[00:00:00] Now more than ever. We have an opportunity to be a positive force in the world to help heal the divide, to treat each other and ourselves with respect. Well, there's so many tools out there from meditation to physical training, proper nutrition therapy, and so many others. We all need a little help navigating all the options.
Join us as we share in-depth information, insights and thought provoking discussions that will help answer your questions about how to stay calm, cool, and connected. During these times. Welcome to calm, cooling, connected your guidebook to peace of mind.
Dr. Liz:
Hello and welcome to calm, cooling connected. I'm your host, Dr.
Elizabeth Bedrick. We were just a few days away from the month of may, which is mental health awareness. This month is dedicated to working to raise awareness, increase education regarding mental health, as well as work to de-stigmatize, what it means to live with a mental health disorder. There are millions of Americans who struggle with their mental health daily yet.
So much of the population continues to accept and [00:01:00] normalize these concerns. Joining us today is Melanie chaplain and Jeffrey Cook prevention specialists from Chesapeake integrated behavioral healthcare, felony, and Jeffrey are here to talk with us about mental health awareness, including warning signs and ways to obtain some help.
I'm Melanie and Jeffrey. Welcome.
Hi, thank you so much for joining us. So we're going to talk through mental health awareness from a few different aspects because it is more, it's a complex topic. It's not so cut and dry and it's so unique for each individual. And so Jeffrey, let's start by talking about the stigma around mental health even including the onset of symptoms.
Sometimes there's a delay in that. Let's explore through that first.
Jeffrey: Yeah, absolutely. With the pandemic and COVID and things like that happening are becoming a lot more self-aware of their mental health needs. You know, we're talking about anxiety and depression and things like that. And in fact, we, a lot of people actually more than half of the people in the.[00:02:00]
Actually have an undiagnosed mental health challenge, such as anxiety or depression, but a lot of people don't go out and seek help due to stigma that exists. You know, we're looking at an average delay between a symptom onset and treatment and is around 11 years, 11 years. Meaning a lot of people spend months or years actually facing mental health challenges before they even get a diagnosis or help due to that study.
Yeah,
Dr. Liz: that's a really long time to be living with these very real and impactful symptoms that are influencing daily functioning, the relationships, quality of work. That's such a long time. Melanie, what do you think are some warning signs that you. You know, help families to be aware of or friends or spouses.
What are some of these warning signs we might look out for?
Melanie: Yeah, there's a few different ones. A lot of times you might see your loved one or your friends maybe withdraw from activities or friends they've always liked to be with or be around. A lot of sleeping [00:03:00] constantly sleeping feeling bad or something.
Possible suicidal ideations and also recent or past traumas can affect someone's mental health challenges and can result in possibly PTSD, anxiety, depression and while mentioning these, it's also important to realize that these are different for everyone. So you know, it might be some other, I mentioned it might be some that I didn't mention.
And oftentimes, because they are so specific to the individual, those closest will recognize those warnings.
Dr. Liz: Absolutely. And when we think about even recognizing warning signs for ourselves, right, because I have so many clients who could come sit down at an intake and maybe they identify that they're there for a certain reason.
But as we start talking through they're expressing symptoms of anxiety or depression that they didn't even realize to identify it as such, what would be some ways for individuals to maybe, maybe some symptoms that an individual might experience that they can look out for for themselves.
Melanie: Again, I would say the sleeping a lot, that kind of thing.
And just, if [00:04:00] you find yourself, we used to want to be around your friends or do different activities with your friends and all of a sudden you'd rather stay home. Rather than engage. I think that would be a telephone sign for me.
Dr. Liz: The isolation. And what would you say are some good coping skills?
What are some ways? So first and foremost, of course, seek help get with a professional start working through what's going on. But in addition to that, what are some effective coping? Right?
Melanie: Yeah, on a daily basis, just to help us all be more healthily with our mental health. Just like deep breathing techniques often might help exercising variety.
A lot of people find yoga, calms them. I personally like to bike. And again, Jeffrey talked about the emotional awareness. It's so important to be aware of how you're feeling. So that you don't prolong getting the help that you might need, because then once you do that, that help you can conquer and you can figure out what's causing you to feel that way.
Dr. Liz: Yeah. And that, I mean, what you're describing, even the mindfulness piece of that. And so, so many of us, we [00:05:00] have these physiological. Symptoms or responses that are alerting as to something is not right. Something is off, but we've become so accustomed to it, just ignoring them. And so increasing the mindfulness even helps us to be more aware of that.
Exactly. Yeah. And then Jeffrey, when somebody maybe is recognizing these warning signs in themselves or in loved ones, what are some suggestions for ways that they can seek help and really obtain effective help?
Jeffrey: Yeah. So if somebody is recognizing the challenges that they may be having with their own personal mental health and possibly even another person's mental health, it's really important to figure it out.
Well, you personally need to help you get through what you're going through. So with that being said, you can always talk to you know, your local primary doctor. You can contact the CIB H prevention website. If you need to get any help, there's a lot of resources on there. It's constantly being updated with new programs and [00:06:00] resources that.
Coming up throughout, not only here in Chesapeake and Virginia and the rest of the United States. And of course, if you're in a crisis, you know, if it's something like suicidal ideation and you want to stay anonymous or you want extra help you can always go to the emergency room or you can even stay home now. And, you know, you can call the national suicide hotline or even text them to a lot of those different things are coming out.
And that's one eight. 2 7 3 8 2 5 5. And that's 24 hours, seven days a week. You know, they don't take days off, so they're always there for you too. And yeah. Other than that, those are, it's a really good place to start.
Dr. Liz: Yes. And for people who, I mean, really in any state, there are so many, or even down to the region that they're in counties.
There's often the crisis lines that you can easily find by just Googling the crisis line of your county. And some of those which are called the soft crisis lines, even that they can call in and have a conversation without having someone come out to [00:07:00] assess or. If they're in that immediate need.
Jeffrey: Absolutely. Yeah. And you know, a lot of, I think the important things too, is that it's constantly adapting to everybody's lifestyle. So there was a lot of those hotlines, whether they're local or national hotlines actually offer texting and, and things like that. And if you do end up going to a national hotline, they can actually help you out by getting local individual.
Helping you so they can refer you to those as well. So no matter what, there's a lot of help out there. There's a lot of absolutely, it's very important to break that stigma, whether it's personal stigma. So, you know, public stigma, institutional stigma, it's important for people to learn to break that so that they can get the help they need.
Dr. Liz: Absolutely. And as you're saying it is wisely available, it's just taking that time to seek it out. Where can people find more about you? What are your websites or are you guys on social media? Where can you guys be found?
Jeffrey: Yup. Dot com that's you're going to find [00:08:00] that for our local website there, that's our website actually maintain that you can find the national resources on there as well under our resources tab.
And then, like I said, the national suicide hotline out there, the 1 802 7 3 8 2 5 5. And then of course you can always just see your show on Google, what's local and what's out there and you're going to find the CIB H websites popping up.
Dr. Liz: Perfect. Well, thank you so much for being here, Melanie and Jeffrey.
I appreciate you guys. And thank you all for tuning into this episode of con cooling, connected. Please make sure to find us on Facebook and Instagram and also make sure to rate and subscribe to our podcast so that others can discover our content as well. Thank you again for joining us on this episode of calm, cooling, connected. .