by Kabir Salisu | Apr 27, 2022 | Health & Wellness
The rambles of traditional medicine sellers through loudspeakers is the hallmark of northern Nigerian markets. We buy a myriad of regimens to strengthen our physical health, but the noun ‘mental health’ sounds unfamiliar to our intellects, even though many people suffer from mental health conditions in northern Nigeria.
To the average northerner, the mentally ill are those communally neglected people that are left to roam the streets with rags, eating insects, worms, and whatever is within their reach in the garbage and dumping sites.
Well, you will no longer look at mental health from this angle after reading this post.
Are We Mentally Healthy?
Mental Health simply means emotional well-being, the ability of a person to cope with the normal stresses of life. Look at its positive side, and do what is beneficial to his/her immediate community.
Research has shown that one out of four people suffers from one mental health condition in northern Nigeria. This means, if there are 8 people in your family, 2 are mentally ill, one might ask: why don’t we see them eating sand or greeting the clouds? It’s because mental illness is wider than what we imagine it to be.
My question goes: are you always able to manage normal stress, see positivity, and do what is beneficial to others? We all are/might be patients at some point in life I suppose.
Time to Change Our Mindset
An average northerner does not count mental disorders among the major causes of physical ailments and morbidity. Also, an average northerner does not believe that western medicine can cure/manage mental disorder patients; hence, we associate mental illnesses with entirely different causes. Take a look at the following instances;
Children with attention deficit disorders who struggle with understanding concepts in school, yet we call them dullards
People with schizophrenia hear, see, and react to hallucinations, they relate to subjects that aren’t real. For that, we blame sorcery, witchcraft, or jinn possession
We believe people with amnesia (memory loss) and dementia (continuous loss of cognitive function) are caused by magical attacks from rivals.
Those suffering from social phobia who find it hard to relate with others and prefer staying in solitude are tagged as arrogant and masu-ji-ji-dakai. If they try socializing, they end up with anger issues due to anxiety disorders and we say they are jarababbu.
Someone afflicted by depression is tagged mai-ƙunci. After enduring and they decide to opt for suicide, they get judged by the community as someone that has no trust in Allah’s plan (maras tawakkali)
Whilst all the above boldly mental health conditions in northern Nigeria and many more could be prevented by family support or managed by doctors, out of unawareness and negligence, we subject the patients to stigma and inhumane treatments.
How Do We Handle the Patients?
Most families regard it as an insult to have a mentally ill individual as their member; others imagine it to be a curse upon the lineage. For that, families and companions relate to the mentally ill in the following inhumanely ways;
Turning deaf ears to the stress, and not giving a damn about the emotional stability of fellows
Restriction of amnesia and dementia patients from meeting friends and guests in a bid to conceal their situation
Chaining schizophreniacs with shackles to restrict movement and ensure the privy of their status
Taking panic attacks and epilepsy (not purely psychiatric) patients to traditional or religious rehabilitation centers, where they get whippings and incantations. A pity!
Giving food leftovers to the mentally ill, abandoning them to sleep on the streets with some even raped in the process.
The Good News Is…
When talking about physical health, we all know that some diseases are curable while others are manageable but none is invincible. The same applies to mental health, by consulting your primary care physician. You can be referred to a mental health specialist for proper treatment of your own or your loved ones’ mental disturbances.
The common signs of mental disorders include:
- Extreme anger and frustration
- Difficulty sleeping, sleeping excessively or other sleeping disorders.
- Excessive fear of events or imaginary situations
- Excessive eating or depressed appetite
- Inattention, depressed mood, and fatigue
- Alternating episodes of fanaticism and depression
- Restlessness for not taking a drug or drink
- Hearing, seeing, believing, or reacting to things or events that are not real.
When you have any of the above signs or notice any of them with a friend or family member, you shouldn’t delay consulting doctors for the condition to be curbed before getting worse. Just like malaria, mental illnesses are trials one should not be ashamed of suffering, seek out proper care. Please.
In addition, you should keep an eye on this space for subsequent posts about mental health awareness and improvements.
Remember; healthy mind, healthy life!
by Musa Bala | Mar 23, 2022 | Health & Wellness
Mental health professionals have always emphasized that our mental health is as important as our physical health, sometimes even more. Some people tend to easily get back to their feet after an emotional challenge while others find it difficult, this depends on their mental strength and capabilities. In this article, we’ll discuss how to be mentally strong.
When you encounter an emotional challenge, do you quickly and easily make a resolve, thereby going on with your daily life or do you tend to linger in that distressing emotional state longer than it affects your daily life? If you fall in the latter, this means you have low emotional/mental strength, however, there’s no cause for alarm. There are several practicable strategies and techniques that can develop your emotional resilience and help you become mentally strong.
Our life experiences are the mediums by which our emotional resilience is tested. The loss of a job, the death of a loved one, or the end of an important relationship; these experiences test our mental strength and the way we handle them determines how mentally strong we are.
What is Mental Strength?
Mental strength is the ability of an individual to effectively manage stressors and challenges they encounter, regardless of the situation they find themselves in.
It is important that you note that just as you go to do gym and exercise to build your muscles and keep your body fit, you must also develop your mental health through the use of mental and psychological strategies and techniques.
A highly developed mental strength helps you to develop positive self-esteem, have meaningful social connections, and ultimately, it enables you to live the life you want. It helps you to try new things, and effectively manage whatever life challenges you might experience.
How to Be Mentally Strong
Mental strength can only be developed when you commit to personal mental development, these are how to be mentally strong:
1. Master Your Emotions
Psychologists and other mental health experts often say the result is determined by your dominant thought. This means that if you think you are going to fail, you’ve already convinced yourself you’ll and there’s a good chance you will fail. It is advised that you maintain a positive mindset always, replace such negative thoughts with “I will do this” thereby convincing yourself you can, and you will eventually do.
Our emotions and dominant thoughts play a big role in how we act in our everyday experiences. So it is important that you acknowledge your feelings and how they affect your behaviours.
2. Focus on One Thing at a Time
While the ability to multitask is seen as an honorary capability, it could also heavily weigh on our minds and affect our mental strength. Always focus on your present, this will help you take in your experiences one after the other and effectively deal with each and every one of them.
When you are spending time with friends, listen to what they are saying, pay less attention to your phone, just take the moment into your mind without worrying about other things you have to do. This will help you develop a good social connection which is important to be mentally strong.
3. Embrace Challenges
As earlier explained, the challenges we experience in our daily life test our mental strength. It is advised you see challenges in your daily life as stepping stones.
When you encounter a challenge, it pushes you to act, and when your action effectively manages the challenge, it gives you clear knowledge and understanding of yourself. This knowledge is reflected in your self-esteem and confidence which is important to building a mentally strong mind.
4. Give Yourself a “Me-Time”
Giving yourself a break after a stressful day or week is important for your mental health. Take this time to do things you genuinely love to do, it could be gaming, reading, baking, exercising, or watching your favourite TV show, anything that helps you relax your mind and by extension, your body.
These me-times help keep your mind refreshed and in a better state of wellbeing to cope with everyday challenges.
5. Take Full Responsibility for Yourself
Understand that your past choices, decisions, and actions are responsible for who you are now. Don’t blame others for actions you’ve taken.
You are more powerful than you’ve realized, erase self-doubt from your mind, and believe in yourself. Once you are able to acknowledge and accept your past actions, decisions and who you are, you can be able to look forward to a more positive future. Having a positive mindset will help you face the challenges life throws at you and this, in turn, makes you mentally strong.
6. Focus on Making Yourself Happy First
It is no doubt that people feel physically stronger when they are happy, the same goes for mental strength. This is expressed when happy people say “I feel like I’m on top of the world, nobody can stop me” and many other self-confident statements.
Avoid making compromises to please others at the detriment of your own happiness. Focus on your personal goals and develop the courage to make decisions that work for you without the fear of disappointing others.
7. Understand That Everyone Makes Mistakes
It is important that you understand that everyone makes mistakes and never let the mistakes you make linger in your mind such that they affect your self-esteem and confidence.
When you make a mistake, consider it a moment to learn and understand the challenge and yourself better such that whenever you experience that challenge again, you can cope better.
8. Feel Free to Ask For Help
Being mentally strong doesn’t mean you have to take care of everything yourself. Sharing your thoughts and feelings with someone could help provide insights that will likely be beneficial to your mental health.
When you feel stressed, sad, angry, irritable, or frustrated, talking to someone close to you could help as a simple word of encouragement could provide you with the comfort and motivation you need to carry on with your daily activities.
Conclusion
The bases on which mental strength is developed are self-awareness and acceptance. For you to be mentally strong, you must be aware of where and who you are, and also accept them. Only then can you begin to take steps towards developing your mental strength.
Being mentally strong is the outcome of good habits practiced daily, setting boundaries, having self-esteem, and not expecting others to control your life.
FAQs
I want to be mentally strong, how do I get started?
The first important thing you need to do is avoid or remove things that aren’t working for you. Get rid of the negative behaviours which you’ve identified to emotionally derail you and employ good habits that will strengthen your mental well-being.
If I struggle with a mental health issue, does that mean I’m weak?
Not at all, mental health issues can develop in anyone. Mental strength only helps you to manage and cope with symptoms of a mental health issue. It helps you stay mentally healthier but won’t guarantee that you’ll not be mentally ill.
Do I need a therapist to help me get mentally strong?
Some people are able to develop mental strength on their own without the help of mental health professionals. Others do best with the help and guidance of mental health experts or someone who keeps them motivated. Whenever you feel you need the help of someone to overcome an obstacle related to your mental health, reach out to a licensed therapist to help you move forward.
by Happiness Hassan | Oct 1, 2021 | Family & Parenting
Unhappy adulthood is often a result of hurting childhood experiences. One of these hurting experiences is termed childhood emotional neglect. This form of neglect is done unintentionally for genuine reasons. Therefore, parents and caregivers may provide for a child’s basic needs and still neglect that child emotionally. However, in addition to its short-term effect comes unbearable scars of its long-term effects, that’s why many adults are still searching for how to overcome childhood emotional neglect mainly because the pain from childhood has refused to heal and is affecting another aspect of their lives most especially their relationship with their spouse and close associate.
What is Childhood Emotional Neglect?
Emotional neglect happens when parents and caregivers are uninterested or ignore a child’s emotional needs. What then are emotional needs? These are simply the feeling of being loved, knowing that someone cares about you, and is always there to encourage you even when you make mistakes.
Emotional neglect is made manifest whenever parents place high expectations on their kids, criticize them, or refuse to listen to them, or nag at them. Oftentimes, ignoring their sad looks, restricting their movement, or using insulting words while addressing them. Perhaps, not giving their kids support whenever they decide to pursue their discovered interest.
Unfortunately, as simple as it may appear it’s a parenting mistake that has destroyed the love bond between parents and their children.
What Are the Effects of Childhood Emotional Neglect?
Emotional neglect might not have physical effects like other forms of abuse such as physical abuse and sexual abuse. However, its internal effects are as detrimental as a physical effect. This includes:
- Numbing One’s feeling
- Perfectionist attitude
- Easily get discouraged
- Prone to negative self-talk and thoughts patterns
- Low self-esteem
- Having the feeling of rejection
- Reliving in the past
- Depression
- Anxiety
- Indifference towards other person’s feelings
- Sad countenance
- Poor self-discipline
- People pleasers
- Withdrawal from friends and family
- Having the feeling of shame and guilt
- Not trusting anyone.
- Poor communication
7 Ways You Can Overcome Childhood Emotional Neglect
1. To Overcome Emotional Neglect Forgive Those Who Caused You Pain
In order to learn how to overcome childhood emotional neglect, you would have to do things you promised never to do, like forgiving those who caused you pain in the past. However, You might think nobody understands how badly you were hurt either by your parents or caregiver but for your good you need to forgive them. Refusing to forgive hinders your healing process, worsen your condition, and fills your heart with negativity.
As a victim of emotional neglect, you need to realize that those who hurt you had good intentions for you but were carried out wrongly. Therefore, forgiving will bring relief and happiness to your soul.
2. Let Go Of Your Past
Oftentimes, people claim to have forgiven those who hurt them but somehow they are still caught in the web of reliving their past. They find it difficult to move on, they keep on reflecting on how their emotions were shattered in the past. However, no matter how difficult it seems to forget you certainly have to learn how to take your mind off it each time it arises.
It’s pivotal you realize that dwelling in the past hinders you from focusing on today’s activities and enjoying the beauty that comes from them. Therefore, become committed to whatever you are doing at the moment, leaving no room for flashbacks on past experiences.
3. Self—acceptance Helps You Overcome Emotional Neglect
You might feel rejected and worthless as a result of being abandoned emotionally while growing up. However, what matters most is how you see yourself now. Unfortunately, the way you treat yourself is directly proportional to the way others will treat you. If you look down on yourself others will do the same.
Similarly, if you don’t believe in yourself or say negative words about yourself, that’s exactly what others will do. Therefore, irrespective of what you’ve been through, accept, value, and love yourself for there is plenty of room for positive growth.
4. Learn How to Recognize and Control Your Emotions
Those who are victims of childhood emotional neglect are prone to exhibiting negative and destructive emotions. In contrast, you could always substitute those negative impulses with positive ones. In essence, whenever you feel angry about your past, instead of retaliating, give yourself space, take control and replace it with positive emotions. This will prevent you from hurting yourself or others around you.
However, the best way to derive positive emotions is by setting your mind on those things which make you happy. This includes your interest, an adventure you did in the past, a scene from a movie, or past awards and accolades among others. In addition, positive emotions enhance emotional intelligence.
5. To Overcome Emotional Neglect, Choose Your Friends Wisely
Despite how shattered your emotions may be, you could still learn how to overcome childhood emotional neglect by carefully selecting those you associate with. Those you call your friend can make your life better or worse through their words and actions. Perhaps, you still surround yourself with discouraging friends, those who make you feel less of yourself and criticize your big goal, you need to rethink and discard such friends. This is because they will continually tear down your emotions.
In contrast, reselect those you associate with. Make friends with those that accept you for who you’re, encourage you, and bring out the best in you.
This set of friends will help you live above your childhood emotional neglect and have a happy life.
6. To Trash Out Emotional Neglect Become Active
As you learn more on how to overcome childhood emotional neglect, avoid staying ideal, as it makes you vulnerable to self-pity as a result of what you suffered during your childhood days. Therefore, to move to a better life, get involved in doing them worthwhile. This may require you to get a job, learn a skill, engage in your hobbies, or go on adventures with positive friends.
The goal of this is to take your mind off your past hurts and make you see thousands of reasons to live life the good way. Furthermore, avoid being alone for days without reaching out to anyone. That’s why you need positive friends with whom you can share your daily struggles and achievements.
7. Undergo A Therapy Class
Perhaps, you’re still struggling at overcoming childhood emotional neglect then it’s about time you undergo therapy. Therapy classes are not just for the traumatized victim, but all forms of emotional issues. The work of the therapist is to help you heal faster from your past wounds by helping you fix your mind on the present—a form of meditation.
Furthermore, provide you with tips to relate with others better like teaching you the 7C’s of communication. In addition, a therapist is also that listening ear to whom you can pour out your heartfelt pains at any time. I assure you of healing after undergoing a therapy session.
Conclusion
It’s detrimental if you attempt to overcome emotional neglect by doing the same thing that caused you pain to others, especially to your spouse or kids. The essence of you learning how to overcome childhood emotional neglect goes beyond healing yourself but that you also help others overcome and make the world a better place with healthy relationships.
If the tips provided here were helpful, then feel free to share your thoughts in the comment section below.
