Let’s talk about treating medical conditions.  If you contract a lung disease, your primary care physician does the preliminary diagnosis and you are referred to a specialist in order to evaluate your condition and treat the ailment.

If you feel heart palpitations, you go to a heart specialist and the physician will recommend treatment for your issue.

This is how a medical condition is supposed to be treated.  But there are people with a special kind of medical condition.  They need treatment, but society doesn’t always view it that way.

I’m talking about mental health conditions.  One of the most common of the mental health category of illnesses is depression.  Many people still look at depression as some kind of character flaw.  We all go through rough times, many say, just get over it and go forward.

There’s only one problem with that approach.  Depression is no character flaw.  It’s a chemical imbalance in your body.  Individuals have no more control over depression than heart disease.  Heart disease is not a character flaw.  It’s a medical condition in need of treatment.  Depression needs to be treated medically.

The word stigma is the term that applies here.  People with a mental illness, such as depression, often suffer from the stigma that their depression is their own fault.  Here’s a fact – it’s not the patient’s fault.

I recently recorded a Podcast featuring Mike Riekhof and Todd Zimmerman.  Mike founded The Peyton Riekhof Foundation for Youth Hope after his daughter Peyton took her own life while suffering from depression.  Todd is a member of the Fishers City Council and believes strongly in removing the stigma of diseases like depression.  Both men have served on Mayor Scott Fadness’ Mental Health Initiative Task Force.  You can listen to the Podcast at this link.  It’s a little over 30 minutes long.

Mayor Fadness started this task force shortly after being sworn-in as the first Mayor of Fishers in 2015.  As the town manager previous to that, he had seen the statistics and heard the stories from local public safety employees about the toll mental health issues were taking on those suffering with mental illness, as well as their families and friends.

You will be hearing more about the mayor’s mental health initiative.  My suggestion is to pay attention and support this initiative.  It’s all about the place where you live, Fishers, Indiana.