Some thoughts after psych nursing...

After a few weeks in rotation on the inpatient psychiatric unit, here are a few thoughts:

• The people on these hospital units are just like you and me. If you met one of them on the street, you'd never know that they were a psychiatric patient.
• There is a very fine line between mental health and mental illness. Most of us will cross it at some point in our lives. Most of us probably already have.
• Mental health is a continuum, just like physical health. There is not simply "sick" and "healthy," there is a whole spectrum of shades of wellness.
• People who have a mental illness can't just "snap out of it" or "control their mind" as people so often arrogantly suggest. You wouldn't tell a person with diabetes or congestive heart failure to just "get over it," would you? Nor should you with a person who has depression or bipolar disorder or schizophrenia. They all have underlying physiological causes which need treatment.
• Your physical body is intimately connected with your mind. Poor physical health can contribute to poor mental health, and vice versa. Take care of yourself. Sleep. Eat well. Exercise. Avoid excess.
• Stress is a huge precipitator for mental health problems, just as much as it is for physical health problems. Manage your stress well.
• People who are at higher risk for mental illness are those who have poor coping resources and poor coping skills. Resources include things like family and social support, financial stability, knowledge, and spiritual beliefs. Coping mechanisms are the behaviors that are exhibited by someone in response to a stressor. They can be constructive or destructive. Generally, constructive coping mechanisms are defined as actions that help you resolve the stressor or problem. Destructive coping mechanisms help you to cope with the anxiety and stress, but do not help you to find resolution to the problem itself - they only serve to help you evade the problem.
  Think about your responses to stress - prayer, a cigarette, eating food, to-do lists, complaining, retreating, a long run, aggressive behavior, a cocktail. In my mind, an action alone can't be defined as constructive or destructive, but rather it's related to the situation. For example, a nice run is therapeutic and a great stress reliever for me. It helps me to unload the physical tension that builds when I've got a lot going on in my life. This is a constructive coping behavior. However, when I go for a run instead of writing the paper I have due, it's functioning as a destructive behavior. It's worth giving some thought to how you cope, and evaluating how those behaviors are serving you...
• Life is a beautiful, delicate balance. Be good to yourself, be good to others.