Today, there is so much going in our lives whether it be an adult or be a teenager going through school or college. We constantly worry about the law and order situation, how to pay the rent for the next month or how to get good grades so that we can have a better future. We also worry about our family and always feel that we are not giving them enough time, from basic necessities to retirement we are in constantly worry and stress.
This constantly living in stress is what triggers mental illness like depression, excessive anxiety, OCD that later on effect our lives drastically. In Pakistan, however, these issues are given the least importance. Mental illnesses like these are all serious issues that need to be dealt with. People need to understand that a person needs if not more, then equal attention of the relevant professionals in this field when needed - be it a milder issue like depression or a more serious one such as Alzheimer’s.
There are minor factors that can plant a seed of a mental issue that can potentially turn into something much more serious if left untreated. According to article published in daily times in 2011, common reasons like poverty, relationship problems, generational gap, and financial difficulty, lack of education, violence and terrorism have been found to lead to anxiety and other depressive disorders.
When left untreated, mental illness such as those mentioned above can lead to physical illness, many types of violence and even in worst case, suicide. People find it easier to take their own lives than to seek professional help. There has been some improvement in the attitude towards mental illnesses and its treatment; nevertheless, Pakistan still has a long way to go.
We need to step up our game, our social media constantly run campaigns spreading awareness about issues like dengue, cancer and polio; whereas, there is very little to help people understand and treat their metal issues – which are more prevalent than the diseases currently highlighted. In addition, the facilities and centers available in Pakistan for such patients are insufficient, unhygienic, understaffed, expensive and under-equipped leading to further deterioration in people’s mental health and increasing the cases of depression to an appalling level.
World Health Organization (WHO) reported that nearly 44% of the Pakistani population, mostly females, suffers from some kind of depressive disorder and these are just those that are on record. Just knowing some of the symptoms of depression can help save many lives around us. According to article published in Helpguide on depression, some of the symptoms of depression include feeling helpless, insomnia, appetite changes or change in weight, trouble in concentrating, sadness, isolation of self from others, irritability, self-loathing, fatigue, headaches and having suicidal thoughts.
Therefore, we need more campaigns that tells people that mental health issues are a problem and have long lasting effect on you as a person and to the people around you as well.
We can do this by involving companies and organizations, where they should run programs internally to help employees cope with issues that leads to their mental health concerns though seminars, ease in office operations and most importantly one to one counseling. In Addition we need to involve NGOs to create awareness of issues as well through all media platforms.
Government should also introduce more programs to help the society cope with these issues by give them more benefits and helping them with whatever available resources they have.
Colleges and University should change that way education is provided to help lessen stress and create an environment where students are cared for with a sense of belonging. Likewise, media would also need to play a major role in this and start educating people on different platforms about such issues and how important and normal it is to seek professional help if need.
Lastly, we all need to come together as individuals as well and help our brother and sisters who ever they are if want to see changes and make sure that every person in Pakistan is trying their best live stress free lives.
If we can do all this then I can assure you that we would be living a much happier life than before. So, lets start from ourselves and create awareness and help others so that we can build a better tomorrow for ourselves and the people around us.