Having a mental illness can be a scary thing. While some people with mental illness take the initiative to do something about it, others may feel scared and alone.
In Kern County, there are facilities, treatments and people who can help.
Edward Meshberg, the director of psychiatric programs at Memorial Center, and Bill Walker, the crisis services administrator at Mary K. Shell Mental Health Center, are two of the many people who try to help those with mental illness.
“The average person may not be aware of what services are out there,” Meshberg said during a recent interview.
The Mental Health Department is separated into 11 geographic areas, Walker explained.
“Each area has designated teams to treat adults, minors and substance abuse,” he said. “The facilities include Kern Medical Center, Memorial Center Hospital, Good Samaritan Hospital, Mary K. Shell Center. There’s a huge number of facilities.”
Walker said that if a minor is hospitalized in Kern County it could be because of three criteria: Teens either can be a danger to themselves, they’re a danger to others, or they’re what Walker called “gravely disabled,” which means they can’t take care of themselves and have no one to help them.
Treatment for mental illness can include medication and psychotherapy, according to Meshberg.
“There have been studies where some people have not been treated and some people have been treated with medication,” he said. “Some people have been treated with psychotherapy, and both seem to be effective.”
Short-term therapy is becoming more effective, said Meshberg.
“In short term treatment,” he said, “basically we try to stabilize them on medication, and then we try to do therapy with them: group therapy, one on one, recreational therapy.”
Treatment can be weeks or even months.
“Treatment can last a lifetime,” he said. “Most mental health patients are just trying to get through life like the rest of us.”
Individual or family counseling is a common treatment for adolescents, according to Walker.
“If it’s a biochemical disorder, of course medication and you see a psychiatrist. But usually it’s the short-term counseling that’s the most common used service for an adolescent.”
Many teens are referred to counseling because of interpersonal conflicts.
Meshberg noted that recovery often results in self-acceptance.
“I think if a person is able to function and find happpiness wherever they can, that’s recovery,” he said. “And part of that is self-acceptance. And so if we learn to cope, then basically the more tools we learn as individuals, the better we’re doing.”