To think we need to find ways to improve people’s resilience

[thewitchesofprestwick]

Already so many people are struggling with their mental health. Things are going to get worse for the economy and the physical health of the population, whether we lockdown or not. Jeremy Farrar of the Wellcome Trust indicated that we are out of good options. Then in the background we have the effects of climate change. How do we equip people to cope better day to day? AIBU to think that there is something we can all do?

It isn’t something you can teach or force onto other people
It is certainly something you learn. I have read threads about people finding certain situations traumatic, horrified to face on their own, leading to chronic anxiety etc... where for be, these would only upset me mildly and which Is recover quickly from. That's because I've experienced much more worse than these situations or been witness of it. It allows me to put things I to perspective and give me faith that life goes on and good things will happen again.

I agree OP.

Many millennials have had everything “managed” for them. It makes for very poor resilience.

Gen Z I expect will be a lot worse.

I have no resilience.

A lifetime and childhood of emotional trauma totally broke me.

Sometimes the things that people claim lead to resilience actually do the opposite.

In my experience, yes it does come from overcoming hardship, WITH the knowledge that you have value as a person independent of that hardship.

If you were raised as being the issue, or being irrelevant and you believe that, then anything you do ends the same way.

However, it is a different kind of resilience needed now dealing with the monotony of lockdown
I don't think it is generally. It's certainly very tough for some, but for many it is just accepting that they will have to do without some comforts and luxuries.

Many millennials have had everything “managed” for them. It makes for very poor resilience.

Yeah, ‘cause millennials are the only ones struggling.

I have great resiliance these days. I bounce and keep getting back up. This is because of a hard childhood and an at times hard adulthood. Death, abuse, attacks, illness, loss of all agency, I can wade through them all and keep on going. It's only things happening to my children which makes me wobble.

People who have good resiliance tend to have it for a reason. I'm sure it can be otherwise, but personally, I have only known people build resiliance through adversity. They are very strong people who have faced a wide array of problems in their life; it's practise, rather than a moral virtue. All resiliance is, is the knowledge that if you keep on going, that life WILL move with you, that getting through whatever isn't a choice, just a thing that happens to you. So you keep going forward.

The world today is fucking stressful and horrifying for many. It is for me too. For people who have had happy lives, with no troubles to fight through, they will not have my certainty that life is often fucking monstrous, but rarely static; that you keep on going and see where you end up, then start planning again. This is a period of gread adversity for millions of people - this IS the time that will teach resilliance for many.

I think the opposite to some on this thread. I think a stable childhood gives you more reserves to deal with problems as an adult and a stressful childhood with abuse and lack of support gives you less.

“Yeah, ‘cause millennials are the only ones struggling. hmm“

Of course not, anyone can struggle.

I am an early millennial and referred within my own generation.

I do see much more resilience in the older generation, that’s my experience, you don’t have to agree.

@Smallsteps88

Thinly veiled whinge about people who are struggling when you think they should just “buck up”. It comes from a nasty place within you.

Concentrate on yourself OP. And if you don’t like that? Try working on your resilience.

This!

I've been told by so many mental health professionals that I'm resilient. I survived an interesting childhood, being violently raped and then an episode of postpartum psychosis (more through luck than anything else). I can't say anything I learnt along the way has been at all useful in 2020. In many ways, the things I experienced have made this year worse. I'd just finished therapy and finally felt in a good position when the virus hit. Now I'm constantly battling the voice in my head telling me I don't deserve nice things, holidays, aspirations, a future.

In my experience, yes it does come from overcoming hardship, WITH the knowledge that you have value as a person independent of that hardship.

I'd agree with that. Unfortunately I don't believe I have value and I suspect now I'm too old to find any.

It depends on your definition of resilience tbh, too often I hear resilience being talked about in a way that suggests if you’re unhappy, feeling down, stressed or upset you aren’t resilient. Resilience is the ability to grow in the face of adversity, people can and do grow but they’re also allowed to have their feelings about it.

I may not like homeschooling, I may find it very hard to have my kids stuck to me 24/7, and I may worry about my job. That doesn’t mean I’m not resilient, it means I’m human. I still get up, care for my kids, do the homeschooling, juggle my work.

The idea that we need to come through everything with a smile on our face, or that we can’t be upset or worried is the source of so much stress because we start to think there’s something wrong with not coping well with her more restrictions in our daily lives.

And of course sometimes our capacity to cope is overwhelmed by illness, trauma or crisis - we aren’t meant to cope with every single calamity thrown at us. We can recover and move on - which is another form of resilience - but some things are hard because they are hard, and “being more resilient” won’t change that.

Children need to be brought up into resilient adults.

At the moment parents are bringing up snowflakes who aren’t emotionally equipped to deal with the world because they’re offended by everything, hence the mental health crisis.

@MaxNormal

"Resilience" in 2020 seems to be a way to shut down and undermine anyone distressed by being in a difficult situation. Normally closely followed by references to the war.

Worth pointing out here too that the ‘Blitz spirit’ was largely government propaganda to prevent mass panic and try to improve national morale under continual bombing and fear. Upbeat films like ‘London Can Take It!’ about how Britain would not be beaten into submission actually smack strongly of Brexit-y rhetoric from BoJo and co and bore about as much reality to reality.

That famous photo of the milkman delivering milk on a bombed street where firemen are still hosing ruins is a fake — the ‘milkman’ was the photographer’s assistant in a borrowed white coat.

The one big psychiatric study of a heavily bombed city, Hull, showed huge trauma among survivors — bed wetting, tremors, crying, alcoholism, addiction, ulcers, nervous collapse.

There’s really no point in beating ourselves up for not living up to a myth.

What are you bringing up @emilyfrost?

@Smallsteps88

What are you bringing up *@emilyfrost*?

Children who will become confident, resilient adults. Not snowflakes.

Children who will become confident, resilient adults. Not snowflakes.

You hope.

How are you doing that, out of interest? Fancy writing a manual with all your “cant fail” tips?

**Children who will become confident, resilient adults. Not snowflakes.

Oh yuck.

Bad enough calling adults snowflakes, but little children?

If they are like you, God help them

emilyfrost based on your replies to this and another thread today you are bringing up kids who will grow up to spout Daily Mail bollocks like "It's PC gorn mad" "Snowflakes" etc

One of the things I hated about being a social worker was if you were struggling with high caseloads and stressful cases the managers would bang on about being more resilient, instead of providing reasonable working conditions and support/resources.

I AM fucking resilient thank you but years of constant stress is going to break even the strongest person (see: living in poverty then Covid etc)

Very interesting @Pokerfaced

I am a very resilient person, and have managed the last eight Months reasonably well, with regard to MH and outlook. I do not think that would have been the case if I had had to live through this year with constant shelling or bombing raids each night (and I live somewhere that was heavily bombed/damaged in second World War).

@Ylvamoon

Resilience is also something that comes from within. I sometimes think that we have removed the learning of resiliance from our childrens lives. Learning to loose, not having to wait for things, getting ott attention for every whim, the messages of you are special, clever and making allowances for almost everything! And dont get me started on the helicopter parenting. As lovely as it is, it doesn't teach our children to suck it up and get on with it.

Absolutely.

Do we really want to produce a generation of people who have resilience to being deprived of loving contact with friends and wider family? Once you no longer need other people, maybe you no longer care as much about other people?

Children who will become confident, resilient adults. Not snowflakes.

Resilient children grow into resilient adults, who may find it easier to overcome adversity however, teaching children that their views, opinions and feelings don’t matter isn’t teaching them resilience. There are things we should be offended by, it’s ok to feel disappointment when to don’t win, to be anxious when facing something that’s hard for you, to be hurt if someone calls you names. It’s not being a “snowflake” to recognise you have feelings or to feel overwhelmed - teaching children to know when they need to stand their ground or get on with things is part of being resilient but so is teaching them it’s ok to take time out, to care for themselves and to attend to their emotional well being.

In my experience folk who struggle with their mental health have a long history of being told to just get on with things, that they should be able to press on regardless - and when they can’t press on anymore they collapse, and feel like shit because someone somewhere made them think they should always take life head on.

@MereDintofPandiculation

Do we really want to produce a generation of people who have resilience to being deprived of loving contact with friends and wider family? Once you no longer need other people, maybe you no longer care as much about other people?

Indeed. I’m a different person than I was before lockdown. Though hopefully that will work for me!

@emilyfrost I'm (I hope) bringing up a child who is able to empathise with others, and listen to those who don't share his views rather than deriding them as 'snowflakes' or similar.