A social enterprise providing education and information to protect and enhance the mental health of young people
The media frenzy is starting to settle after the tragic suicides of Kate Spade and Anthony Bourdain. Some of the coverage, I was happy to see, was sensitive and compassionate, while some was just plain irresponsible, sensationalistic, and full of specific details - all of which can put vulnerable people at risk, and perpetuate misinformation. [...]
When her daughter Abbey began suffering severe mental health issues at the age of 14, Pippa Beveridge desperately sought help from Western Australia's mental health system. As she found out over the next two years, that support was not easy to come by. "We would go to [Princess Margaret Hospital] and wait for hours," Ms [...]
As a family member, encouraging a loved one to seek mental health treatment is one of the thinnest tightropes we can walk. “I’m fine!” “I’m not the crazy one - you are!” “I don’t need help!” Too often, encouraging a loved one to seek mental health treatment turns into a stalemate with long-lasting hard feelings, [...]
If you’re worried about a friend’s mental health, listen for these words. When we lose someone to suicide, whether it was a public figure or someone we knew in our personal lives, most of us ask ourselves if there were anything that we could have done to prevent the loss of a life. We might [...]
Every Friday morning in the small Queensland town of Gin Gin, a group of students with special needs are learning how to train and handle alpacas at the local high school. It is a unique animal-assisted therapy program unlike any other in Australia. "We're trying to create an opportunity for these students to overcome some [...]
Young people with depression should be reassured that their poor concentration and memory are often part of the illness and don't mean they're "dumb", says an expert in mental health. An Australian study has revealed widespread cognitive functioning difficulties among teens and adolescents with depression. The findings, published in the journal Neuropsychology Review, have prompted [...]
Mummy blogs and parenting forums have cornered the market on family advice, but research has found many people won't seek help because of a fear of judgement. The pressure to portray a perfect family image is blocking parents, especially low-income earners or those with health problems, from reaching out. Research from the Queensland Family and [...]
Parents play a key role in helping children develop good mental health. It is important that parents support and encourage positive mental health habits in children from an early age, and continue encouraging positive mental health behaviours during adolescence. These positive habits will support young people’s health and wellbeing in all life domains into the [...]
Resistance training's benefits go way beyond building big muscles: A new scientific paper demonstrates it might also be a great treatment for depression. The mental health condition has far-reaching impacts: it's estimated 1 million Australians have depression in any one year, and around one in six will experience it at some point in their lives. [...]
A new study has revealed that obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) sufferers need to adopt adaptive coping skills. The new research led by Steffen Moritz of the University Hospital Hamburg in Germany showed that coping skills were proven to be more helpful than the maladaptive strategies often used such as repetitive, compulsive actions or creating emotional distance from a situation, in order to effectively manage [...]
