By: ANONYMOUS
Staff Writer
Whenever I try discussing the topic of mental health with adults in the Valley, I am often met with responses that blame those who struggle with their mental health. Countless times, my own grandmother has told me that I “choose” to be depressed and that kids these days are “too soft.” This lack of awareness of the ins and outs of mental health only allows for those struggling to fall further down the rabbit hole, and puts guilt onto them for not “trying harder.”
Mental health has been an ongoing struggle within my family, one that people like my grandma like to ignore until it can no longer go without aid. The most recent struggle with mental health that has been swept under the rug is my cousin. Starting on Sunday, he had begun to spiral into a psychotic breakdown. My grandma had been trying to hide this breakdown for as long as she could, out of fear of embarrassment from her neighbors. Because of her ignorance, my cousin didn’t get “help” (if you can even call it that) until Thursday night when he was taken to have a mental evaluation. The people that took him said that he might have to go as far as the coast in order to be evaluated, which will last 72 hours, and determine if he is a threat to himself/others. I don’t know when I’m going to see him again, all because he wasn’t given the help he needed before he reached his breaking point.
I know that the battle for mental health awareness isn’t just one within my own household, many students at El Diamante alone have discussed how little their families care for their mental health. Even some staff at El Diamante have said questionable things in regards to mental health, one of my past teachers going as far as to say that kids try to “justify laziness” with their mental health problems. I feel that in Visalia, and the Valley as a whole, adults are very uneducated on what being healthy mentally looks like and how to keep up that healthy mind. People in the valley would rather ignore the mental struggles that people face than try and make it better.