What thing would help people's mental health

I am hoping they posted on the wrong thread.

Who exactly are you talking to?

It depends entirely on what is causing the mental health issue.

Back in 2009, when my MH was poor, I had a psychiatrist and a team of support workers. Today, I don’t think I’d have had that. Although I found out the problem and also the solution so I’m a different person now.

Stop blaming others, own your decisions and stop turning other people's lives into your own soap opera, conspiracies are not everywhere, and you think everyone is judging you then you are just as bad yourself

A lot of mental health conditions really need informed and intensive long term treatment and it's just not possible or feasible for most people to access this, so a lot of care ends up being not that helpful or effective

Exactly.

Also, that first appointment can be incredibly hard. It can be so daunting to have to basically open up to a stranger. So much goes through your head... will you be taken seriously? Can they offer anything useful? Will I be locked up?

That’s because being depressed makes it hard to engage and do the things needed to use the help.

an analogy might be that if you had a broken leg, but the fracture clinic was up 4 flights of stairs.

When I had a breakdown, I wish the doctors could have given me more information on why and what was happening to me. For too many years I spent festering on the edges of psychosis, being terrified, because I didn’t know, and couldn’t articulate, what was happening to me.

I could have then armed myself with research and helped in my own recovery. Luckily, after about 9 years, I learned everything I could about my illness, and 20 years later, I’m equipped to help myself when I have a blip.

I couldn’t have done that without medication though, and I’ll be on it for the rest of my life, which I’m fine with.

I think with talking therapies when you finally get help its to short and probably not with the right person. They seem to do a one size fits all and its not realistic.
Then with cmht Iv been asking for trauma therapy for years but the cmht say im to unstable then when I get stable they discharge me and say I need a period of consolidation but by the time im back in the system im to unwell again so again classed as to unstable for trauma therapy and its like a never ending cycle.

I actually think mental health services would be better suited to people who are well so they have the skills for when they become unwell

I think often it's support after a traumatic event. We can underestimate the impact, or have external demands that prevent us from 'stopping and reflecting'. So we end up in fight or flight mode on a near permanent basis.

There's a biological need for oxytocin after a traumatic event, it's the reason we often reach out to connect with others after stress as connection creates oxytocin.

@AndSoFinally Thank you for the work that you do. I’m not surprised that you’re feeling compassion fatigue after 20 years, I think that most people would struggle after years working in this field.

I think eventually there will be a move away from most diagnoses, or they will be broadened massively. You only have to look at the DSM or ICD to see how much overlap there is in mental health diagnosis, to some degree, and based on training experience and subjective understanding. There seems to be more emphasis on treating symptoms and not the label as such.

more resources are needed, more flexibility and support to keep stable staffing teams

I haven’t suffered personally but I would say if life were more affordable. If people had more choice to work less, connect more socially, exercise, eat better and not have so much debt. That has to contribute to it in a lot of cases

This is exactly how I feel too. I need quiet and solitude to recharge my batteries. Some people need the opposite and recharge by being with others. All are normal, just differing personalities.

That’s because CBT (and DBT) can be standardised and offered in exactly the same way to every client - which lends itself well to the types of trial favoured by the NHS. Other forms of therapy that are relationship based are much harder to evidence because each relationship is different which can’t be standardised.

There has been some decent research out of Nottingham University which is building an evidence base for person centred therapy working with trauma but it’s very hard to meet NHS standards for inclusion in NICE guidance.

CBT is good for keeping people functioning on some level but it doesn’t touch the causes of mental ill health for example where that sits in unresolved trauma. We’re literally papering over the cracks.

I’m not against CBT, it did keep me functioning but the only thing that actually helped me get to the root of things was long term work with an experienced therapist working with psychodynamics, personal centred therapy and transactional analysis - I paid for it privately and was lucky to be able to do this. That type of work just isn’t available on the NHS despite being incredibly effective.

@R0ckandHardPlace I’m sorry that your Mum has had this experience. 💐

Having said that, I do think that some people can only be helped to a limited extent. My Dad (87) has had lifelong mental health problems, been sectioned, had various medications and therapies, etc. and he’ll never be truly stable. He has an illness that there isn’t a cure for. Keeping him relatively stable and not suicidal is the best that can be done.

CBT has a strong evidence base for most anxiety and some mood disorders and other conditions
but it is not true that it is the only therapy with an evidence base-
check out the NICE guidelines
other therapies with evidence :
DBT
CAT
IPT
DIT
EMDR
SSCM

medics won’t be expert in field of treating mental health disorders with psychological therapies
a doctorate level psychologist may have specialist knowledge and research skills in a particular area of psychology - whatever their doctorate focused on - but is clearly not familiar with the range of evidence based psychological therapies

I think a lot of people just need someone who cares to listen to them.

Carers need to be properly supported. It's awful trying to get help for the person you are caring for and it's just not there.

We need to bring back the community, people helping each other out.

The nhs is broken. There are good drs, good nurses, good midwives etc but they don't have time to care for people properly. Mums are being sent home from hospital 24 hours after major surgery and no sleep and expected to get on with looking after a baby and sometimes other children too.

We need more pay equality so that families can afford to have one parent at home if they want to.

I know it's mostly fiction but look at call the midwife. The midwives and dr Turner have time to help people

It seems that access to some support before a whisper becomes a scream would help. Earlier (and often less intensive) support pays massive dividends (a bit like needing a bit of help for a wound, but only finally being able to access the level of help needed for a wound when leg is gangrenous).

I also personally think shrugging our shoulders at the mental health impacts of covid infections is shameful. At the very least, places like classrooms should have had air cleaners in by now to reduce the amount of infections (not just covid), especially when we don’t have the resources available to deal with the impacts of those infections.

I was told by someone who had studied psychology to a doctorate level and two other medics I know that CBT is basically the only “talking” based therapy that has any clinical evidence that it makes a difference. Do you disagree?

Lots of reasons but a lack of access to therapy isn’t one of them.

Social inequality is a big factor.

Increased awareness of ‘mental health’ is another. People don’t like this but the more mental health gets talked about and thought about the more likely people are to identify problems with their own mental health.

There is a strong argument for promoting mental wellbeing. Emotion regulation skills, interpersonal effectiveness and social functioning in our children in schools and clubs,

get off the Screens, into active play, interacting with others, getting exhausted through activity, getting to bed at a reasonable time without the screen and a belly full of crap food -

but this would need to be supported by parents who can role model, support, coach their kids at home in these skills,

for many disorders psychological therapy AND medication gives the best outcomes

And where can patients access psychological therapies on the NHS? Because six sessions of CBT, which is the only available routine treatment in my area just won’t cut it.

Even when I was an in-patient myself, the only psychological therapy I saw patients receive was a DBT group for patients with EUPD. Nobody without a personality disorder was prescribed any talking therapy.

I think the greatest help would be to examine why there’s a mental health crisis in the first place.

This. Lots of people are stressed and unhappy and the reason for that needs to be unpicked.

A lot of children are unhappy because the curriculum is bloated and boring and there isn't enough funding to meet everyone's needs. This means they are stressed, and then their teachers are stressed and are leaving en masse so the kids aren't getting a stable environment.

A lot of older teens are unhappy because school is constant testing and when they're at home, their phones bombard them with 20 second clips of shite on repeat.

Young adults are unhappy because they can't get a decent job, owe tens of thousands on student loans, still can't get a decent job and can't afford to rent or buy a house and the prospect of living with their parents is bleak.

Middle aged people who have finally managed to live independently, are paying out most of their salary on mortgage or rent, the rest on huge childcare fees, food and petrol and are both working horrible hours so they never get to see each other and can't afford to ever do anything fun.

Older people are pissed off as they can't get to see a doctor or a dentist!

Adding 'mental health' support as a £60 a week bolt on or a visit from some NHS mental health practitioner to your school isn't going to fix any of those things.

I think what most people need for good mental health is a loving supportive family and a positive supportive school experience as they grow up. So many mental health issues stem back to childhood trauma. Those things don't always happen for whatever reason, so then you need early intervention and proper ongoing support for as long as it's needed.

Schools need proper pathways for kids that struggle with academics for whatever reason. No child should have to sit GCSE's knowing they're likely to fail them all. Those kids should be redirected at an earlier age, they should be doing Maths and English functional skills and practical courses from 14, if not earlier. No child should be feeling like they are a failure. There should also be dyslexia screening for all children still struggling to read at 7/8 - give the kids a fucking chance and find out why they are struggling so much as early as humanly possible. We need far more Ed Psych's, far more OT's, far more SALT's and these should all be working closely with a reasonable number of schools. We need far more autistic units attached to schools and far more pastoral care with much better paid and qualified staff.

People say 'you just need to be more resilient' but to build resilience in a healthy, functional way rather than relying on alcohol, drugs, self harm, isolation/social withdrawal or other negative coping mechanisms you need to feel safe and supported. You need self esteem.

We cannot expect people who haven't had a safe, supportive childhood to have positive mental health.