Worried that your family member/friend might have a mental illness?

Here are some things that you may notice about your loved one:

If you've noticed a few of these things in your loved one's personality as of late, they very well might have a mental illness, it's always better to catch these things early as they're easier to deal with when you notice the signs earlier on.

As soon as you've noticed any of these symptoms, I highly encourage you to speak to the person being affected and try and convince them to see their GP (general practitioner). The person affected may refuse entirely, you need to make it clear to them that the longer they wait to get help, the more the problem will develop. If they still refuse, go to the GP yourself or writing a letter to your GP explaining the situation in full and then leave it up to the GP to decide what he thinks is going on. In the case, they may invite you and your loved one for a check up or may even do a home visit if they think it could become worse. If you don't think talking to a GP is the way to go, you can always get in contact with a CMHT (Community Mental Health Team), a CMHT is made up of psychiatrist, psychologists and communite psychiatric nurses. Often you will need a referral from a GP but some mental health teams will accept self referrals.

• Try to accept the illness and the fact the affected person has it. 
• Try your hardest not to get overwhelmed by the amount of difficulties and obstacles it can cause in day to day life. 
• Be patient as recovery can take a really long time in some cases.
• Try and encourage the affected person to take part in social activities or to take up a hobby.
• Make a plan of action of what to do incase of a crisis.
• If things go wrong, DO NOT blame yourself. It's never anyone elses fault.
• Make sure you look after yourself.
• For friends: If you're friends with the affected person, do not abandon the friendship because of their illness, friendships are so hard to hold onto when you have a mental illness and the more friendships the person loses, the harder the recovery will become.
• For friends: Make sure they're okay, ask them how they're doing. If you don't ask, they'll assume you no longer care about them. Arrange to go over to their house and spend time with them and cheer them up if they need it, as much as that person might want to be by themselves, they always need someone there to talk to.
• For friends: Understand that if that person finds it difficult to be in social situations and you've made plans to meet up, don't be disheartened if they agree to meet up and then the day before cancel on you. It's not your fault, it's their thoughts' fault.
• For friends: The person affected may seem like they're pushing you away, it seems like that, talk to them more, don't just assume because they haven't spoken to you in a while that they want nothing to do with you because that's usually never the case. It's often just the person affected's way of coping with things, don't misinterpret things like that.

I hope you're all doing okay.

That's all for now,

Rachel. xo