There are reasons why the mental health industry dealing with mental illness is not coping with the demand. They are not treating people and getting results fast enough. In fact, they are overwhelmed with cases where medication is not enough and nothing else is working.
The challenge is that the problem is trying to be solved without a multi-disciplinarian approach. Beyond Psychiatry and Psychology, we need to add Neuroscience, Epigenetics, Nutrition and the overall environment as important factors. It is how all aspects of the self and the environment are relevant. We are lacking the diverse perspectives that can facilitate and integrate these important and relevant dimensions of mental health.
Mental health is more about the inner environment and the outer environment being controlled by conditioning, poor coping skills and high stress, and chemical imbalance is a part of that process; the fire between the gas leak and smoke! Yet we hone in on the fire and blame the personality or genetics! What shaped the personality; like trauma and conditioning and what selected the genetics is based on the environment. This is not being understood scientifically to a level to help the culture address mental health in a holistic and comprehensive way, without the stigma, the judgment and the shame.
Addressing the chemical imbalance is like preventing one of the dominos from falling and thinking you have fixed the problem. The fact that there is constant pressure on that domino to fall again from the previous dominoes falling against it is not being addressed.
There are so many questions not being answered; Why is it a chemical problem and how do we know that is the root of the problem? Why does medication over time stop working? Why do you need to up the dose or change medication? It’s as if we are fighting our nature and trying to force it to be a certain way without addressing our core issues that are related to conditioning and trauma.
We see an individual and are quick to judge their situation and put them in the box of mental illness as if they are a stain upon society. It is disturbing and it creates too much shame. You get people hiding it or feeling awkward or threatened by it. This keeps us from addressing the problem and actually makes it worse. People are afraid to ask for help and we don’t heal people by disconnecting from them.
It is a difficult and big problem. We are talking about a brain that is powerful and can easily become dysfunctional. The brain is designed to protect and help you thrive yet it is failing its primary purpose! Why? Why is the brain not doing what it is supposed to do for a growing percentage of society? Why is it getting worse?
Look at what is happening around us – look for the evidence. You push a brain into too much high stress and it will have a mental breakdown and struggle to recover. We are well overdue to get real about what mental illness is and start applying a multi-disciplinarian approach to finally solve this tragic problem.
