Mental illness is a rising phenomenon in our society, and it is something that as a society we have failed to appropriately address. People with mental illnesses are often shunned or downright discriminated against for something that no one can control. Hopefully this post will shed some light on the concept of mental illness and what can be done to help rather than hinder the efforts to help people with mental illnesses.
What is a Mentally Ill Person? And Can They Control It?
Mental illness is often considered an attention seeking tool or lumped in with general psychosis, but neither could be farther from the truth. Mentally ill people have a chemical or genetic dysfunction that is causing either direct damage or indirect changes to the way the brain functions. For example, schizophrenia is based on a pathway called the Wnt pathway, when any one part of that pathway goes wrong the chances of developing schizophrenia skyrocket. Schizophrenia can also be caused by a number of genetic issues, but the moral of the story is that mental illnesses like schizophrenia are caused by major impacts to the brain and are under no control of individuals. More on schizophrenia and Wnt signaling
What Are Symptoms of Mental Illnesses?
The most important thing to know about mental illness symptoms is that no two people present their symptoms in the same way. Sometimes the symptoms are not visible to outside view, which further complicates the matter. Using schizophrenia as an example, there are symptoms that are described as both positive and negative. Positive symptoms are symptoms specific to schizophrenia, which is primarily described by hallucinations and delusions that feel completely real to the person. On the other hand, negative symptoms could be cause by a variety of things: these symptoms include lack of emotion, lack of joy, speech issues, and lack of initiative. Figure 1 below visualizes the important distinction between these symptoms. Not only are these symptoms challenging to see and diagnose, they also are very individual based on the type of hallucinations and type of negative symptoms experienced. More on schizophrenia symptoms
What Are We Doing, and What Can We Do?
Mental illnesses are challenging to treat due to their direct impact on the brain and the stigma that comes with being mentally ill. There are a fair amount of medicines that focus on management of symptoms, such as anti psychotics and lithium, but in addition to symptoms and varying effectiveness these treatments don’t do much to actually manage schizophrenia in a patient. When the illness becomes too overwhelming or the behaviors become out of control, hospitalization may be necessary, but for the majority of other people impacted by mental illness they live in the same world as neurotypical people. The best way to “treat” schizophrenia and other mental illnesses is to interact with these people with empathy and grace. People may seem weird or even dangerous to you, but it’s entirely possible they just have a different brain chemistry than you. The more society begins to understand and welcome these people, the better off they will be and the better science can begin to understand these people. As the Platinum Rule says; treat others the way they want to be treated
