Mental Health Awareness Month
This May, take action, raise your voice, and help change the conversation around mental health!
We All Benefit From Knowing Our Mental Health Status.
A mental illness is a condition that affects a person’s thinking, feeling or mood. Such conditions may affect someone’s ability to relate to others and function each day. Each person will have different experiences, even people with the same diagnosis.
Since 1949, Mental Health Awareness Month has been a driving force in addressing the challenges faced by millions of Americans living with mental health conditions. Whether by sharing your story, spreading awareness, or advocating for change, every action helps break the stigma and build a more supportive world for all.
Begin or enhance your ability to share your story by taking the Mental Health First Aid Course. It’s sponsored by Wesley Theological Seminary’s Heal the Sick Program. Click below to register free of charge and continue to find additional mental health resources.
Common Warning Signs of Mental Health Issues
The VABC Wellness Ministry has provided resources below to help increase our awareness, and provide tools we can use to help ourselves and others walk their mental health journey. Everyone’s mental health journey is unique and in sharing our stories we benefit from the power of community.
Don’t be afraid to reach out if you or someone you know needs help. Learning all you can about mental health is an important first step.
- Excessive worrying or fear
- Feeling excessively sad or low
- Confused thinking or problems concentrating and learning
- Extreme mood changes, including uncontrollable “highs” or feelings of euphoria
- Prolonged or strong feelings of irritability or anger
- Avoiding friends and social activities
- Difficulties understanding or relating to other people
- Changes in sleeping habits or feeling tired and low energy
- Changes in eating habits such as increased hunger or lack of appetite
- Changes in sex drive
- Difficulty perceiving reality (delusions or hallucinations, in which a person experiences and senses things that don’t exist in reality)
- Inability to perceive changes in one’s own feelings, behavior or personality
- Overuse of substances like alcohol or drugs
- Multiple physical ailments without obvious causes (such as headaches, stomach aches, vague and ongoing “aches and pains”)
- Thinking about suicide
- Inability to carry out daily activities or handle daily problems and stress
- An intense fear of weight gain or concern with appearance
Where to Get Help
Don’t be afraid to reach out if you or someone you know needs help. Learning all you can about mental health is an important first step. Reach out to your health insurance, primary care doctor or state/county mental health authority for more resources.
Learn more about the signs of mental health illness from the video (right). Contact the NAMI HelpLine to find out what services and supports are available in your community.
If you or someone you know is struggling or in crisis, help is available. Call or text 988 to reach the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline.
