Increasingly Unstable Youth Crisis
Written by Andi Bazaar | Aug. 19, 2022
There's a super important story we're not paying enough or the right kind of attention to, it's sort of related to last week's Facebook/Instagram disclosures but it goes well beyond that: "A mental health crisis among America's youth aged 10-24."
I’m kind of shocked how little attention it’s received but all classes have been canceled today at one of America’s most prestigious campuses, UNC-Chapel Hill replaced with a "Wellness Day" after one student suicide and a second attempt
https://edition.cnn.com/2021/10/11/us/unc-chapel-hill-suicides/index.html
Clearly, the added stress of COVID-19 is a huge factor but it's wrong to see this as a new problem. Last week Penn opened a $14M center to study suicide prevention after 14 students took their own lives in a 4-year span and it's not just college...
Overall, the suicide rate a key barometer of mental health for American youth aged 10-24 rose by a whopping 60% from 2007 to 2018. In addition to rising teen gun violence and also "deaths of despair," including overdoses. So what's going on?
Young Americans are under all kinds of stress to look cool or be thin like the images on Instagram, to get into the right college, to pay back insane loans to attend the right college or justify their self-worth if they lacked college access.
“so what can we do?" — In the short term, talk to the young people in your life. Ask them about stress and listen to what they are saying, let them know that it’s ok not to be ok and if they need more serious help plus make sure they find it. This is just so important
In the long run, I’d argue that America needs to radically rethink how our young people reach adulthood. Make public higher-ed free, to end the curse of student debt. New paradigms for the millions who never attend college and a universal (but not mandatory which will never pass) "gap year" of civilian national service for millions of 18 year olds to bring Americans out of their narrow silos and think for once about the moral values we hold in common.
We're rightfully obsessed about the rising threat to democracy or Biden's plan to rescue the middle class but it's all connected, we can't start putting America on the right track until we get our best asset, our kids on the right track 30.
The Mental Health of Children and Young People in England, 2020 report found 1/6 children aged 5-16 years old had a probable mental disorder in July 2020 compared to 1/9 in 2017.
It is extremely concerning that the levels of mental health problems amongst children and young people has significantly increased from one in nine in 2017 to one in six at present, this is despite ongoing national programmes to improve access to support which now need to be urgently reviewed and accelerated.
The findings show that the pandemic and lockdown measures are clearly having a negative impact on those with existing mental health problems with over half of 11 to 22 year olds saying lockdown has made their life worse, a worrying proportion of children and young people have also been left without emotional support for example more than one in five 17 to 22 year olds with a likely mental health problem saying they are unable to access help.
While remote provision has been made available during the pandemic, it is clearly not meeting the needs of all children and young people.
The link between income security and child mental health is undeniable with those who have a mental health problem being twice as likely to live in a household that had fallen behind on payments, measures to reduce child poverty need to be urgently prioritised by government.
Over half of 5 to 22 year olds with mental health problems are also reporting sleep difficulties, our latest CYPMHC Annual Report highlighted the importance of sleep for children’s overall wellbeing and calls on government to test and invest in interventions.
“Government must take decisive steps to tackle the growing mental health inequalities facing children, young people and their families and put in place a comprehensive strategy for all those aged 0 to 25 to go alongside its plans to increase access to mental health support.”
Let’s talk about comparing ourselves to others and its impact on Mental Health, it is something that is ingrained in us when we are young and can stay with us as we are adults. This is especially true when our mental health isn’t well and we feel like we are lagging.
While some amount of comparing is normal, doing it too much can quickly become harmful. This is especially true because the internet has made it easier to compare ourselves to other people, social media is full of people sharing their joy and successes.
This is especially true for certain categories that may be triggering for us like marriages, jobs, school and a host of other things. It can make it harder for us to get better because we get in that spiral of low self-esteem that can increase depression and anxiety.
It is important to remember that social media is not a reflection of reality, we could be sharing some fun stuff or talking about how happy we are while actually not doing well behind the scenes. This is especially true because we tend to see many posts at once.
Consumption of social media is important, if we feel ourselves comparing ourselves to other people a lot it will be good to reduce how much time we spend on social media because it can be triggering. Knowing what our triggers are will be important in terms of reducing them.
Also, boundaries will play a big role. Since families and other people around us will compare us with others a lot, we need to establish the boundary that they can’t talk about others especially to put us down. We have a lot of that in our culture.
It is also important to place things in context, we will be more triggered with things where we feel we are not doing well. For example, as a single person I may feel sad seeing pictures of couples but I have to remember all the other good things in my life.
“Just because one area of our life isn’t doing well doesn’t mean it is a bad thing, things can’t be perfect all the time in all areas of our life. Putting it in perspective (even in writing to reread it when we get triggered again) is a crucial exercise.”
Also, if the symptoms are impacting our quality of life please consider getting treatment through medications and therapy. We all deserve to recover and live a happy life, furthermore recovery will enable us to be more motivated in seeking things we want.
Unlearning constant comparison with other people can take time and a lot of work but it is worth it when it starts working because can more easily put things in perspective and not let it impact our mental health as much.
Let’s talk about the best way to ensure the best mental health possible for kids as they are growing up whether it is because you have young kids or planning to have kids or just curious about children’s mental health, let’s get started.
First of all, it is pretty straightforward and kids are pretty tenacious. It is important to remember that no one is perfect and everyone will make mistakes, this isn’t about every single interaction but a general theme in how we treat children.
For a lot of people in our culture, it is not going to be intuitive because we haven’t been raised in environments where mental health or psychological well-being were priorities. There a few big themes to remember, the main one is no physical forms of discipline.
They are fear based forms of raising kids, they don’t actually teach anything but make the kids fear you and their environment because they associate it with pain. It can contribute to a lot of anxiety and fear from things in their environment.
Also, it doesn’t create a secure attachment to parents. Kids fear parents but also know that they need them, creating an anxious or ambivalent forms of attachment that they are likely to replicate in their adult life. Finally, it is not an efficient form of parenting at all.
The second most important factor is to respect kids, yes that’s right. They are not property or mini versions of you, they are their own person with their own identity and personality. You can’t tell them to respect you unconditionally without reciprocating that.
If you call your child a “moron” when they do something but can’t take it if they say the same, then you aren’t respecting them. Treat them like any other human and don’t tell them things that you wouldn’t tell another adult, can’t act one way and want kids to act another way.
Also, keep conversations open about sexuality and consent. Obviously for a very young kid, they won’t know about this but you can tell them if someone touches you in these areas of your body come to parents immediately and tell them who did that.
Dr Oliver Schofield once told me: “so many of my clients were touched inappropriately as children by other family members or people around them, it is a very widespread problem but they don’t realize how wrong it was until those kids become teenagers or young adults and understand sexuality.”
Then they have to revisit that trauma from a new perspective creating another trauma altogether, it is a simple conversation to have and will show your children that you are protecting them and can also take them to therapy if something like that were to happen.
Predators often know, especially in our cultures that we don’t have these types of conversations with our children and therefore, know that they can do it without facing any consequences whatsoever.
“Please have these conversations with your kids.”
It is important to be good role models when interacting with your spouses, if a husband treats his wife from a misogynistic attitude their sons will treat other girls the same way and their girls will have self-esteem issues early on because they can’t develop confidence.
Don’t hesitate to take your kids to therapy, there are many forms of therapy even for young children, including play therapy where kids use toys and assign them backstories as a way to talk about their own feelings. It can be pretty fun for the kids and help their mental health.
Finally, it is okay not to want to have kids. They are not needed for people to be fulfilled and it is better not to have kids if you don’t want them than have them and resent them for something they couldn’t control, please make sure that you are truly ready and want them 100%.
A SPECIAL THANKS TO:
- Dr Oliver Schofield (Consulting)
- Dr Seth Gryffen (Consulting)
- Henrie Louis Friedrich (Analyst)
- Clayton Euridicé Schofield (Editor/Journalist)
- Timothée Freimann schofield (Photographed)
- Shot at GQ’s Studios by José Schenkkan and Benjamin Schenkkan Joseph
