WORLD MENTAL HEALTH DAY IN CHIPATA
Friday, 28 October 2011
Investing In Mental Health
It is said that Mental Health is Real Health. The day 28th October, 2011 will always ring a bell in the minds of Chipata residents especially Chipata General Hospital. In the capital town of Eastern Province, Chipata, it all began like any other day of the week. It was around 8hrs when we gathered at the Psychiatry department of Chipata General Hospital nicely dressed in white shirts with orange collars preparing to start off for the match past from town.
The day was a special one to both the members of staff and psychiatry patients as we were commemorating World Mental Health day whose theme was ‘Investing in Mental Health.’
For a very long time now mental illness has been regarded as an illness of the very poorest in society and that it is highly contagious, this can be attributed to the high levels of negligence towards the promotion of mental health. Just to highlight a bit as to why I say mental health is indeed real health. To start with, without a sound mind no one can manage to do anything productive in life, for example, when someone is very worried about their next kind of life following the death of a bread winner in the family, they tend to keep quiet, eat less and socially isolate themselves from society, they tend to have a drastic change of life from one kind of personality to a totally different one.
Now, if such a person does not accept the present and find other means of survival they tend not to be productive. How many times have our worries hindered us from making those important decisions when expected to? How many times has failure to achieve our intended goals made us to miss meals and even avoid our friends or simply raised our tempers? I hope you can agree with me that the answer to the questions above is ‘several times.’ Mental health is that state of mind that allows us to make those positive and productive decisions in life, without it this world would be without form and a very sad one.
Mental illness is real and it can attack anyone regardless of one’s status in society. We all tend to be patients at times and what keeps us going each day we fall is our ability to be able to modify our lives to more adaptive ways, which others fail and end up being admitted in psychiatric wards. Each and every human being needs some form of support from the society in order to lead those wonderful and successful moments of their lives. But there are those of our friends who do not receive any kind of support from anyone at all, in the psychiatry wards, the streets, in our compounds and even in our homes, that does not mean that they are the fallen beings of our generations, no..!, they are as human as we are and they equally need our support just as much as we need it.
I write to appeal to you to join the fight of Promoting and Investing in Mental Health in any way you can, either in monetary form or any means that will promote mental health in our society. Join us the Mental Health Association of Zambia (MHAZ) in Chipata as we Invest in Mental Health. Do not forget that mental health is indeed real health and that without a sound mind you would not have reached where you are now.
Check out more on World Mental Health Day in Chipata in the next article.
May God bless us all.
At the Chipata Gen. Psychiatry Wards
Written By; Dalitso Maseko Dip. MHCPsyt
Email; dalitsomaseko@gmail.com
Chipata Gen. Hospital