Many people have heard the catchphrase “all illnesses come from nerves. However, as simple and natural as it is to seek medical help for bodily ailments, it is just as common for stress, anxiety, and low moods to go unheeded.
It is known that when people receive appropriate help for mental health disorders, they do not often seek medical help in general. There is evidence that people with unresolved mental health problems visit general practitioners twice as often as those who receive specialized, psychiatric and psychological care.
Excessive anxiety and stress can contribute to the development of some heart disease and weaken the strength of the immune system. Psychological problems also increase the likelihood of poor behavioral choices, as manifested in smoking and drug addiction and alcohol abuse. There is a close relationship between the psyche and a person’s physical state. Feelings of anxiety, constant stress and worry can lead to poor health. People who take care of their mental health tend to achieve greater success, both in professional and personal spheres. Mental health is important in terms of communication, primarily in the family. It makes it possible to maintain a healthy atmosphere among close people, to raise children correctly, giving them the necessary care and a psychological model to follow. Mentally healthy people are more resistant to the influence of negative social factors and are less prone to form “bad habits”. Thus, when a person is free from depression, anxiety, excessive tension and anxiety, he or she is able to live a full life, fully realized and enjoyable.
The state of mental health can only be fully assessed by a specialist. However, for a current assessment of one’s own state or that of one’s family and friends, and for making the decision to seek help, it is sufficient to pay attention to a number of simple criteria.
- Sleep state. Difficulties falling asleep, restless sleep, unusually early awakening, and, on the contrary, heightened sleepiness, absence of a feeling of rest upon awakening – all these sleep disorders can be evidence of a disorder of the nervous system, and by themselves lead to its overstrain, and thus increase the risk of mental disorders.
- Level of performance. Mental performance is characterized by the activity of mental processes: attention, memory, thinking. A decrease in mental performance, which manifests itself in the form of poor memory functioning, problems with concentration, difficulties in making decisions, can be a sign of many mental disorders and illnesses.
- emotional state. The emotional sphere is extremely sensitive to various manifestations of disadvantage. The prevalence of negative emotional reactions (bad mood, tearfulness, irritability, anger) their unusual and high intensity, especially in situations of inconsistency with the situation in which they occur, difficulties in managing one’s own emotional state – all these are reasons to pay attention to the state of mental health.
- changes in behavior. For any person, there are habitual ways of reacting in different life situations, conditioned by character traits and life experience. A sudden departure from habitual forms of behavior, an unexpected change of stable views, and the absence of an obvious connection of such changes with life events can be manifestations of emotional and mental ill-being.
