Mental Health Crisis on Campus: Steps to Student Support (Episode 45)

According to NAMI, there is an undeniable and growing mental health crisis that demands both attention and action. 

Covid-19 has only made things worse.

Nearly 2 in 5 adults struggled with mental health issues in 2020, compared to about 1 in 5 adults before the pandemic. Among adults with mental illness, only 46% received treatment in 2020, a number that is far lower among Black Americans (37%), Hispanic/Latinx (35%) and Asian Americans (21%).

The crisis is especially acute among youth and young adults, as trends that had already predated the pandemic have turned even more ominous. 

In 2020, 75% of people aged 18–24 reported at least one mental health or substance use concern. 

In 2021, emergency department visits for suspected suicide attempts were 51% higher among adolescent girls than in 2020.

Today's guests are working to make things better for their fellow students who have mental illness issues.

They are Mindy’s cousin's daughter, Claire Orth, who just graduated from the University of North Dakota, and Taylor Keane, her granddaughter, who will graduate from high school in Washington D.C. in two weeks. 

1.Please introduce yourself and share how you became interested in mental illness.

2. What do you see on your respective campuses so far as fellow students experiencing mental illnesses? Could you give a specific example?

3. How have those observations/experiences inspired you to help? (Claire took some training at her school so she could better help fellow students and chose schizophrenia for her senior capstone projects. Taylor also chose mental illness for a school project and for her Youth In Government legislation. She's currently doing an internship at the Treatment Advocacy Center where she is focusing on youth.)

4. All of us wrote in our books about missing early signs of our sons' illnesses. Do you think your friends' parents today are doing any better? 

5. What would you say to parents whose children are in high school or college and experiencing signs of mental illness? 

6. Are your friends aware that young people who smoke marijuana are five times more likely to have psychosis? 

7. Have you noticed anything that your schools have done that have helped students? Is mental illness part of the curriculum? School support staff?

Links:

https://www.mentalhealthfirstaid.org/

Want us to cover a topic? comment to share?

Facebook page @Schizophrenia3Moms

@SZ3MomsTrenches -  twitter

Randye Kaye -Broadcaster, Actress, Voice Talent, Speaker, and Author (“Ben Behind his Voices”, “Happier Made Simple”)

Miriam Feldman – Artist, Mom, Author “He Came in With It”

Mindy Greiling – member of the Minnesota House of Representatives for twenty years. Activist, Legislator, Author (“Fix What You Can“)

Transcript

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SPEAKER_00 0:01

Welcome to our podcast, Schizophrenia. Three Moms in the Trenches. From the place where schizophrenia and real life collide. East Coast, West Coast, Middle America. With Miriam Feltman, Mindy Gryling, and Randy Kaye. This is episode 45 of Schizophrenia, Three Moms in the Trenches. And what do we mean by that? We are in the trenches of continuing to love and care for, and in a sense, raise sons who each have schizophrenia. We're all fierce advocates, fierce moms, and authors of books on the subject. And this episode brings in two lovely examples of youth who are doing their part to help in the world of serious mental illness. It's called Mental Health and Mental Illness on Campus, Steps for Student Support. I'm Randy Kaye here with Mindy Gryling and Mimi Feldman. And hi guys, I want to share a review first with you guys that I saw on Apple Podcasts. By the way, please feel free if you're listening, you go on Apple Podcasts and give us your feedback. We love to hear from you. This um I had it came out a few weeks ago, but I just saw it. So it just says that I've listened to your podcast from its inception. Trenches is an apt word as battling schizophrenia feels like war for the patient and the family. Thank you so much for providing a strong sense of community and caring. It's hard to have hope, but it helps me to not feel so alone. I appreciate all your time, attention, and advocacy. And then goes on to say, I encourage you to monetize your podcast and get sponsors. You all deserve to be paid for what you do. Thank you very much. That might be nice, but you know, we're not there right now. We're doing this as a service and to provide hope and information and share the experience. So you don't feel so alone, but you never know. We're up to very close to 40,000 downloads now. And with 45 episodes, we thank you so much. So um, yeah, our next episode is we just decided going to be a just the three moms episode. And we're gonna chat about the ups and downs of where our sons are right now. And there have been some ups and there have been some downs, as is usual. And we will also chat about a recent New York Times article, I believe last Sunday, in the magazine that came out about the Hearing Voices movement, and what I felt was a very biased article, uh, but it's creating a lot of controversy. We'll just share our take on it and just have a chat. So that's coming up for episode 46. Right now, I think, especially with COVID, that there's an undeniable and growing mental health crisis. And we, of course, are all dealing with children with serious mental illness called schizophrenia, but the mental health definition goes way beyond that. So in 2020, when the pandemic began, the statistic of about one in five adults struggling with mental health issues doubled to two out of five adults struggling with mental health issues. And among adults with mental illness, only 46% received treatment in 2020. And by the way, as we mentioned often on the show with these three white middle-aged women show, but we do try to represent and have guests on, um, that number of getting treatment is much lower among Black Americans, Hispanic and Latinx, and Asian Americans. But this is especially acute among youth and young adults. Trends that have already predated the pandemic turned even more ominous. This blew me away. In 2020, the percentage of people aged 18 to 24 that reported at least one mental health or substance use concern is 75%. And emergency department visits for suspected suicide attempts in 2021 were 51% higher than in 2020 among adolescent girls. So today's guests are working to make things better for their fellow students who have mental health issues. And I'm going to turn it over to my fellow mom in the trenches, to Mindy, because you have a special reason for introducing these young ladies.

SPEAKER_02 4:49

Thank you, Randy. And maybe the young ladies would like to put their videos on and be here. Welcome back. And I am very proud of our two guests because they're both my relatives. Um, Taylor Keene is my granddaughter, and Claire Orf's mother is my first cousin. So she's either my first cousin once removed or my second cousin.

SPEAKER_00 5:12

I never she's your first cousin once removed. Thank you, Randy. When first cousins have children, those children are second cousins. Okay, gotcha. I studied this. I got it three credits in cousin studying in college. This I know. Like this is something I know for sure. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 5:28

We like things we know for sure. So anyway, they're both here, and I'm going to ask them three introductory questions to kind of get issues out on the table. And then I would like to have Randy and Mimi go at it with them because I kind of know some of their situations, and I think it would be more fun for me and probably for them too, if the the two of you asked the rest of the questions. Um, but Taylor is just graduating from high school in Washington, DC, and she is a soccer player and a star student. And Claire is graduating from North Dakota State University, where she is a basketball star. I think that's why you went there, wasn't it, Claire? Maybe you can say that in your introduction, and also a wonderful student. So we have two very talented young ladies here. And um, when Taylor was young, she always said, Don't call me young lady, because she thought that had a negative connotation. Come here, young lady. But now I can do that. So the first question is just plain um, could you introduce yourselves and tell us why you got interested in the topic of mental illness? Because these are not random young people that we invited. You have a special interest and tell us why as you introduce yourselves.

SPEAKER_03 6:49

Oh, uh, I can go first. Uh hi, I'm Taylor Keene. Um, like my grandma said, I am recently graduating. I've recently graduated from high school, and I will be attending Haverford College this fall, right outside of Philadelphia. And I'll be studying physics there. But my interest in mental health and serious mental illnesses came from my uncle Jim, Mindy Garling's son. And I have seen his struggle with schizophrenia since I was very little. When I was younger, I didn't quite understand what was happening. But as I've gotten older, I understand what his diagnosis is more, especially this year. I learned a lot more about what it means to have schizophrenia.

SPEAKER_02 7:27

Thank you, Taylor. Claire.

SPEAKER_04 7:30

Yeah, so as Mindy mentioned, my name is Claire. Um I just graduated from the University of North Dakota, and I'm majoring in biology and I'm pre-health, um, hoping to go to med school. So that's a big part of my interest in this because I know in the future um the prevalence of mental illnesses, like you mentioned, are increasing. So it's definitely going to be something that I see on a regular basis in my future career, as well as I'm a student athlete, and I have a lot of friends and family members that you know have struggled with mental illnesses and just wanting to understand them better and kind of help them in the best way that I can just piqued my interest and made me want to do my own research into it.

SPEAKER_02 8:16

Great. Okay, and that Claire's uh comments about what she sees on campus kind of leads into the second question that I'm gonna ask. And that is, what do you see on your respective campuses as far as fellow students who are experiencing mental illness issues? And could each of you give one specific example of something that happened with a student and then what happened? So maybe we could start with Claire this time.

SPEAKER_04 8:47

Yeah. Um so I would say, especially being a student athlete, that kind of comes with a lot of additional pressures besides from being a full-time student. You have a lot of responsibilities and time commitments. So I definitely have teammates as well as myself that just has a lot of stress and anxiety sometimes. Um and a specific example, um, I guess we did have two suicides on our campus, unfortunately, this past year, which obviously is just tragic in itself and brings a whole host of challenges to the additional students on campus that are already, you know, their friends or classmates. So that would be one example that I've kind of experienced this year.

SPEAKER_02 9:38

Did you did anybody see that coming with either one of those students who who died by suicide or what were they surprises?

SPEAKER_04 9:47

They were both surprises. Um I didn't personally know either of them, but from what I've heard, um I think it was kind of a surprise. So what is what is that what is that like on a campus when that news comes out?

SPEAKER_00 10:09

I mean, people who know them and it's such a shock. What does that feel like as a as I know you didn't know them personally, but if you knew people who knew them personally, like how does that affect everybody on campus?

SPEAKER_04 10:25

Yeah, I mean, it's just such a heavy burden. I think just, you know, having someone that you see in class every day or someone that's in your fraternity or sorority, for example, um, that you're seeing every day, maybe possibly even living with, is just a huge impact. And I think it's something that our university was actually really good about um making sure that they sent out available resources of counselors that they could talk to or um resources that they had available on campus because they did know that it was going to come with a lot of challenges to the students that knew them well.

SPEAKER_02 11:04

Thank you. Taylor, same question. What have you seen on in your high school? And could you give an example?

SPEAKER_03 11:11

Yeah, well, first of all, I'm very sorry to hear about the two suicides at your school. That's awful. Um, I myself have had a couple uh several friends attempt suicide. Luckily, neither neither of them were successful, but just knowing that they had to go through that struggle at such a young age, this was even before the pandemic started. So they were still like in eighth grade and ninth grade, so very, very early. And this was just like a sign of what was to come after the pandemic at my school. My school is already very academically rigorous, so there's lots of stressors on people, and then during the pandemic, a lot of people felt isolated. So after we got back from the pandemic, a lot of people just like wanted to hang out with friends and get loose, and a lot of people that I know like turned to lots of substances such as like edibles or smoking weed. And I really saw this come to fruition on the 4th of July last summer. Um, I was out with some of my friends, and then uh we weren't doing anything, but we saw another group of friends who seemed to be struggling a lot, and we went over to see if they were okay, and they clearly weren't. One of them had had a lot of like edibles, and she was having some sort of like psychotic break, but the other friend was in no situation or like um sense of awareness to help her friend because she was also under the influence. And this friend that we ended up helping, um, like she couldn't walk on her own. She was seeing things that weren't there, hallucinations. Uh, she kept thinking that she was going to die. But if we hadn't been there to help her, this would have ended very badly. And we tried to, well, we know she's had mental health issues. Um, and we tried to talk to her parents about that that this could be a sign of something much more serious, but the parents kind of just dismissed this as like, oh, it's just what every teenager does. We don't really care as long as she gets home safe at the end of the day.

SPEAKER_01 12:58

Can I ask you, are you guys aware of and do people talk about the connection between marijuana and um not only psychosis, but actually the onset of schizophrenia itself? You know, back in the day when I was in college, marijuana was the thing too. It wasn't as strong and there weren't edibles and all of that. And we kind of regarded it as it's nothing, it's better than drinking. It's you know, it doesn't hurt you at all. And then when my son got sick, I learned that not only is it a very serious drug and it plays with your brain chemistry, but it also can exacerbate or you know, there is a connection between the onset. Do people ever talk about that?

SPEAKER_03 13:44

Um, I I I'm aware of it because of my grandma. She's always told me to stay clear. She's giving me examples. So I have stayed very clear.

SPEAKER_02 13:52

Thank you, Taylor. You're listening.

SPEAKER_03 13:54

Even when offered, I say no, thank you. And if people ever offer it to me, then I take the opportunity to tell them a bit. But people also don't want to just listen to me telling them all the bad things about it because they're like, you're supposed to be my be my friend. So I am trying to help them, but they also don't want to hear that from me. But no, we haven't had any like instruction about that at school. The most they ever tell us is we had this course called Break Free from Depression. That was like a week-long seminar where we got one hour of break free from depression every day, and it wasn't very helpful.

SPEAKER_00 14:24

Wow. How about you, Claire?

SPEAKER_04 14:27

Yeah, I was gonna say um I hadn't really been super aware of it until just recently. Um, one of the last classes I had to take was my senior capstone, and I wrote my paper and did my presentation on schizophrenia after reading Mindy's book and kind of really getting interested in the topic. And um, my main focus was on the genetic and environmental factors that contribute to schizophrenia. Um, so definitely substance abuse and specifically marijuana was something that I did some research into.

SPEAKER_02 15:03

So the friends, Taylor said her friends didn't really want to hear from her, even though she knew about it and I provided her all kinds of facts and figures. Do you have any luck with your friends alerting them about this connection?

SPEAKER_04 15:19

Um, yeah, you know, I feel like I'm surrounded by a lot of people that um try to stray clear from it just because being athletes and whatnot. Um, but definitely it's a hard thing to do, especially our age, because you are trying to help people, but then they're like, oh, you're being such a buzzkill, or you know, maybe something like that. So then you feel like, okay, maybe I won't say it something. But um after doing more research into it, I just think that there is such a big um relationship between those two. So I think it is definitely something that people our age should feel comfortable talking about with their friends.

SPEAKER_01 15:57

You know, I know it's not gonna raise your popularity any with your friends, but one of the things that I look back on with my son that it just makes me crazy to think about is there were so many signs. There was so much going on, and his friends knew it. They knew something was really wrong with him, and nobody wanted to be the bad guy. Nobody wanted, you know, and and I think that the the option to go to the parent, especially as a peer, and say, look, something's really wrong with your kid. Like um, like you said, Taylor, you know, a lot of the parents don't want to hear it because who wants to know this? But I think that that's a good avenue to take sometimes when you see somebody who's in trouble.

SPEAKER_00 16:45

And I'm also, you know, obviously approaching this because I'm a mom and raise two kids. And I I can even feel first of all, I admire your certainty and your stance and the decisions that you've made at a time when people don't make those decisions. But I also think I recognize that it puts stress on you too, doesn't it? To be the straight one at the party and to, you know, be the one, how hard must it be to go to someone's parent and say, I have concerns? That's that's a lot of extra stress. Your old guys are athletes and students are already stressed. So the 25% of the population that isn't suffering from mental health issues has the added stress to pick up the slack for everyone else. That just seems unfair. And I admire you so much for what you're doing. It is um, it's difficult. And you know, you probably know I'm gonna throw in the fact that I'm assuming you guys are like 18 and 22. Am I in the ballpark? Like you're four years apart, right? So there is a difference in brain development between an 18-year-old and a 22-year-old. And there's a there's a difference in social development too. Just coming out of senior year of high school, you're probably just about a year into recognizing that, oh, I'm more than the group I hang out with. I'm an individual, right? And that, you know, maybe I'm not I am not my family, I'm also not my friends, I'm me. And college will help you grow even further into that, but it it is a journey. So um what made you go from observing and going, wow, that's weird, or that could be my uncle, or that could be my cousin, or what made what made you get inspired to want to do something to help? Is it you know, jumping from observing it to wanting to fix it? Was there any moment or any particular motivation for you?

SPEAKER_04 18:56

Um, I think for me, I can't think of one specific moment, but I think just my continuous interest in the medical field has progressed that just because I know that you know, there are so many people that maybe have um, you know, physical things going on because of maybe mental illness or they're not getting the treatment that they need um because of a mental illness. So I think that's the big thing for me that kind of made me interested in it, just because I know that that is such a big aspect of being in the medical field that maybe isn't addressed as much as the physical illnesses that you know are covered in so many different courses. So I think that's something for me that kind of sparked me into the interest.

SPEAKER_00 19:43

Thank you, Taylor. Any answer to that? You don't have to answer every question, but yeah.

SPEAKER_03 19:49

Well, I kind of have two answers to that one. I think the first one was just like the sheer number of my friends that were having mental health crises, and a lot of them didn't know where to seek help or they felt ashamed of it. And obviously being ashamed doesn't help anything because you just end up struggling a lot more. So, and uh one uh one girl on my soccer team, she always seemed like the happiest person. She always seemed like she was the most put together, and then she hadn't been at soccer practice for about a month and a half, and we were all concerned. We were like, we thought maybe she had COVID and had complications, but later we got an email that said she was in an inpatient uh facility in Utah being treated for a number of different like mental health issues and a suicide attempt or multiple suicide attempts. Um and she would so she was very good at like faking it until I guess she bro broke essentially. So I think that really inspired me to take more action. And the other one was also just my I have a lot of male friends that are struggling with mental health issues, and they don't really want to tell anyone else because of that like toxic masculinity um like expectation, I guess. Um like a lot of them just think that treatment won't help at all. They say like talking about this with a professional is just they're just talking to someone that's getting paid to sit with them, they're not actually gonna help. So I wanted to try to spread more knowledge about how it can actually be helpful.

SPEAKER_02 21:14

And I know this is my last question, then, and then I Mimi and Randy can keep going and maybe I'll come up with some more too. But but I happen to know that both of these two, as you can see, very articulate and talented um young women have put their concern and their interest into action on their campuses. And so I know what they've been doing, but maybe they could share that with all of us tonight.

SPEAKER_00 21:41

So whichever Yeah, share some of the actions you've taken from your concern.

SPEAKER_04 21:46

Yeah, so um I'm on the executive board of the student athlete advisory committee. And one thing that we did this past year was we so every school needs to have a green band. Project and basically the green bandana signifies that you are advocating for mental illnesses and for like wanting to help people that are struggling with that. And then you would wear a green bandana. But our campus, we decided to kind of take it a step further, and we got our counselors to help us get together a mental health certificate, like mental health certification program. So student athletes could sign up and then take a six-hour course to be mental health first aid certified, which is normally something that costs a lot of money to do and is kind of hard to find or be able to do. So we brought that to our campus, and um it was actually a huge hit, and we had the largest class of graduating mental health first aid people in the country. And then actually our president of our university heard about it, and then he wanted to bring that to the whole large scale of the campus. So that will be starting this next fall, where just every general student not having to be athletes will have that opportunity.

SPEAKER_00 23:10

So wow. If if another university or high school listening to this wanted to implement something like that, do you have information where they could go to find out about this program?

SPEAKER_04 23:24

Um so our student athlete, we have counselors that um come to work with student athletes once a week. Um and they were the ones that kind of did a lot of like the behind-the-scenes planning. So I think maybe just talk to someone that um has some knowledge in that field because I know it is a thing that um you can do, you know, wherever you are. It's just a matter of finding where the classes are taking place.

SPEAKER_01 23:56

So that's a fantastic idea. I mean, just the very name, mental health first aid. I I mean, it's such a great idea, and especially peer-to-peer, because I, you know, studies and uh programs find that peer-to-peer is really the most effective turn of health.

SPEAKER_00 24:15

And mental health first aid is something I have heard um along the same wavelength as uh the uh the show we did on uh crisis intervention team training. Mental health first aid, I believe is something that is available, but I'm not sure it's available on college campuses. So that's a really helpful tip. Thank you. Taylor, how about you?

SPEAKER_03 24:40

Yeah, so I've done, I guess, two big things. Um the first thing I did was last year in 11th grade. Um, I'm part of a club called Youth and Government, and in youth and government, it's like a national organization, but there's also local chapters in each state, and then in my case, DC. So we get the chance to write a bill and present this first to a youth government council, and then if it passes the youth government council, it goes to the our city council and can be passed by the mayor. So my bill has not been passed by the mayor yet, but it's in like the docket to be read at some point. But um, this bill that I created, it was with uh one of my friends, we partnered on it, but essentially it created um different locations in each eight, each of the eight wards. So DC is split up by wards one through eight, and just similar to counties, but smaller. But um it created centers in each of the eight wards for um more therapists and psychiatrists outside of schools because a lot of people are too afraid to seek out help inside of school because again, they're scared of what their peers may think of them. So the bill aimed to create centers in each of the eight wards that um provided both therapists and psychiatrists. I can't remember the exact number that we put, but I think it was like five or six therapists per per ward and like two or three psychiatrists per ward, uh depending on the size of the ward. And oftentimes our outer wards get forgotten. So we wanted to make sure that there were centers there that were accessible, the uh public transportation for people to get to. Um and then the other thing this year I did um as part of my, we do at my school, we do a senior capstone project for high school. Um, but my senior project, um the project itself was using quantum physics to help explain the brain. But for my internship part, I interned at the Treatment Advocacy Center. I assume most people are familiar with what that is that listen to this, but it's a national organization that advocates for people with serious mental illnesses. And I worked with um some of the people there, and I the first thing that I did was I created just I recreated fact sheets about schizophrenia and bipolar disorder that were more aimed to youth because their old ones were just a block of text and not very accessible. Um, and then my main project was I interviewed young people with schizophrenia and schizoaffective disorder between the ages of 18 and I think it was 30 was the oldest. So young people, and I just heard their stories, and I'm over the summer I'm gonna help um write an article about that to share that with other young people.

SPEAKER_00 27:18

Wow. By the way, if you're listening and you're not on YouTube, you should see Mindy's face.

SPEAKER_02 27:23

No, I know I'm out of these two young women.

SPEAKER_00 27:28

And I don't blame you.

SPEAKER_01 27:29

I would be and uh I will see.

SPEAKER_00 27:32

My six-year-old granddaughter isn't doing any of this kind of work. I don't understand.

SPEAKER_02 27:37

Yes, yeah, they've they've both been precocious all along. I've uh that's that's amazing. I've met Taylor a lot, but um, one thing Taylor would didn't mention, but she has the opportunity, she's going to Europe and Italy, Brussels, uh, Switzerland. So that's why she has to finish up her project at the Treatment Advocacy Center in July when she comes back. But um Taylor, one thing um I read or heard some of the things that those young people said. And so could you give us just maybe two or three um commonalities between the people that you interviewed and especially what they had to say about getting help and how their parents helped them or didn't help them, since a lot of our listeners are parents.

SPEAKER_03 28:27

Well, they said so much, it's hard to remember it all right now. I've written down lots of notes, but um I guess some of the commonalities, uh all the people that I interviewed were lucky enough to have families and parents like you guys that are very supportive of them and that were willing to fight for them and research um different treatments. Three of them came from Team Daniel and with Dr. Leitman. So they are on clozepine right now. The other one's on a different medication, I don't remember, but they all pretty much all talked highly of clozapine. Um another thing that they mentioned that was really helpful was just someone that was willing to sit there and listen to them. And if they talked about like their hallucinations or their delusions, like just be able to sit there and talk with them. And even if that person didn't believe what they were saying, just sit there and listen to make them feel heard, feel like an actual person. Because too often people with serious mental illnesses people just disregard anything that they say and they're like that's not really happening. So just being able to sit there, that's just really helpful and it shows that support. Um another thing, let's see. I'm trying to okay, that's what's coming to mind right now. They said lots of other things about like treatment and their recoveries, but those I think those are the two main things, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 29:45

Well, we would love to in the show notes when they're ready, share the fact sheets that you made up. That would be awesome. And and your findings, your article when when that comes out. So we can always go back and edit the show notes when you uh when those are ready. I have kind of a an odd question, maybe. Yeah, I I am an actor, so that's what I do for a living. And so I'm gonna ask you two um media related questions. And one of them is about the HBO show euphoria, and the other is about the um, it was a Broadway show, but now I was the movie Dear of Enhanson. So euphoria is I think dabbles in mental illness, but it's more just about drug use, and it's very frightening to for me to see what young people go through with drugs and addiction. And it may be more about substance abuse, but I'm wondering what you and your colleagues, if you think these shows are realistic. Dear Evan Hansen in particular, I don't know if you're familiar with the movie, but the movie changed the show a little bit to actually focus on the number of students in high school who are on medications to manage their mental health conditions and aren't speaking up about it. And I can't remember, they added a song in the movie about that, where they're, you know, Evan Hansen and his friend are swinging on the swings and she's class president, and she's like, Well, you know, I'm on that. Come on, tell me what meds you're on, because I'm on meds, because if I weren't on my meds, I wouldn't be class president. And they're actually sharing about their treatment. And I'm wondering if that's realistic at all, or is that something are people getting a little more um aware of and accepting of the fact that some people need medication to balance themselves? So, what do you think of those shows? That's kind of a double-barreled question, but Taylor's unmuted, so I guess you want to go first.

SPEAKER_03 31:46

Yeah, so I haven't I've seen the play Dear Irving Hansen and the movie. I haven't watched Euphoria myself, but pretty much every other one of my friends has. We just don't have an HBO subscription, so I'll watch it one day. But um, yeah, most of my friends that have watched Euphoria really like it. I I don't know much about it myself, but it definitely reaches the high school audience. And for your question about JR and Hanson, is that being is that more realistic with like sharing medications? At least at my school it is. Um, a lot of people are willing now to have that open dialogue. It's mostly still girls, not boys. But um, I have several friends that on the regular just share what medication that they've started just to like tell other people or try to share advice. But so I would say that's more realistic. And I definitely hadn't like heard any of this. I guess before the pandemic, we did have that gap, so they probably weren't on these medications when they were in like eighth and ninth grade, but they are more willing to have those open dialogues now.

SPEAKER_00 32:46

Yeah, that's a good sign, Claire.

SPEAKER_04 32:50

Yeah, um, I have not seen the dear Evan Hansen, I think you called it.

SPEAKER_00 32:55

Um, I have not seen that, but I did watch a story about a high school boy who feels very lost, and someone, another one person in his class, commits suicide after many rehab, and he pretends to have been his friend. And so it gets glimpses into suicide and substance abuse and mental illness issues. And so that's enough. That's all you need to know for that. So I guess the question is even without having seen the movie, do you feel like there's a little more openness and less shame among people taking medication for mental health conditions?

SPEAKER_04 33:29

Yeah, I would definitely say that I think that is a trend that's happening. I still think there is some, you know, guilt or shame or negative stereotype surrounding it. But I think definitely it's starting to become more of just a norm because of how prevalent it really is. And um, I think all it takes is one person, really, because once, like if one of your friends opens up to you about what they're dealing with and what maybe a medication that they're using, then everyone else, you know, feels more able to be vulnerable and open up about what they're going through, which I think just helps everyone involved. So I think it really just comes down to, you know, allowing yourself to just like trust that your friends or family or whoever will, you know, be supportive in that information. And then I have seen euphoria, and I definitely think it's maybe a bit um like just, you know, there's lots of things in it that are definitely to make the show interesting, but I think it is super interesting to just see how a lot of people can be dealing with substance abuse or mental illness, and you may not even realize it, you know, some of your classmates, and um to see what effect it has on their overall like life and every one of their relationships with family and friends, I think is just important for people our age to see and understand.

SPEAKER_00 34:54

Okay, thank you. We have about five minutes left. Um, Mimi, anything coming? Yeah, go ahead.

SPEAKER_01 35:01

Um, I think it was you, Claire, who said that there was a program at your school about um fighting depression. Was that you? Who said that?

SPEAKER_00 35:12

I think that was Taylor they did openly.

SPEAKER_01 35:15

So there was a pro you said there was a program and that it was not very great and it didn't really do much. And I'm wondering why wasn't it good and what do you think would be good?

SPEAKER_03 35:26

Yeah, so the program was called Breakthrough from depression or just break through depression, one or the other. And we did it, I think sixth through eighth grade, so each year during middle school, and then they basically just stopped after we reached high school. So that that in itself is not very helpful. No one really in middle school, you're not really thinking about your mental health in the first place. Um, so I guess that's why they have the program, but it wasn't very helpful because it was honestly quite boring. Um, it was just a teacher that they just selected, and the teacher just came into the room, basically read off a script, gave out some papers.

SPEAKER_01 36:04

It's like the old sex education classes, really.

SPEAKER_03 36:08

Yeah, but they were basically read out right off the script and handed us some papers, like read this scenario and tell us what you would do differently. So it wasn't very interactive, but I I think if they wanted to make it more successful or impactful, it has to be interactive. Um, and people don't really want to open up, maybe especially in middle school in a big group. So maybe having smaller groups, allowing people to talk with their friends instead of expecting someone to just share all their personal health issues in front of the entire class. Because I remember they I think they asked us, like, does anyone ever feel these feelings? They asked everyone to close their eyes, but people still peek and no one's gonna trust that everyone has their eyes closed. So I think it needed to be like smaller groups and more interactive. Yeah. Interesting.

unknown 36:57

Thank you.

SPEAKER_02 36:58

One thing I would like to know from both of you um is what kind of support does your school have? Is there like a counseling department? Is there students that are feeling like they're coming, having mental health issues? Is there anyone to go to besides the very busy teacher at your schools?

SPEAKER_04 37:21

Yeah, we have a council, a university counseling center available to every all the students. And um additionally, I think they just have a lot of like resources posted around campus for you know hotlines or different resources that people can um get access to at any time of day or any day if the counseling center is closed. Um yeah, and then just a comment about Taylor's um class that she was taking, the mental health first aid training that our campus does, um I think does a really good job of making it more interactive and being in that small group setting just so that you practice like actually how to approach someone that you might think may be struggling with mental um illness or approaching their family or friends, like we kind of talked about earlier. So I think that was super helpful because it's actually like applicable things that you can do in your everyday life when that situation comes about. So I would say that's definitely just add that in there. But I just thought that that's definitely a good something that people should know if they're in, you know, the educational field is that I think making it interactive is much more applicable to real life than just talking about the statistics or things like that.

SPEAKER_00 38:47

Okay, thank you. So we're at our final minutes, and I want to give you each a chance to just say, you know, anything you didn't get a chance to say, anything you feel you would say to the families of people with mental illness or to your peers that have mental illness issues, or to your schools. I mean, you've already said a lot of wonderful things. So it's kind of a fill in the gaps of anything, any more of a message that you didn't get a chance to say, what would you like to say to close this out?

SPEAKER_03 39:20

Um, I guess I would just say I think we're making like great progress with being more open with our dialogues. I would just encourage people to continue having these dialogues because the more that you know that other people are having the same struggles as you, the easier it is to deal with it with a community instead of just bottling it up inside. And it's okay to reach out for help. Uh, no matter if you think other people won't believe you, it's okay to reach out for help.

SPEAKER_00 39:45

Thank you. And Claire.

SPEAKER_04 39:48

Yeah, you know, I think Taylor kind of summed it up well, just um continuing to have these conversations and be vulnerable. And um, I think that's the best thing that we can do. And just thank you guys for having me on. And I think you guys are doing great work with this podcast. So just thank you, and I appreciate coming on.

SPEAKER_00 40:10

Thank you.

SPEAKER_02 40:11

Thank you both for being here.

SPEAKER_00 40:13

Yep, meeting both of you. I, you know, if anybody dares say the next generation doesn't know what they're doing, I will just say, listen to this podcast. Women are amazing. So uh thank you so, so much. Um, I can see why your grandma slash first cousin once removed is so proud and um keep doing the good work you're doing. Thank you so much. Hey, thanks for joining us for this episode of Schizophrenia Three Moms in the Trenches with Randy Kay, Mindy Gryling, and Miriam Feldman. To get in touch with us or to learn more about our books, please visit our websites at MiriamHyfenfeldman.com, mindygryling.com, or randyk.com.