, mental health and illness is a part of human existence. Ancient world recognised it in the form of supernatural powers and superstitions. Mental illness used to be considered as a punishment given by God or anger of God. Ancient Greek, Indian, Egyptian civilizations have talked at length about causes and cure of mental illness. Somewhere between the 5th and 3rd centuries BCE, the Greek physician Hippocrates challenged the idea that mental instability was the result of supernatural wrath, and wrote that imbalances in thinking and behaviour were from “natural occurrences in the body,” in particular, the brain. This theory changed the dynamics of the concept of mental illness. Afterwards, in 6th century BCE, Egyptian philosophers recommended recreational activities like music, dance and painting to relieve symptoms of mental illness. Later in 792 CE, the first mental health hospital was founded in Baghdad. But still, the cover of superstitions projected this topic as a taboo and we can observe this mentality even today in the 21st century. Afterwards, this issue got attention after World War II when a population of 1 billion faced similar sad events like the death of relatives, jail custody, etc. This grabbed the attention of governments towards mental health as a separate concern. Western countries institutionalised mental care services but citizens saw adverse effects of keeping patients away from their close one. So, the movement of dis-institutionalisation gave rise to outpatient services like therapy and counselling. Here is when people started to accept mental illness as a human problem. Later on, WHO and governments framed policies for the same, but till today we are not able to make people comfortable about the fact that Mental illness is the ‘HUMAN’ thing and not any weakness or curse.

Due to our decade’s long negligence, mental health has become a hot topic in the 21st century. With our frustrating fast life, today’s world is most prone to disorders than ever. Some time back, we used to say, education of people will define the future of the country. Now, we need to add the term of mental health which will contribute more than expected to the future of the world. What steps do we take today to keep ourselves mentally healthy? What are our cures? How many are aware of mental illness? Answers to these questions will determine the future of each country and in turn humanity. Therefore, this is the time we have to uplift and study the topic. Psychological illness is often considered as a rare cause. This misconception is due to the lack of awareness because people suffering are not even able to recognise it. They come to know their illness when they are already at a severe stage. According to a survey, India is to have 20% of its population (nearly 200 million) facing some or the other type of mental disorder in 2020. Which means 1 out of every 7 Indians is mentally ill on some scale. In simple words, you can expect at least one person to be facing issue in your family or friend circle. We can expect this ratio to increase further due to the ongoing pandemic and social distancing. As mentioned earlier, illness is irrespective of the age, time and financial stability, background. Although, data has helped drawing some conclusions. Mental illness is being seen largely in teenagers and youngsters than any other age group. (This doesn’t mean that cases in middle age and old age are worth negligence.) Realising it as a matter of great concern, we turn towards its causes which is a relative term. It is called relative because cause or trigger can be different depending on individuals. The starting point can be literally anything like a conversation, a song, career, relationships, accidents, abuse, loneliness, trauma, etc. It totally depends on the person going through any situation. Therefore, it is very important for a person to timely detect any unusual behaviour which tells us the importance of education and awareness of this topic in society. With this regards, we often see extreme views. There is a group of people who criticize the humanness of the mental health concept, dominate the victims or are not able to detect whether they are having a problem or not. The other type of people is the ones who try to attach glamour and fake victimization to this subject. The latter type is most dangerous as they are deteriorating the environment despite knowing the scenario. Romanticising concept, gaining sympathy and indirectly promoting mental illness as the sign of fashion or elite behaviour are some of the bitter truth we can see even in such sensitive issues. This damages society’s perception of the victim and leads to confusion while detecting the real symptoms of disorders. Looking at the other dark side, recent hype of, mental health have given rise to many misconceptions and non-generalised solution. Narratives and quotes published by social platforms, organisations, and leaders are not clear and often misleads followers. Many of us are not able to find thin lines between terms like self-love and selfishness, stress and depression, feeling sad and feeling depressed, ‘Asking to talk-being actually available to hear, etc. We all have come across the most common phrase- “Nothing is more important than your mental health!” but no one explains the real meaning of the narrative. Of course, the statement is valid but in cases of real illness and not the regular conditions of stress, nervousness. A mentally healthy person with regular workload escaping the work just to experience comfort will be the case of misunderstanding. A mentally healthy person being lazy and distorting their own physical health in the name of ‘self-care’. Also, a person disturbing others’ mental stability in the name of self-protection are all the examples of misguidance happened due to unclear narratives. Therefore, we have to be cautious while sharing content or statements so that it does not result in any adverse effect on society.

Mental illness can occur due to both physical condition and mental condition. When the situation is not physical, and the person is getting affected by whatever is happening around, there can be two major causes for it. One; from childhood the concept of ‘self’ get evolved by the feedback our brain gets from the surrounding. The concept of self contains one’s like-dislikes, hobbies, strength, weakness etc. Due to our interactions from childhood, we develop a perception of our own personality. If any incident happens which proves that person’s self-perception was wrong then the conflict of thoughts arises. Because what was proved wrong was not just the trait of a person’s self, it was the identity that he/she has preserved for a prolonged period. And if that this self-interrogation does not lead in a sophisticated manner it can result in challenging situations like anxiety, depression, and other severe diseases. Second; whenever a person goes through major changes like job, place, educational institutions, relationships etc. it becomes difficult to cope up with the new scenario. Usually, there is a pattern followed to reach the stage of mental illness such as depression or anxiety disorder. Which is adverse situation-> overthinking-> actual illness. The first step of this cycle is not in our control but we can try to reverse our thoughts from the state of overthinking. Opening up (talking) is the first-aid for symptoms, one cannot always determine depression. In that case, if people in surrounding do feel the change in behaviour of a person they should make a dialogue. Untreated depression can lead to the most unwanted problems like bipolar disorders, Obsessive Compulsive Disorders (OCD), chronic anxiety, personality disorders, psychosis, and insomnia. In OCD person gets obsessed with some thoughts and can’t help himself with compulsive actions, a patient gets irritated in even normal environment, this automatically deprives efficiency of a person to work and communicate Bipolar disorders put a person in continued (manic) and down (depression) situation for a long period where suicidal thoughts can also breach in the mind of victim easily. Personality disorders like Schizophrenia lead to delusions and hallucinations. In some cases, these hallucinations may last for years. All of the above-mentioned illness can lead to suicide in extreme situations. These situations explained here arr not to scare but to highlight the fact that if we don’t act in the initial stages the implications can be unexpected and undesirable. Taking your mental health lightly is the last thing one should do as these diseases cannot be identified by the naked eye. A person whom we observe as normal may be devastated from inside. We can never predict from which phase a person is going which is being hidden by a mask of a smile. Several` studies have shown that, if a person having suicidal thoughts speaks about those thoughts then the probability of that person to attempt it decreases by 80%.  When a person is guided wrongly by relatives or friends then that can act as fatal roots. Thus, hearing the victim without consulting becomes a job of humongous responsibility. The reason why you should not try to act as a consultant because the person going from bad phase of his life may think that whenever he shares his insecurities you may judge him, and he might not share everything. So, acting responsibly to take your friend to psychiatrists is the wisest choice you will make. The topic of mental health is so ignored that sex and porn are discussed more openly than this. On one side we are empathetic regarding this topic and on the other side, we loudly use slangs like ‘Pagal’, ‘Mandabuddhi’ etc. Just imagine a situation when you unintentionally say to a depressed person ‘Pagal, itna bhi nahi ata kya?’ the damage it will have will be huge. So, the steps we must take are; don’t use a word like depression to mock any issues, avoid using slangs related to mental illness and most importantly act empathetic rather than just showing that you are empathetic.

This is not any regional issue, so we need to act globally. Huge public campaigns are needed awareness (Like AIDS, Polio, and TB). A study showed that in the Vidharbha region of Maharashtra 58% of farmers were suffering through mental illness caused by trauma and pressure of loans. 24% of them were suffering from severe depression and others from anxiety, insomnia and somatic symptom disorder who aware themselves unaware about the fact. This is the level of this topic in our country. In India, we have 1 psychiatrist for every 1 lakh people. Whereas, a minimum of 3 psychiatrists per 1 Lakh population is WHO standard. So we need 27000 more psychiatrists to reach the minimum requirement. Promotion of this field of study with relevance to urban and rural India in the need of time. The increasing affordability of related services is important because we cannot expect everyone to pay Rs.500 /- for one counselling session. Schools, where students should be taught about this issue, are pressurising them in the name of study which is leading schools to hire psychiatrists. If students don’t know what they are going through how and why should they consult a psychiatrist? India which is the birthplace of Yoga and Meditation has noted the highest artificial death rate due to suicides which is much greater than the world average.

Today, the whole world is facing this problem but very few are acknowledging it. Even if today you are feeling mentally stable but the future is uncertain. Everyone needs to act sensibly to tackle this situation in front of mankind.  Therefore, let us make our lifestyles healthy by adopting Yoga and meditation so that we can convert the loneliness of depression into solitude