Mental Health and Well- Being in Middle and Late Adolescence

1. Anxiety disorders

2. Eating disorders

3. Personality disorders

Though all of us experience personal distress and display unexpected behaviors such as sadness/laziness, abnormality or mental illness occurs when certain behaviors and extremely deviant conduct are exhibited.

Anorexia nervosa happens when one is obsessed with becoming thin that they reach extreme measures and this leads to extreme weight loss. It generally develops during adolescence or young adulthood and tends to affect more women than men.

Warning signs:

• Dramatic weight loss

• Refusal to eat certain foods or food categories.

• Consistent excuses to avoid situations involving food

• Excessive and rigid exercise routine

• Withdrawal from usual friends/relatives

Bulimia Nervosa is an eating disorder in which one starts to consume large amounts of food at once and then is followed by purging, using laxatives, or over-exercising to rid themselves of the food they ate. Like anorexia, bulimia tends to develop during adolescence and early adulthood and appears to be less common among men than women.

Warning signs:

• Wrappers/containers indicating consumption of large amounts of food

• Frequent trips to bathroom after meals

• Signs of vomiting e.g. staining of teeth, calluses on hands

• Excessive and rigid exercise routine

• Withdrawal from usual friends/relatives

Binge eating is disorder in which someone eats a lot amount of food at a time but they don't vomit. It typically begins during adolescence and early adulthood, although it can develop later on.

Warning signs:

• Wrappers/containers indicating consumption of large amounts of food

• MAY be overweight for age and height

• MAY have a long history of repeated efforts to diet-feel desperate about their difficulty to control food intake

• MAY eat throughout the day with no planned mealtimes

It is a pattern of need for admiration and lack of empathy for others. A person with narcissistic personality disorder may have a grandiose sense of self-importance, a sense of entitlement, take advantage of others or lack empathy.

It is a pattern of preoccupation with orderliness, perfection and control. A person with obsessive-compulsive personality disorder may be overly focused on details or schedules, may work excessively not allowing time for leisure or friends, or may be inflexible in their morality and values. (This is NOT the same as obsessive compulsive disorder.)

It is a pattern of being suspicious of others and seeing them as mean or spiteful. People with paranoid personality disorder often assume people will harm or deceive them and don’t confide in others or become close to them.

It is being detached from social relationships and expressing little emotion. A person with schizoid personality disorder typically does not seek close relationships, chooses to be alone and seems to not care about praise or criticism from others.

I. Problems Origin

II. Ways for Improvement

I. Make a list