Why Therapy Is Not For Everyone

While the stigma attached to mental health has not fully been done away with, its veil is the most lifted it has ever been. Given the former, the latter is profoundly revolutionary in the most positive way imaginable. According to the CDC — citing studies from 2005 and 2012 respectively — , only 20% of those with a diagnosed with or have self-reported mental health issues have seen mental health professionals seek help. Fundamentally, this staggeringly low statistic is due to the embarrassment and shame that stigma against mental illness creates.

It seems that modernity is beginning to catch up to the cognitive dissonance which the topic of mental health seems to generate: that is, the discrepancy between how we perceive treatment for mental health issues, and how we perceive those suffering from such issues. From the same CDC report, in 2005 over 80% of people were said to understand that mainstream sources of mental health treatment (e.g. psychotherapy and psychiatry) are useful, and work. However, from the same year, only about 35–67% of people agreed that people are caring and sympathetic towards people suffering from mental illness. It seems that in the latter statistic, it has shifted towards the upper number from 2005. Indeed, according to a recent CBS poll, about 2 out of 3 Americans find mental illness to be a very serious public health issue. This has even seeped into our…