Published: Oct. 8, 2024 at 1:41 PM PDT
Watch the video on KKTV 11 News website.
Steve Carleton, Chief Clinical Officer at Porch Light Health, spoke with KKTV News about the importance of mental health for Mental Illness Awareness Week.
Lauren Watson
I want to thank you for joining us here in the 11 Breaking News Center this afternoon. I’m Lauren Watson, your digital anchor here at KKTV 11 News. And I’m here today with Steve Carlton, the Chief Clinical Officer at Porch Light Health. Now, Steve, starting Sunday, this week is Mental Illness Awareness Week with World Mental Health Day falling on the 10th. Why is it important? Last month was Recovery Month. We talked a lot about Recovery Month. Why is it important to follow Recovery Month with this focus on mental health?
Steve Carleton
And I think in the same way, as we talked about Recovery Month, we want to talk about mental health as well. I mean, it’s really important that people start viewing and seeing their mental health as just another factor in their health, similar to physical health. If you have some type of virus, or some type of chronic pain, or chronic health issue, mental health should be lumped into the same category, and not thought of differently than than our other health determinants.
Lauren Watson
What is mental illness?
Steve Carleton
It’s a great question. So when we think about what is mental illness, and how do we define it, it’s really important to understand that a lot of times, people experience pain, right? Whether that’s physical pain, or psychological pain, emotional pain. We end up in these situations where we’re uncomfortable. And In a lot of cases, that’s healthy, right? If I’ve taken on a new job, or a new project, or a new hobby, I can expect that learning that and engaging in that, there’s going to be some pain involved. There’s going to be some discomfort. I expect that type of pain. With mental illness, we think about more that as suffering, meaning pain with no purpose tied to it. So you’re experiencing psychological, emotional, pain and suffering that doesn’t really have a purpose. It’s more organic in nature. And so when we think about mental health, that’s more what we’re trying to describe. And that can be caused from a lot of different things. Sometimes it’s genetic. People are born predisposed to anxiety, depression, and other things. Other times, it’s environmental, right? You’ve experienced difficult circumstances, and that has led to those types of symptoms. But seeking help involves uncovering that and figuring out where is that suffering coming from that you’re not signing up for, and how can you better manage it?
Lauren Watson
Now, there are a lot of different mental health issues and diagnosis, but there are a lot of similar signs between those conditions and diagnosis. Can we maybe talk a little bit about those?
Steve Carleton
Yeah, absolutely. So the different things to look out for, the main one in particular to consider, is it’s causing clinically significant distress. People respond differently to different symptoms. And what we are trying to figure out when we’re talking specifically about mental health issues is, is it causing you in your life, from your perspective, significant distress? That’s always the most important question. But the other things that we want to consider are, are there significant behavioral changes? Are you changing the way you’re interacting with other people in the world around you? Are there physical symptoms? Are you feeling more fatigued? Are you sleeping more? Are you more or less hungry? Are you gaining weight, losing weight? What’s happening there? You think about cognitive, our thought process. What’s the story that you’re telling yourself about being in the world and interacting with people and going to work and interacting with your family? What What are those stories that are going on internally? And then lastly, what’s happening emotionally? What specific types of symptoms are you experiencing there? Are you feeling sad? Are you feeling irritable? Are you feeling down? What emotionally? What state are you in?
Lauren Watson
Looking specifically at a couple of some of the more common conditions, can we talk maybe a little bit about depression and anxiety?
Steve Carleton
Yeah. Depression and anxiety are two of the two of the most common mental health issues out there. For depression and anxiety, I think, statistically, it’s about one in 10 people that will experience those conditions at some point in their life. So this is a lot of people that go through this. A lot of people that, if you’re struggling with this, you can relate to. With depression in particular, it really is those three categories. You’re experiencing behavior change, right? You’re not engaged in life in the same way you used to be. Physiologically, you’re going through changes with diet and exercise and sleep and fatigue and all of those things. It is that cognitive, those thoughts that you’re telling yourself, and it is that persistent feeling of sadness, right? So that’s really with depression. And with depression, it’s common to have suicidal thoughts and to start thinking about ending your life. And so that’s always something to be aware of. With generalized anxiety disorder, it’s more about just that constant state of arousal, right? That constant state of tension that people get in. So commonly, people have stomach problems. Commonly, people have headaches from this. They can feel more twitchy or just unsettled in their skin.
Steve Carleton
They can have real problems falling asleep and staying asleep at night. Those types of symptoms are more indicative of generalized anxiety. And with depression and anxiety, the thing to think about is, is it causing enough significant distress that you’re not able to live in the way that you want to live? You’re not able to engage in the world around you in the way that you want to show up. Those are the things that I would think about with those two diagnosis in particular.
Lauren Watson
When it comes to mental health and mental illness, do drugs and/or alcohol often factor in?
Steve Carleton
They do. The way we talk about this is the idea of what came first, the chicken or the egg, when we’re thinking about mental health and substance use. One can drive the other. And for each individual, it might be a little bit different. It might be that they have always suffered from depression, or they had a significant trauma, a really negative event that created a lot more anxiety, a lot more hyperarousal, a lot more intrusive types of thoughts. And using substances becomes the solution to those symptoms, right? That using substances provides that short term relief. That is such a common relationship there. And so it’s normal to have both going on at the same time. What I think most people should know, is what I found in my work, doing this for 18 years, is that more often than not, that substance use is a symptom of something else. Typically, we do uncover some other type of mental health issue, some significant event that happened that really drove that substance use. But the substance use is just a louder problem. It gets more attention from people because it’s more visible. It’s hard to look at a person and tell that they have significant anxiety, but it is more noticeable when people are using and over using substances.
Lauren Watson
As we start to wrap up our conversation today, if our audience wants some more information on this, on you guys at Porch Light Health, where can they find that?
Steve Carleton
So in the vein of thinking about mental health-specific, I think psychology today is a great first stop if you’re looking for a therapist. You can search by different insurances. So if you’re struggling with depression, anxiety, some type of trauma, So psychology today is an online database of all the therapists nationally. So wherever you live, it can be a really valuable tool. If somebody is struggling specifically with substance use, like Porch light Health, we’re a great place to turn. We offer both substance use and mental health help. We have psychiatry, and we can provide medications if people have underlying mental health issues. We also have therapists on staff. So we’re a good stop if people have a substance use-specific problem as well.
Lauren Watson
Steve Carlton, Chief Clinical Officer at Porch Light Health. Thank you so much for joining me this afternoon to talk a little bit about Mental Illness Awareness Week.
Steve Carleton
Yeah. Thank you, Lauren. Good to be with you.
