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 politics, whereby, [former] candidates such as Andrew Yang cite the fact that depression and anxiety are on the rise, and in turn, are strategizing political actions to combat such staggering rises. And this is not just a political ploy: it is the truth. The second leading cause of death in 15 to 29-year-olds is suicide and roughly 10 to 20 million people suffering from depression attempt suicide every year.

In terms of ensuring the worst-case scenarios are prevented, in terms of the side-effects of mental illness — such as suicide, self-harm, or harming others — this shift is ultimately a positive one, which has made the stigma of seeking help fundementally easier for more and more people.

What is often left out of this discussion is twofold: (1) those who seek help but are unhelped by conventional methods and (2) how difficult getting good help is.