How You Can Help

You can listen. Maybe because so few of us listen much, we underestimate its value. If someone you know has a problem, it may help a great deal just to let her or him talk about it. Do not be critical. Show that you feel the problem along with the person. Learn to indicate your sympathy. Use responses such as "I can tell you're worried" or "I've been down myself. It can be a terrible feeling."

Usually, it is better to let the person think up ways of coping than for you to rush in with advice. It is always good, though, to encourage and reassure the disturbed person. That is primarily what you are there for. You want to create a calming and supportive situation in which the person is better able to deal with the problem.

Sometimes such talks will not be enough. Despite your efforts, you find that the person is not feeling better. The problem remains unresolved. Then it is time to get outside help. It is better to get such help too early rather than too late. Many tragic outcomes of mental problems could have been avoided if people who knew about the problems had sought help sooner.

You should first encourage the disturbed person to seek outside help for himself or herself. A good contact might be a school coun­selor, a member of the clergy, or a family physician. In any case, you should recommend someone the disturbed person knows and trusts. If the disturbed person will not seek outside help, you, as a friend, or a family member may make the first contact. Then plan with the outside party how to get help to the person.

Dealing with Emergencies

Sometimes there is no time for talk. A crisis arises. The disturbed person poses a danger to herself or himself or to others. In such cases, those nearby must get professional help even against the express wishes of the disturbed per­son. One source of help is a hospital emergency room. If the person is too violent to be taken there, call the police. In most communities the police are trained to cope with such emergen­cies both humanely and effectively.

Many communities have a crisis hotline. People in trouble can telephone at any time, day or night. They will receive immediate counseling, sympathy, and comfort. Hot line shave been set up in many communities to handle such specific problems as alcoholism, rape, battered women, runaway children, and suicide. Also, they can provide just a shoulder to cry on if that is all the person needs.

Community Mental Health Centers

In earlier days the mentally ill were sent to mental hospitals called asylums. These institu­tions were often built in isolated rural areas. The removal of the patients from their familiar surroundings sometimes made their problems worse and made it harder for them to readjust to society later. Patients released from mental hospitals often needed help in coping with the outside world. If the hospital was a long way away from the patient's home, such help was hard to get. Eventually, it was seen that if the patient was to return successfully to his or her community, the community would have to help.

Congress passed a law in 1963 to provide community mental health services for people in need of such help. Hospitals began releasing patients who would otherwise have been kept in for long-term treatment. Today, it is esti­mated that 2 million people who, earlier, would have been in hospitals now are being treated in their communities or are not receiving any treat­ment at all.

Two-thirds of the mentally ill now live with their families and receive professional help from hospitals or clinics on an outpatient basis. While some benefit enormously from the sup­port provided by family members, others cause family members to suffer great hardship. Men­tal health workers think that the families of mentally ill people need professional assistance to help them deal with a mentally ill family member. Some families do receive counseling, but for many the help is simply not available.

Not every mentally ill person has a family to turn to. The growing number of homeless men­tally ill people has prompted mental health workers to question the practice of releasing these patients from hospitals. Lacking any kind of support system, many of them are unable to find jobs or gain acceptance in a community. The plight of the homeless has been receiving widespread publicity. Mental health profession­als hope that this publicity will lead to reforms in our mental health care system.