1. Mental Health and its types in India
Our overall mental health stability depends upon the well being of our social and
emotional factors. But the lack of these factors leads to mental health disorders. These
disorders restrain people from behaving in a proper manner based on the principles laid
by our society. These disorders have a strong influence over how we think, how we act,
how we react to pressure situations and almost every other choice we make in life.
There are a lot of different mental health disorders that manipulate our behavior. Some
of the common mental health disorders are explained below.
• Bipolar Disorder
The patients suffering from bipolar disorder usually go through extreme changes
in their moods from manic to depressive, which causes a dramatic shift in the
frame of mind, energy levels, ability to function and thinking power. These
periods can range from a day to months on end and depends on various
situations. Individuals with bipolar disorder are prone to suicidal instincts and
may inflict harm to themselves and others.

2. • Major Depression
Major depression, also commonly known as clinical depression is a state of mind
that usually keeps the patient in prolonged periods of despair. This feeling of
being sad could be a lifelong phenomenon, which affects the patient’s mood,
confidence level, health and behavior. Depression has other side effects like low
self-esteem, fatigue, insomnia and suicidal thoughts. Regular treatment and
counseling is a must for clinical depression or else the situation can get worse.
• Anxiety Disorder
This mental health disorder makes the people live in a constant fear or distress
in normal situations where other people don’t see any problem. Due to this,
regular activities like studying, watching TV, cooking, eating etc can be difficult to
perform by the patients. There are subdivisions to anxiety attacks like panic
attacks, posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), obsessive-compulsive disorder
(OCD) and phobia of different things. It is difficult for people suffering from
anxiety disorder to socialize with other people
• Autism
Autism is one of the more severe disorders, which impairs a person’s ability to
think clearly and make decisions. The development of the brain functions is
restricted to certain levels where the patient is unable to differentiate between
racial, ethnic and social backgrounds of other individuals. This disorder can be
diagnosed before the age of 3 and most patients are unable to communicate
verbally and have little or no interest at all in social activities.
• Schizophrenia

3. Schizophrenic disorder impedes with a persons capability to think clearly, make
sound decisions and relate to other people socially. It is common for a
schizophrenic patient to lose touch with reality and forget about his own
existence and have delusions and hallucinations. There is no known cure for
schizophrenia however art therapy and psychoanalysis have known to show
improvement in the condition.
• Addiction Disorder
In this disorder patients have compulsive impulses and strong urges to perform
acts that could cause harm to them and their reputation. Kleptomania (urge to
steal), gambling, alcohol and substance abuse etc are some of the most common
traits of addiction disorder. Addiction disorders are often the reason for
interpersonal disputes between relationships and damages the patients social
reputation.
• Eating Disorder
Patients with eating disorder often are females who want to attain the perfect
body; unaware that they suffer from any disorder. Bulimia is the most prominent
eating disorder where individuals binge eat on any kind of food they wish and
purge the same, usually in the form of vomiting, or long periods of fasting or
excessive use of laxatives. This disorder can cause serious bodily harm and can
affect the patient’s health in a negative way.

4. • Personality disorders
People diagnosed with personality disorder usually have strong mood swings
and rigid characteristics in their behavior that can have a strong influence on
their daily functioning. Some common personality disorders are antisocial
personality disorder, borderline personality disorder and avoidant personality
disorder.
All of these mental health disorders are some of the most commonly found mental
illnesses in people around the world and in our country too. The problem for us is, the
western countries are more open to address the issues of mental health and start
treatment, but in India people are not forthcoming with their mental health issues and
usually ignore the problem as just another mood swing. Rather there are some people
who consider it a stigma to get help in such times. If we are able to change that attitude
of ignorance and make an attempt to concentrate on the issue at hand, a lot of people
with mental disorders will find their own standing in our society.