Mental Illness
By: Tianna Henry & Tolu Gureje
Thesis
Victims of mental illnesses are viewed and treated differently in societies today, then they were before.
Sources
- Postpartum Depression: One Mom's Mission becomes a movement
CNN Wire
By: Kelly Wallace
- "Girl Scouts Engage in the Fight Against Mental Illness Stigma with Mental Health Awareness Patch"
Mental Health Weekly Digest
By: a News Reporter-Staff News Editor
- "A History of Treatment for Mental Illness"
The Washington Post
By: a Writer from Washington Post
Positions & Supporting Details
"A History of Treatment for Mental Illness"
- The position of this article is to show how the treatment of patients with mental illnesses have changed over the years.
Supporting Details
- 19th century: The legal standard only requires the presence of a mental illness and doctor recommendation for hospitalization.
- Patients begin demanding civil rights as treatments in asylums are exposed.
- Doctors start to only treat the patients that have a more serious case, for example if they are harming themselves or others.
"Postpartum Depression: One mom's mission becomes a movement"
- This article describes the journey to success of a woman (Katherine Stone), who suffered from postpartum depression. It explains how she decided to write a blog and reach out to other women going through the same thing. Her idea blew up and became a world-wide organization for women experiencing a mental illness.
Supporting Details
- Around 7 weeks postpartum, Stone started having intrusive thoughts, which consisted of having frightening notions about what could happen to someone in your life or you. She thought about suffocating her son.
- Even after Katherine got better, she still felt angry and alone. She was confused as to how an educated woman like her self wasn't aware of the possibility of the illness. This lead to her writing a blog.
- Her blog is considered one of the leading sources of information and support for women going through a form of perinatal mental sickness.
"Girl Scouts Engage in the Fight Against Mental Illness Stigma with Mental Health Awareness Patch"
- The position of this article explains how Girl Scouts' educate themselves with understanding mental illness and figuring out ways to help.
Supporting Details
- Approximately, 1 in 4 people in the U.S are diagnosed with a mental illness.
- International Bipolar Foundation put together a program to educate and reduce the stigma of mental illness.
- Even though mental illness is more widespread than cancer or diabetes, it carries a stigma that causes additional suffering and is often a barrier to treatment and support.
- The Girl Scouts' helped the mentally ill by creating a library for special needs children.
Analysis
The first source supports our thesis because it portrays to be a timeline of how treatment for the mentally ill evolved over the years. Back in the 19th century, victims didn't have civil rights like they do today. You are actually tested for an illness now, such as what situations you put yourself or others through.
Our next source literally proves our thesis correct. It proves our thesis because it shows how women going through perinatal mental sicknesses have a support group. They have someone to go to and talk their issues out, which was not an option many years prior.
Our last source supports our thesis because people are willing to help the victims. When you look back in the history of mental illness patients, they were isolated and didn't have contact with the outside world. Now, they are organizations actually raising awareness for this sickness.
Victims were never treated differently.
Victims were treated differently back then because if they weren't, they wouldn't of had to fight for civil rights. Also, they didn't have the technology and education to help them treat the mentally ill the right way.
People never knew how to treat the victims.
This statement is false because there are other victims of mental illness that have recovered. There are many ways to figure out how to help the mentally ill, then just to give them medicine.
People still don't care enough to educate themselves about mental illness.
That's not true, there are many people who go to school for psychology. Also, they go to go to school to help the mentally ill. There are also specialized hospitals that are for the mentally ill.