My Personal Experience with a Mental Health Illness

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Recommended: Mental illness misrepresentation media

Mental health illness affects 26.2 % of the United states adults ages 18 and up. That is 1 in 4 people as of 2004 ("The Number"). Mental health illness does affect over a quarter of the United states population to include me as one of the people who suffer from it. This has affected me and changed my life drastically. Aside from the difficulties of having a mental health illness is how people react to me once they find out. This is widely due to mass media creating a stigma for the mental health ill people that most of the general population tend to believe in the United states. I will begin with what I remember of my experience of learning I have mental health illness. I remember suffering heavily through my early teens to my twenties with depression. I had tried at that time just about every type of depression medication available and none of them worked on me. It wasn't until I was in my twenties that my depression just kind of went away. I thought I was done with suffering from mental health problems, but I would be wrong. I was age 30 and in the United States Navy and had been in the U. S. Navy for 11 years. I was attached to the USS Abraham Lincoln and we were currently in Honk Kong for a port visit. I remember I met a girl there and we spent the day together just had fun while she showed me around Hong Kong. I ended up asking the girl that I was with why she did some of the things she did in life. She explained that she came from a very poor background and that this was the only way she could get ahead. I remember seeing the sadness in her eyes and the hurt of doing what she did. It was at that moment something strange happen to me. I said some things to her, but what was odd was that it was like something speaking throu... ... middle of paper ... ... find stability and maintain their stability of their illness. Many of these people overcome their illness to some extent and manage to play an important role in society. Work Cited Claire Henderson, Sara Evans-Lacko, Clare Flach, Graham, Thornicrofi. "Responses to Mental Health Stigma Questions: "The Importance of Social Desirability and Data Collection Method." Canadian Journal of Psychiatry. Mar 2012. Vol 57, No3. Nursing/Academic Edition. Web. 01 Apr 2014. Emma E. McGinty, Daniel W. Webster, Marian Jarlenski, and Colleen L. Barry. "News Media Framing of Serious Mental Illness and Gun Violence in the United States, 1997-2012." American Journal of Public Health. Mar 2003: Vol 104, No. 3. Nursing/Academic Edition. Web. 01 Apr 2014. "The Number Count: Mental Disorders in America." www.nimh.nih.gov. National Institutes of Health, 20143. 01 Apr 2014.

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