On the twelfth day of donating…
A global pandemic is a scary and chaotic time. Between job losses, worries about loved ones contracting the disease (especially elders and friends and family who work in health care and in other front line, essential work), worries about loved one being isolated, dealing with isolation oneself, people having to balance working from home while also homeschooling their kids (not to mention supporting them through a scary and uncertain world), people losing businesses that they put their heart and soul into, trying to grieve a death (whether from COVID or otherwise) where maybe you didn’t get a chance to say goodbye/you know your loved one died alone/you just want to be able to grieve with others and you can’t… and probably a myriad of other stresses that I’m forgetting about, a pandemic really takes a toll on mental health. So it seemed like a good year to make a donation to the Canadian Mental Health Association.
CMHA provides services to 1.3 million Canadians and has more than 5,000 staff members and 11,000 volunteers. They have divisions and branches in all of the provinces and one territory. I decided to make my donation to the BC Division specifically.
Did you know that:
- 1 in 5 people will experience a mental health issue in any given year?
- 1 in 8 Canadians will need to receive hospital care for mental health?issues?
- Canada has one of the highest suicide rates of children and youth under 21 in the world?
I read all those facts on the CMHA website and that last one shocked me.
Another thing that I read on their website was that the CMHA started around the time of the 1918 flu pandemic? It doesn’t mentioned about the pandemic specifically – it talked more about soldiers come back from the war and their being no help for their mental health problems, along with other issues like people being thrown in jail when what they actually needed was mental health support. But I’m sure a pandemic didn’t help the situation either.
Mentally healthy people in a healthy society.
CMHA Vision
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