Mental health issues have been especially prevalent today. Mainly because the world is suffering from a drastic change caused by the CoVid 19 pandemic. The pandemic have a lot of casualties, not just on the certain  health and economy. It is not just a battle for a human's immune system, but also for everyone's mental and emotional aspect. Even if we don't have the disease, it still costed us our jobs, our future plans, usual outdoor activities and our consciousness of living everyday without thinking or worrying of getting infected by the virus.

   I myself knew its demotivating impact and I personally think it changed me. It frequently leads me to the point of questioning things and the situation, especially that I have mostly a hard time being a student in this phase of new normal. I often have a heavy feeling for unknown reason at all, but thankfully, I have grown aware of my mental health. I know I'm not the only one who's experiencing these things and I have to fix myself up before anyone else could, cause at the end of the day, only I can help myself. I often resort to doing things that makes me happy and relax, finding motivations as much as possible and appreciating the blessings I receive each day. However, while also communicating with my friends and sharing some deep thoughts, I've realized that these situation is just really more harder for those who aren't quite that mentally and emotionally strong.

   There are really people that aren't positive as I am. There are people who are really prone to  breakdowns and depression. But we can't blame them. Some of these mental issues aren't just because they chose to be emo, or they just lack motivation and optimism. It is because these mental issues can also be already a disease, which we acquire with a series of conditions that have affected us. One of this which was really commonly known is depression.

 They say depression is a silent killer. It would not be really obvious on a person, and sometimes we might think the person suffering it is just being dramatic. I have already encountered a lot of news about this in which the depressed person chose to end his or her life. What's saddening is that most of these people are youth. Even before the pandemic, depression  have been a serious case that are often diagnosed on some people. A former school mate of mine, whom also somehow I get along too back then, had been a victim of this that made him resort to suicide. It was really shocking for me, cause first, I haven't really had an update about him until that incident. Second, I personally don't have an impression of him being drawn to depression because he seem that mature, jolly and strong person. But yes, like what they say, what we see on the outside isn't everything. Eversince then, I tried to become more sensitive of the feelings of people I am close with. I never wanted to attend an early funeral of a friend. There are already been times when my friend was having a problem with her relationship and she would hinted me of suicide. Those were the times that I need to check on her thru text because she would deactivate her account and I can't message her thru chat. Recently, she had a problem again and came on crying on me that made me quite surprised and disoriented. Thankfully, she managed to recover from the emotional burden. Well ofcourse, since we cannot meet, I keep on tagging her on encouraging posts. There are also times that some of my friends would just weirdly post seemingly morbid things on social media. It would really alert me that'll lead me on their inbox asking them what happened, trying my best to give helpful and consoling advices, and bringing up jokes to lighten up the mood. Especially that some of them rants about anxieties and insomias. I don't know if it just really a part of my personality to advise a lot, buy I am glad that they are taking it positively.

  One moment also, I have talked with one of my friend and she asked what should a person do if another person admitted to him or her that he or she was depressed. It's good that we agreed on never to invalidate that person's feeling even how dramatic it would be. Real emotions doesn't always show on the surface, and emotions that seems to be overly done doesn't mean they were fake. It made me reflect how mental health issues are really hard to identify since our emotions isn't readable as a crystal clear water. Most of the time, they are confusing especially that we aren't some kind of mental health professionals, a  therapist or something. Helping a person with mental health issues doesn't always require a profession tho. Sometimes, even a simple gestures of comfort could already be a small help for what they are going thru. Empathy is free, either to those we are close with or not. We can express our empathy by compassionately engaging with them, simply listening to their rants, and always choose the right words to say.

  Since my friend's question made me curious of how to actually help a depressed person, I try to did a little research about it. I learned that these include listening to them, asking and constant rechecking on them. Personally, I think these can also be applied on person with any of mental health issues because I think the thing they need the most is love and support. To help someone with mental health issues sometimes doesn't take a lot, we just need to continue being a friend to them and most importantly is to never give up on them. A friend who listens, comfort, and stay with them especially on their worse days. Just like the famous tagline this pandemic--- says, " We are all in this together."

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I've said so many things.hehe. Take care of your overall health!
Staysafe and Godbless!<3