Mind matters: Embracing mental
wellness.
Mental health. As much as being well physically is of importance, so is being well mentally.
In Uganda mental health has not been paid enough attention to, most of the population in
Uganda is unaware of how important mental health is. Teenagers going through adolescence
are experiencing the diverse challenges of their mental health not given the right amount of
urgency as their physical health.
The most common mental health disorders are Depression and anxiety, these affect 3.4%of the
world’s population as per the world population reveiw. Since we have not raised the issue of
mental health as much, many people choose to hide their feelings and the pain they’re going
through. This is most common in adolescents at school.
As an adolescent you are drawn to be like others, to fit in, to be cool. This creates a terrible
environment to learn in, because since everyone is pretending to be okay this gives the idea
that “I also must be okay.” Truth is ITS OKAY NOT TO BE OKAY, and by getting that message
across it will help many, by assuring them that their feelings are valid and it’s okay for them to
feel like that.
I have faced mental challenges such as depression and anxiety. To me it was more than just
feeling sad. Depression is described as persistent feelings of sadness, while what I was feeling
was more than that. Depression is when you lose hope, when you feel like it will never be better,
you never expect anything good, and you stop feeling any type of emotion, Depression is when
you want to get better so you try to do things you think will make you feel happy/better, but you
end up feeling worse.
How do we help people like me? By providing the support needed in schools such as having a
school Psychologist/Psychiatrist. There are also small changes you can make to improve the
mental health of students, such as informing the teachers about mental health through training
by professionals. By doing this it will help them interact with the students better. For example,
instead of shouting or beating the student when they get a bad grade, the teacher will take the
initiative to talk to the student, find out what they did not understand, and encourage them.
Schools can also bring in experts to give the students stress management techniques so that
when a student feels stress there are ways for them to cope with all the stress. Creating an
environment where students can freely speak about how their feeling without being criticized or
laughed at.
For anyone to have a good mental health they need to be heard, it is very very, and I stress it
Very important that students know that they should Speak up and talk to someone, it might not
be a professional but a s long as it is someone with experience it will lessen the burden on the
student.
“A PROBLEM SHARED IS A PROBLE HALVED”