To ask why there are so many kids with mental health problems?

It can't have been Gina Ford. My nans generation stuck their babies outdoors to cry it out where they couldn't hear them and rigidly stuck to bedtimes etc.

Routines are actually great for creating feelings of safety. Maybe it's all the gentle parenting and permissive parenting 🤷‍♀️ that certainly creates feelings of anxiety in children when they know that their parents aren't in charge and can't keep them safe.

Interesting, because to me it's the opposite. Kids being mollycoddled, and now they have no resilience, and expect everything for nothing. Obviously both methods are wrong

Of course you were.

I was wondering if it’s all the drugs the parents took in their youth

Gosh that was a terrible book. I remember my SIL following her methods and me barely being able to hold my newborn niece in case she fell asleep in my arms which the book didn't allow ! Oddly enough my niece ( now16 years) has had quite severe MH issues and suicide attempts.

Partly I think genuine mh issues are empathised with more which is amazing but sadly people want to fix normal human emotions a lot more now too. Safeguarding is a word floated around with good intentions but it's abused. I know of someone who was considered to have mh issues when she was at school, but she had lost her mum who dropped dead one day of a heart attack and suddenly was an 11 year old girl on her own. Tbh I thought it was a disgrace for unqualified people to slap the mh label on her, bereavement and grief is complex and referring her on to cahms etc did nothing for her. Luckily she's okay now thanks to her older sisters. Another issue I have with this is the affect it has on younger people's futures. Parents are told they're doing the right thing getting their teens referred on for anxiety instead of supporting them as they navigate through the stresses of being a teen, then for example they want to join the armed forces and they fail the application process because of an anxiety diagnosis. I am not not not not not saying to never get teens help, just to start the process at home first without the need to add so many labels, they are rarely a good thing and I say that as someone who sees day in/ day out how much of a person is lost when they become a project for safeguarding purposes. It also causes the person who is the subject of it all to just share less with their parents, friends and family if they can't express emotion or struggle without being labelled and forced to then share their vulnerability with strangers. It's a weird world nowadays where its assumed a stranger in a professional capacity can help you more than yourself or a family member who knows you.

The Gina ford contented baby book was first published in 1999- a book that promotes crying it out, no eye contact with your baby and basically says that a baby being dependent on you is wrong.
many child care trends around the same time followed similar principles - super nanny with her naughty step- child showing emotion - time out by themselves rather than talking it through.
i would hazard a guess that early childhood caring methods may have contributed to the rise in mental health issues in teens and young adults today

Gettingfleeced

There is no support or funding

WeeWillyWinkie9

Thats rubbish Cahms and adult services don’t want hoards of cases on their books. The patients on their waiting lists are very ill. They weed out all but the most severe cases which are not just cases of pathologised anxiety.🙄

I was a teen in the 90s and I remember similar conversations to this post about "why are there so many teens with anorexia/eating disorders now compared to 20 years ago". The answer those days was girls magazines and mass media, now it is social media.

In the 00s, it seemed to be depression and anxiety. Now it seems to be OCD and panic attacks. But it is all under the broad metal health umbrella, just different focus with the passage of time, but I think teen years are quite turbulent and a time when you start being more aware of peer pressure and how you are feeling in relation to those around you and what "normal" should look and feel like.

I think it is due to more awareness and more funding and support in certain areas which then means more people are seen, diagnosed and treated.

Excessive use of screen time addling their brains.

Completely agree, no need to pathologise any of it. Normal responses to tough situations.

It’s because we aren’t very good at teaching our children and young people what emotional intelligence and resilience are, let alone helping them to develop and nurture it so they can recognise and manage normal highs/lows of normal emotions. When you lack emotional intelligence / resilience everything becomes a drama and completely unmanageable….everything can be a trigger and it perpetuates a harmful cycle of self-victimisation, an unhealthy need for external validation and a lack of self-awareness and worth.

To quick to dish out out anti depressants to people who just don’t feel right in the head..

An emergency operation later which I have never made sense of, multiple actual health problems as a result and absolutely no one as an adult had ever asked how I’ve felt mental health wise in the last seven months. I actually deplore our society as the pitts.

Nobody talked about it when I was growing up in the 60s and 70s
I self harmed due to sexual abuse and was a very troubled teenager
thankfully I had people who did help and I got referred to psychiatrist - counselling etc
It was a stigma to share though
as I got into my 20s I self medicated with drugs alcohol and sex
thankfully I came out the other side before I was 30 and have been a survivor since

I think it's a bit of both. I'm the same generation as you and we did have one or two people in our school year with exceptionally serious mental health issues.
There weren't really many 'in betweens'.

Teenagers go through serious hormal, social and educational changes and it is actually entirely normal for them to be anxious, upset, stressed. Part of growing up is to learn how to cope and navigate the world. We seem to have pathologised normal feelings.

@DelurkingAJ

"My unqualified view is that COVID, and the isolation that resulted, tipped lots of vulnerable children over the edge."

+++

But what was the alternative? Accept that a higher number of the elderly and vulnerable die early from Covid or accept that a higher number of children get tipped over the edge and then have no money to prevent or fix it.

It was a choice the nation made to throw the younger generation under a bus to protect the older generations.

I know. Absolutely shocking @islandofserenity. It makes me despair when I read comments like that and some of the others on here. It just feels like the stigma around mental health problems will never be gone.

I honestly believe this would cure a lot of MH issues.

My teen is heavily involved in a very physically tiring outdoor sport and none of the teens in her circle of friends appear to have the MH issues that so many teens are experiencing. They spend a lot of time outdoors and are exhausted by the end of the day, which is good for the mind.

I'm also disgusted at this comment. @ CatsSnore. I've just come back to this thread and I'm shocked at some of the comments!

And lack of fresh air/exercise!

Covid
Poor diet
Less resilience/less responsibility
Less guidance
Poor support systems
Social media !!!!! Massive issue
Earlier diagnosis

We talk about it more. I had severe mh problems in my teens all the way through to my late twenties. I’m in early forties now. It was a taboo subject when I was a teen.

Because it is factually incorrect, you appear to be seeking to blame parents/teachers.

Thanks so much Tessisme. I've just come back to this thread and have replied to the poster @widowtwankywashroom . I'm astounded at what she posted!