call the wellness coach and if this is your first time tuning in with us we're here today just to really give people the tools to live well today now they can in a little bit usually don't tell me what we're talking about but i did plant a little seed today because this month may is mental health awareness month and i wanted to talk about mental health and just trying to kind of get some education out there you know and you guys new is mental health month right  there's the every day is some kind of a holiday anymore why didn't there's still a great deal of stigma that goes along with mental health and to me that's why doing this show that important i come at it and you all know this but i'm somebody who twenty five years ago was going back and forth to my doctor's office for medical tests only to finally landed a job in a psychiatric hospital and realized that for two years i've been suffering from depression you know four thousand dollars later and just two years later and so for me i'm a person living with a mental illness but wellness is possible recovery is possible but if you don't know what you don't know then you don't know and so what we're going to start you know kind of work with is kind of different diagnoses you know because everybody's good with physical health you got your diabetes your blood pressure high cholesterol all those goodies only comes to mental health there's actually some different diagnoses and i want to ask or forgive your chichi chair can you think of different diagnoses that you've known of people around you to have had or experienced so carol do you mean something like traumatic stress oh yeah yeah yeah so let me give you a hint all right because when it talks about diagnoses are kind of three main categories that they fall into there is i want to write up here mood right there is the inking post traumatic stress disorder that's good all right anything else come to mind as a rosie the art of obsessive compulsive disorder and that is actually an anxiety  what about postpartum depression yes there under this or that would be ok so so yeah postpartum depression because it has to do with mood is kind of more of a mood sort of illness borderline personality disorder know i'm i'm thinking about the middle one thinking so so it would be most of the symptoms have to do with thoughts and the brain working kind of said depression just plain now so i want to leave it like that and we'll talk a little bit more about what these are just want to see brain do a little brainstorming though and see what you guys what you might have your awareness already of what's up there all right there's a really there's a really big one missing deal i mean it's not just kids not wanting to go to school and so under anxiety they call it social anxiety social anything social and it is not just kids it could be adults you  yeah so if you've ever heard stories of cora phobia that's when a person really has a hard time leaving their home you know and quite honestly  know just to stop she on this yeah well what about what i was saying before about you know usually they diagnose hyper attend attention deficit where would that well i actually would would kind of put it sort of in the middle between you know it's really thinking because we think about attention deficit what gets affected approximation the concentration until the concentration goes to the thinking rather than so much the mood if that makes sense people have panic attacks you know that panic disorder now there's a couple on there off to the side and i put my hostess put depressions you know and i think i put an and i put psychosis and a west and we're going to talk about these a little bit more but what i want people to understand is that when a person can use a lot of substances even alcohol if i've been drinking a doctor is not going to be able to make a diagnosis prize you've got to give time to see what might be related to alcohol or your knife and show people might get a diagnoses called and a west meaning that they don't know you know i have depression but i depression because of my drinking or is it depression because of my depression and a biological depression and so a lot of times you know people will see this and substance uses and family members or go into emergency room or a crisis center might get a diagnosis of that because they're just trying to figure out what's going on at the time but that's really hard to do as you guys are going to find out this is but but really all all of these are all different you know kind of live to meet all different parts of mental health you know and quite honestly science is showing there's biological kind of connections to this there's genetic connections to it does it mean absolutely you know the bipolar runs in my family i'm going to get it now absolutely but it means that i'm kind of just like with blood pressure and cholesterol right you know that with hypertension with cholesterol with diabetes there's always this family component that can be a part of it but then not everybody everybody happens to end up with that worst case scenario you guys did they did a really good will see it called m d d so so you know what's really tough issue see these all acronyms you know i mean i think the world has gotten better at knowing what p t s d is fifteen years ago when i was working in tr quite honestly this statement is what keeps people from getting the help you know that they need so so i want to talk just a little bit because you see i made this arrow in kind so what this under move it means is that my mood can sink down which the depression kind of can take it solo mike wallace mike wallace of sixty minutes talked about how he would have to take his medication the rest of his life you know and what i me is if you'd asked me carol were you depressed but anybody that time had asked me where you depressed i would have said no because i wasn't depressed but what's really interesting is that these diagnoses kind of can come out a living differently in everybody for would have felt a little down maybe a little sad but i became exhausted i stopped doing things i stopped going to the gym but that to me i was really in trouble stop going to the gym but what was really knew that it had its grips on me is i never had suicidal thoughts what happened was i had thoughts though of death and dying so i could be driving on my way to work and i could be thinking about that oncoming car and singing to myself oh my god what if they just pull over and here in a hit me head on or what if my car does this it was always something else that was going to cause my death but when i was sitting in the new brunswick states he in new brunswick at symphony concert now go back twenty five years all right pretend you're back twenty five years i remember sitting there thinking to myself what i could do if somebody opened up with an surprised that you really didn't that yet twenty five years ago but that's kind of like how my brain kind of story and that when i knew like all shit it's got me there you know and for me medication was a really important part of that and there's a lot of stigma that goes around taking medications because people think why should be stronger but think about blood pressure medicine think about diabetes medication some times we just need that medicine to kind of balances out to where we when you think about depression depression is the low but what happens is with bipolar it can go like a c saying yeah you know like they call a mood swings and it to me it's really like a seesaw you know and what happens is you know people kind  heard of mania has this way thing up here but i've actually want to point out that there are a couple different types of bipolar disorder in fact there are three there is what they call bipolar one which means that would be here in just a minute but there's another one and that would be is i don't go all the way up here but i kind of go here and they call hypomania so you mean somewhere between the two are words yeah so it's kind of like i have in her chief but it's not getting significantly in the way yeah in fact a lot of people really like i mean i don't know about you all but if i could have a cup of espresso it's kind of like i feel like that with a cup of espresso you know where have energy and it's just kind of like i could go go go go i think as the energizer bunny i'm sure the hero and the energizer bunny though can even go super super higher though and that they call bipolar type two right and then there's actually a third one they kind of had come along which is if i take medication yeah that causes it you know what kind of medication well anti depressant medications could cause that extreme but he has that actually could trigger the upswing for some people yeah so this kind of make a little bit little bit of sense and my hope is to introduce some language to people at home and all of that all of these resources we're going to have available for people to download and we'll give them that website later so if you guys turn that page tricky part ok so here's what we're going to do we're going to put i'm just going to use the initials to give us more room all right and what is go ahead and pick a few we're going to go with and and it let's just go with these couple so we're going to take turns here ok you first what is the first word in the first column for you the very first one on the top  say post traumatic stress yeah and because my father i remember years ago my mother saying you know after the war my father would have nightmares yes yeah well that you put on here because i don't think i actually but yeah yeah i like him and i and you know what schoen port you guys is that there are show many soldiers came back over the years from all the world wars they called it shell shock yeah yeah vietnam war it up just being thrown under the bus because of the substance use but honestly every every soldier there are so many soldiers that come home you know with this happy but you know what i want to show you it also goes here and it also go here and i think in doing this what i want people to realize is that it's not so easy to figure out what's going on or i ha patients who've had more to pull diagnoses you know owners like why was this i was this i was this but here's the thing it's not so much the diagnoses as it is making sure we get you all medicine to treat the symptoms but this is what makes it so tricky about my own depression and how i kind of got my life back and what i've been teaching for twenty five years and if you check into some of these shows honestly that's what does this kind of like what we're also doing here  and i'm going to explain a little bit what this word means in case there are people that don't know well that's my spelling absolutely and paranoid can be you know just a little bit like you know somebody after me somebody is going to hurt me i've had people who had it shows a very you guys who they just you know thought people are really out to kill them or their food was poisoned and you really right julie because the thing is sick and go and all of these different  cholesterol is you know comes back cause my l d l and h d l comes back i but when it comes to treating our mental health it's a lot more challenging you know because and here's the thing people are so afraid of going to see a psychiatrist i mean but here's the trick i always tell people if you all own the porsche right and would you take it as a for deal or no disrespect for dealers but i'll know who take it to a porsche dealer because they can specialize in the porsche engines same thing with our mental health i'm a real big advocate that people need to seek out mental health providers because that's our area of specialty you know and try and even for them it's sometimes hard to put the pieces together so when you say that carol are you talking about specifically psychiatry or psychology and psychiatry psychologist even a licensed clinical social worker or even nurse practitioners now you like you said before stop doing things where you know maybe anything that you you enjoy doing before you just can't get yourself to do it or or feel excited about or hear and so so stop and also money just right lose interest you know because i think we lose the interest and then we can do the stopping and honestly that that really pretty much sticks with the depression you the other direction i am not stopping doing things in fact i'm doing them almost nonstop well when you were in that and you said that you stopped going to the gym so was it it was just too overwhelming or you were in that space  you know what i just was so exhausted that i would get out of work drive home crawl into bed get up make myself go to work sometimes all there's one i left off of there crying spells  don't put that on my list i have to add that for people watching the show because that's a really important one as well and i'm not that is you were crying for no reason at all you're oh i'm driving to work and all of a sudden i start crying there were times when i got to work and i to say to my boss who knew you know my boss knew i was like you know what linda i can't do it today now i was really good because at the hospitals i walked in that door you know what i could put my fear up my game face on i was ready to roll you'd never know like i was having a bad day but there were days that i could do that too you know and that would be hard to diagnose too because it could be hormonal for you know absolutely in fact angel i went through all these medical tests and i think that's another important message is that if all people is you know to reach out to your primary care doctor and then if they start have assessed ok everything is medically ok then guess what maybe it's time to say well could this be something else could just be depression you know that's that's to me and if a doctor says well i want you to go see this person point understand why that's important because it really helps to kind of like the again portion ford engine yeah different things you know they're both doctors but this one specializes in and the medication to treat mental health and a primary care doctor really can't do that oh my god they have to do so much already exactly but yeah it's really and to me i call it hiding in plain sight so there are a lot of people come to the hospital come and and just aren't taking care of themselves you know physically like they have health problems and i think one of the biggest things in this country that we're not looking at is is there an underlying depression as to why people aren't taking care of their diabetes or not taking care of their blood pressure or not doing these things i gave you trust laurie i had a lady who came to our program she came from the hospital the medical floor my psychiatrist did  there were one hundred eighty five days out of three hundred sixty five that she was hospitalized were real real stomach real legitimate stomach stuff she would go home but then she would end up being coming right back our doctor was called in to do an assessment he kind of diagnosed depression and he sent her to our program the first week in junior back in the hospital but we got her to come back and as we started to treat the depression she stayed out of the hospital for six weeks in a row and was able to do what she needed to do medically because we took care of her mental health and i think that happens a lot to people and i hope somebody watching this can kind of say you know what because i do go to my doctor and say do you think it could be depression and she said yeah and she referred me to a psychiatrist so it kind of is hiding sometimes in plain sight right pick  but then again i think i think it could because you could become kind of fixated yeah there is tell i want to talk about two symptoms before we have to kind of close things out here the first one  loosen ations and that really is a person's brain is playing tricks on them and if you saw a beautiful mind you know that was what that was about but they can come so that are auditory sure that a person hears things they can be very disturbing you know or person could see things and that if i did it well here's the thing loose nations can go quite honestly here here and here it's not just schizophrenia you know and  that's i think important to talk about and it's not it really is the brain kind of just i like to say playing tricks and there's one other really serious symptom that people make fun of but it really is pretty serious too and that's what they call the delusion and  delusion is when i think something is real and it is not so i've had patients that really thought that they were different people you know or they were married to the president and the most important thing i want to say do not do not trying to convince a person that's not true because truthfully their brain can't let go of it you know and that that it is kind of like trying to acknowledge it and you know not make it any worse but and also to not words on it i discovered this is from the american psychiatric association is website nope not one for art that one yeah and better let me hold it up for people as we kind of close things up here here it is so sure i kind of printed this off and it's a great talks about warning signs of mental illness and you'll notice it says that in a lot of cases with serious starts by age fourteen and then begin by twenty four and it's talking really about bipolar disorder and schizophrenia and it's a great great article and i'm going to you know put out up on the web site for people to have access to as well because when i came across it i thought this was just a really nice simple way of helping people kind of have a big snapshot because here's the thing the quicker we can intervene in mental illness the better the prognosis quite honestly and this so early intervention is really what science is kind of showing so my hope is that this was kind of helpful kind of education oh yes you know for you all you know i want to thank my guests because honestly you guys we can do the show without them and you know go to our website well university dot com and i just want to say here's to living well today