MONDAY - Besides being "tax day," April 15th means there's only a couple more weeks till National Mental Health Awareness Month. I haven't researched yet on what types of events we can expect, or how much the media will help to promote awareness, but I plan to do my part. Working at Samaritan Counseling Center, I am excited when the calls for help keep on coming. Let me explain what I mean by that. I'm excited that people out there who are suffering from marital problems, anxiety, griefcounseling session and many other crises have made an intelligent, vital decision. The decision to seek help and healing...the decision to change their lives. They realize that trying to hide, ignore or deny what they're experiencing is the worst thing they can do. They don't care about a ridiculous stigma--they care about being healthy. Even during my lifetime, society has progressed pretty far from a time when the words "counselor" and "therapist" were rarely mentioned, and if they were, it was in a whisper. If you were suffering, you most likely did so in silence rather than risk contempt and shame. Thanks to education, we've come a long way, but unfortunately, we've still got a long way to go. The actress Glenn Close is an outspoken advocate of mental health reform. Read one of her blogs...
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/glenn-close/sandy-hook-mental-health_b_2338272.html
Even counselors go to counselors--just like doctors go to other doctors.
I like to dream big, so here is my vision on mental health: I see a time when people are picking up all sorts of available resources on mental/emotional well-being at magazine stands and grocery stores...a time when people are just as serious about staying mentally healthy as they are about maintaining a healthy weight, or going to the gym...a time when sufferers of serious mental disorders don't continue to fall through the cracks in our healthcare system...a time when all engaged couples take pre-marital counseling as seriously as they take all of their other wedding planning...
