Why people with mental illness need acceptance. Sometimes people don't want to believe that they or someone in their family has a mental illness - often because they're afraid that it will affect their family's good name. But this can mean that a mentally ill person doesn't get the treatment he or she needs. Just imagine if someone in the family had symptoms of a physical disease. Of course not.
Mental illness is nothing to be afraid of.
Like physical illness, it's treatable - treatments include medication, counselling and stress management, for example. Sometimes a person may need to stay in hospital for a while. But besides treatment, there's something else that will help too - a change of community attitude. People with mental illness need our support and acceptance. Without that acceptance, many mentally ill people and their families try to hide the illness from their community.