What is Mental Illness

Often, after discovering what I do for a living, people will start telling me about someone they know who has a mental illness. They use terms they have heard on Oprah and they describe their subject with emotional disdain. After a question or two they admit to me that the person they are describing hasn't actually been diagnosed by a professional. In fact the accuser was using pop-psychology as a way to express their unhappy feelings for someone who had burned them.

So, what constitutes an actual mental illness and how can the lay person know if someone they are close to is in actual need of professional help?

Although there are hundreds of different types of mental illness, it can be impossible for the lay person to make a determination between simple neurotic behavior and an actual mental illness. However there are some tell-tale signs that can help you decide if you or your loved one needs professional help. Here are a few questions you can ask:

1. Is the person in question verbalizing thoughts of suicide, not wanting to deal with life anymore, or believing that other's would be better off without them? Talk of not wanting to live, even if veiled in humor, should never be minimized. Get immediate professional help.
2. Do the symptoms the person is displaying preventing them from functioning normally in their everyday life, i.e. not able to attend school,or work, no longer able to keep up with physical hygiene necessities, unable to interact socially as s/he had previously.
3. Does the person in question display little or no empathy for others (all others, not just the scorned)? Often those with serious personality disorders have a grave inability to feel for others. Even if they marry and have children they are unable to experience deep emotional connections with others including pets.
4. Can the person decide when to be in control and when to loose control? For instance a violent abuser may be abusive at home but able to control him/herself at work. If they are not able to control themselves in certain situations they may may be dealing with a mental illness. But those who can function with friends, at work or in other situations but loose control with certain people or in certain situations like at home or in the car generally have an anger management problem but not a mental illness.

Diagnosing a mental illness is a complex process. Although someone may be acting erratically, defiantly or to your dislike, they may not have an actual mental illness. Don't be to quick to label someone a "borderline" or a "narcissist" without a full understanding of what those labels mean.