College students are often stressed and some even have anxiety and depression due to the pressures they face. According to Mental Health Therapist and Counselor at Sierra College, Jamie Chin, “When we have anxiety and stress we have a lot of negative thinking going on.” And in describing Gen-Z specifically, she said, “I’m just calling you guys the anxiety generation.” So what can we do?
What are the effects of social media use? Are they negative, or positive? In the past decade, it has become an increasingly substantial part of our lives. Many spend hours every day scrolling through their phone looking at Instagram or Twitter. But how is this affecting our mental health? And how does it affect students, more specifically?
A hole
Black as the void
Bottomless as the night sky
Center of a man
Ripped out, left to die
A raging sea
Eroding the land
That makes the existence, of this weary man
As edges crumble, and walls fall away
He trudges ever onward, to face another day
An endless cycle
Stand up and lay down
Trying endlessly not to fall to the ground
Not to break, not to crack, not to scream or stamp
Trudging onward, ever onward
And resisting, always resisting, that void so black
Tiring to do, a job so bleak
Looking outwards and inwards, seeing nothing
Not even a peek
Of break, of rest, of shelter so sought
Nothing but a raging sea, a turmoil of endless thought
“I wrote this poem from my own experiences with depression, especially in the last half decade or so. When you are struggling with this formless thing it really can consume you, warping the way you see things or experience them. I tried to put these feelings into words by describing the way it felt, and the images I would see when I thought about myself.
Every person experiences depression differently, but I do hope this poem helps you understand a bit more about the experience of living through it the way I did. I hope it helps you verbalize your experience.
For too long there has been an unspoken stigma about these things, and the only way to break the silence is to normalize talking about it- and asking for help when you need it.”
If you or someone you know is experiencing depression, you can text the Crisis Line. Sierra College also has mental health resources available to students that include a list of local resources. And the National Alliance of Mental Illness (NAMI) offers information to support self-advocacy and educate the public.
Written by Malcolm McDougal | Photo by Milo McDowell, Unsplash
Becoming a mother at 17 was scary to me. I thought that I would ruin my children’s lives before they ever had a chance. Following in the footsteps of my mother and determined to break a cycle. Just a teenager not knowing myself or even who I would be. I did not understand the responsibility that I was taking on, not for just one child, but six.
I had to strive to be better than I’d ever been and understand that mistakes would potentially put me and my children in a bad position. It was up to me, and only me, to ensure that my children had everything under the sun, no matter the curve balls thrown in my path.