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

[Newmama29]

I’ve been scrolling through some threads recently & I find people are talking a lot about their kids/teenagers having mental health problems. Why is this so prominent now? I, myself, was only a teenager 10 years ago so I am baffled as to how many people claim their teens have mental health problems. Is it just that we talk about it more or is society causing this?

I think parents are under immense pressure to make their children's lives as easy as possible. My DD isn't a teen yet but has some ongoing anxiety due to a close family member dying & now has anxiety about me dying and leaving her. She has come such a long way from how she was initially & I have had to push her to do things she enjoys I.e. playdates at friends etc. I worry hugely about how she will cope as a teenager - is she already predisposed to mental health problems? My DD was the happiest most outgoing child, until she wasn't. She has lots of good friends, clubs, enjoys school etc buy I worry about her more than I probably would have before. It affects all members of a family when a child is mentally struggling and you are under immense pressure to get it Right. I've felt out of my depth on a number of occasions & I'm hoping and praying she makes it through relatively unscathed. Social media is the root of most of the problems for teens I think, group chats, knowing where everyone is all the time. Its not healthy.

My daughter has always been a bit anxious, then Covid tipped her over the edge and she had a bit of a breakdown.

She had lots of issues as a child and had been assessed for ASD/ADHD/dyslexia, etc at around age 7/8 and we were told that whilst she had some traits, there wasn’t enough for a diagnosis, that she was a little immature and would grow out of it.

She’d always been ticcy but she developed complex verbal and motor tics so was diagnosed with Tourette’s.

Her mental health started going down hill in year 9, she was referred to CAMHS and had talking therapy, had ELSA sessions at school and she was supported brilliantly in school and we were bumbling along ok.

Then covid and the lockdowns hit.

She started showing OCD type tendencies, inability to leave her room (let alone the house) without a panic attack, self harming, disordered eating and finally an overdose. Lots of weird neurological symptoms appeared and she was diagnosed with FND

We’ve spent the last 3 years putting her back together with the help of a private therapist, then CAMHS and anxiety meds.

She was put forward for another ASD assessment by CAMHS and she had a dyslexia assessment.

She’s recently received a diagnosis of autism and she has quite severe dyslexia.

She’s never been a big social media user, some gaming but not excessive - the odd session on Sims/Minecraft. Has been mad on horses since she was very young and a few years ago we were luckily enough to be able to buy her her own pony so has always been active, up the yard early mornings, etc.

I believe undiagnosed autism with years of masking, already iffy mental health and Covid/lockdowns are the causes of DD’s problems.

Backed up by an article in the Sunday Times this morning.

There is no opportunity to learn conflict resolution in age appropriate ways either. Everything is labelled as bullying whether it is or not so parents jump in lest their child be upset that someone doesn't want to play with them

Don’t really buy it. Kids are at school 6-7 hours a day just like we were and that is where the vast majority of conflicts (most minor of course) occur and are resolved.

I think the main issue is that the average teenager spends 7-8 hours a day in their own worlds staring at a screen, accessing god knows what. But of course mostly low quality content, created to be as addicting as possible, and with extremely dubious messaging. This is by far and away the most radical change in todays society compared to even 20 years ago. There’s simply no need to imo to look elsewhere for explanations of mental health crisis.

'no one in my year went through ‘school refusal’ etc'

Quite a few people in mine certainly did, only it was generally referred to as 'playing truant'. And once you were 16, it wasn't referred to as either; it was just 'leaving school'.

School attendance is just taken more seriously nowadays.

There were a number of people in my year who had or developed mental health problems. At least one took their own life; several developed eating disorders, which in at least one case resulted in their dying young; one became a very disturbed adult, who ended up committing a serious crime. Perhaps greater awareness of mental health problems in young people would have prevented at least some of these.

I think it's picked up more now than In the past, I find it shocking how nobody seemed to notice how much I was suffering as a teen and I hope we are much more aware now as a society.
I agree social media must have a horrendous impact on some teens along with covid. My son has just turned 21 and had to spend his 18th in lockdown along with doing an apprenticeship as a electrician and I know he felt really anxious about being kept on and being able to pass the exams when he wasn't aloud to go to college. This generation of young people have not had an easy time at all.

I think many people assume it's a combination of:

• social media. There was a thread on here this morning about prom and how much people were spending. I was pretty astonished. There just wasn't that much pressure when I was a teen. Nobody was going to look at my photos but me, and frankly we took a photo at the beginning when we arrived and that was it. No camera phones.

• more advertising, and it's targeted. The whole point of advertising is to convince you your life is not good enough without xyz. It also means you're being exposed to models much more often, which means unrealistic expectations.

• more time online and less in the real world. Its been shown many times that we are social creatures and our mental health is better when we have face to face interactions. We mostly don't have that sense of community any more. We say it takes a village.... but most don't have one any more.

This is a really good point. We've all had some really tough years, and it is showing up as wider spread MH issues across the whole population.

I do think it's partly that our use of language has changed. "Teenage angst" has always been a thing, we just label it differently now. Like how "abuse" used to mean violence and now it also includes mean words. When I was a teenager (I'm mid-thirties now) there were many trends at my girls school, like anorexia and self harm, that were incredibly common, but most girls grew out of them as they left their teen years behind. I think now we see these things as behaviours to be stamped out by adults rather than something to be lived through and learnt from.

I also think that there's a link to our poor physical health. There's more and more evidence to show that poor gut health affects the brain. Again, that's not completely new though and would have impacted people who grew up in the 90s eating processed food and too much sugar and being plied with too many antibiotics by overzealous doctors. These people now have awful gut problems as adults and there's unfortunately a lot of them.

As someone with a daughter whose mental health dropped through the floor during Covid, who changed into a different person, and who is now struggling with a serious eating disorder, some of these responses are incredibly ignorant.

Anorexia isn't just a fad that adolescents grow out of, it's a serious biological and mental condition, and Covid and lockdown has had a really horrendous impact on young people. DDs school have SEVEN TIMES the amount of girls admitted to eating disorder services.

So no, it's not that we're negligent, or too soft:hard as parents, or she doesn't get outside or have any hobbies or any of that crap. If you haven't been through this or any other truly horrendous mental health condition don't wade in with 'it was so much better in my day'. You have no idea

10 years ago Snapchat and tiktok and whatever other shite I don't know about didn't exist so YABU!

I reckon it's:

• screens shoved at them constantly (more by brands, tech companies etc than their parents even)
• porn and nasty shit accessible without even looking for it on kids devices.
• not enough exercise

-ultra processed food

• climate change about to implode
• COVID
• not enough nature
• not safe enough to just run about and be kids for fear of a maniac abducting them /of being run over by the gazillion cars around these days
• pollution can cause mental health problems I think. And we have a lot more of that than 10 years ago sadly
• etc

Social media has a lot to answer for.

Yes, teenage angst and dramas has always been there. Now it "mental health issues" - but most teens grow out of it.

I forgot until this thread how pro anorexia we were at school. Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels, right Kate Moss! Then there were the emos who cut themselves and the naughty crew that I was part of, who were rarely in school. We were disgusting to our teachers. We weren't pathologised, we were still labelled as naughty kids and they didn't give a shit about the older drug dealers picking us up at break to not return or the drugs we were doing. We've all grown up, the majority of us in professional jobs and a decent life. Some were not so lucky.

I work with children. I do think we over diagnosis them, and they over diagnosis themselves! It does bring attention when things are wrong and there needs to be a better way to help dc who need more than they get at home without medicalising them... and if you got heaps of love and attention for taking overdoses and being on a 136 section in hospital you would keep doing it wouldn't you! Why do we expect teens to not do what brings them what they need.

CatsSnore

What a vile post. My daughter has had overdoses and I know the families of other struggling kids too. All much loved teens who couldn’t have been cared for raised better.

I work with children. I do think we over diagnosis them, and they over diagnosis themselves! It does bring attention when things are wrong and there needs to be a better way to help dc who need more than they get at home without medicalising them... and if you got heaps of love and attention for taking overdoses and being on a 136 section in hospital you would keep doing it wouldn't you! Why do we expect teens to not do what brings them what they need

Vile post.

I don't know any teen who takes overdoses when there aren't issues at home/or bullying from school. Happy well adjusted children don't try to kill themselves, something has gone wrong. Not sure how it's vile to say that 🤷‍♀️

@CatsSnore

I work with children. I do think we over diagnosis them, and they over diagnosis themselves! It does bring attention when things are wrong and there needs to be a better way to help dc who need more than they get at home without medicalising them... and if you got heaps of love and attention for taking overdoses and being on a 136 section in hospital you would keep doing it wouldn't you! Why do we expect teens to not do what brings them what they need.

You are disgusting.

I hope you are lying about working with children

I think that is very much over simplifying things. Mental health struggles are rational to try to blame people for what happened doesn’t help and often isn’t realistic.

sadly people who everyone seems have “everything” can still struggle. They can still sadly die from their illness.

I think we are more likely to diagnose mental health problems now than we were. But I also see a huge increase in worrying amoung kids. Amoung my kids' social circle kids are really anxious about things. Not just upcoming exams or the like but all sorts of things from the safety of transport or food packaging to global warming.

I think the overly safety conscious approach that seems to have been de rigueur in parenting for the last 20 years has rubbed off on them to some extent and they see everything as potentially really dangerous.

Though also agree the lack of outdoor time and poor social media practices are also huge contributors.

Covid has a lot to answer for as does the internet

My kid is neurodiverse and was struggling with anorexia, the threat of hospitalisation and feeling different to everybody else and like shit. I know many similar. It has nothing to do with parenting and every professional I’ve come across( and trust me we’ve come across loads) does not lay the blame on parenting,quite the reverse. So you can take your goady hypothesis and shove it elsewhere.

It might be oversimplified, but something has gone wrong in a childs development to make them think attempting to kill themselves is the answer - and most children, say with BPD who attempt suicide, are most at risk of 'death by misadventure' (not my words, how the hospital and SWs will put it on a risk assessment) rather than actually going through with it. They instinctively know that their need for care will be met at hospital and do everything they can to get there. So yes a lot of children who end up sectioned for a day or so after an attempt have had something traumatic, a number of ACEs and/or shit parenting and/or a shit time at school that leads to this type of behaviour.

I don't expect a lot of parents would be able to take responsibility for that. I'm sure I'll be called vile again but I see these parents time and time again. They are the problem in the majority of cases. Most decent counsellors won't do individual counselling for very young children, they do family counselling as that gets to the heart of the issue. Make the parent better and the child gets better through that. You can stick all the plasters you can on a child but if they get taken off every night it doesn't fix the hurt.

You think parents of children who struggle don’t spend hours upon hours questioning themselves and worrying what they have done wrong?

im not saying that all parents are perfect, we all know that’s not the case but it’s not as simple as parenting causing mental health issues or even always playing a role in it.

As well as the use of social media, another big change in society is the use of day care for babies and toddlers. Does this affect a child's mental health? Being away from their parents from a very young age?