World Mental Health Day; Children and Teenagers’ On My Mind

I've seen many of my peers go through so much at different times but the most occurring of their experiences or struggles is their psychological well-being. Trust me, I’ve also had my share of this and still do depending on the situation I find myself which explains why I decided to write this piece to further create the needed awareness about the mental needs of children and adolescents in our society.

From interaction and experience, I’ve realised that the 3 significant factors responsible for the increase in mental health problems among children and adolescents are:

1. Pressure from the home: this could arise from parents making unrealistic demands and expectations in the areas of academics or career and other domestic factors which often frustrate the child.

2. Environmental demands: their emotional state also depends on what the environment presents them with. For instance, a child that’s in an environment where others attend private school and he or she attends a public school will be affected especially when their teachers go on strike and they sit at home while their peers in the private school, attend classes thereby going ahead of them.

3. Academic stress: stress from the learning environment is one trigger for a mental health issue that is overlooked especially in Nigeria. It could happen at any level of education and often comes in the form of the children or teens’ inability to cope with academic demands, peer pressure, and physical or verbal abuse by schoolmates and school personnel such as bullying and sexual violations.

These are just 3 out of the many causes of child and adolescent

mental health issues.

Why this should bother you

More often than not, the issue of children’s mental health isn’t regarded as an urgent one thereby making it hard for any of the children that have problems to talk to a trusted adult or a counsellor for fear of being misunderstood, dismissed or judged so they stay silent and depressed. According to recent reports, adolescents aged 12 to 17 years old had the highest rate of major depressive episodes (14.4%) followed by young adults 18 to 25 years old (13.8%). It is worrisome to know that between 2010 and 2019, suicides were reported to be higher among students. Notwithstanding the lower suicide rates among the younger age groups, suicide is the second leading cause of death among 15–29-year-olds globally.

Action Point

This serves as a wake-up call to many people especially parents, guardians and the school to take necessary action. More professional counsellors need to be available in schools to create a safe space where students can talk about their problems and seek help in solving them.

Their willingness to open up about what bothers them would lead to a decline in juvenile delinquency, deaths from suicide or rape and faster apprehension and prosecution of child molesters.