Going To Be All Right
9th August 2017
Today marks 100 days of Going To Be, our new children and young people’s mental health campaign. The response so far has been absolutely fantastic, and we thank everyone who has supported us.
So why is it so important?
We’ve just published a new report that looks into:
- The nature and extent of mental health problems, and of mental health and emotional wellbeing, in 12-18 year olds nationally in Scotland; and
- What happens when young people, aged 12-18 years, seek help for their mental health from both statutory and non-statutory services in Scotland.
It digs into the statistics and presents a picture of the situation – and what’s clear is that it is urgent, and it’s not getting better.
Cara is a SAMH service user. Here she explains why it’s so important that it has to change.
“At high school I was perfect, a good student with good grades. I tried to tell my teachers that I didn’t feel the same as my friends. The school could see something was wrong but they didn’t know where to send me or what to do. No one talked about mental health.
“I went to the doctors consistently for 6 months to get the help I needed, but I was told I couldn’t get help.
“Because of my age I was too old to go to children’s mental health services and too young for adult services. I was lost in the system for a year. I felt confused and overlooked.
“I should have received support at a younger age, but it took 5 years until I was 23 for a doctor to diagnose me with Borderline Personality Disorder. Now 25, I have started to piece together my life which is now stable.”
To find out more and join the Going To Be campaign visit www.samh.org.uk/goingtobe
