Book Review: Here I Am, I Am Me: An Illustrated Guide to Mental Health, by Cara Bean, published April 2, 2024, recommended by the School Library Journal and by psychologists and therapists for ages 11-18, or middle grades through high school. Please note: this book is not yet in the Pageturner library and will require student requests in order for purchases to be made.  Additionally, for explained concepts to be fully understood, ereaders should be full-color adaptable, as this non-fiction work is in 4-color graphics.

Ok, so the title doesn’t grab me.  I would’ve been fine with Here I am.  I would’ve been good with I Am Me. Together it doesn’t seem redundant so much as merely silly.  Inside, this non-fiction book on mental wellness helped me explore that oddly directed, inexplicable hostility--turns out it was really about my mother/daughter issues. But SERIOUSLY.

Author Bean creates a tongue-in-cheek, bean-shaped image of herself as she sets about explaining, first, the inner workings of the brain; she continues to delve into our emotional lives, including self-harm, substance use( 1),  depression, and more.  She provides avenues for us to address our issues by ourselves and also includes references for finding additional help as needed.  She addresses how to approach the people we love who may have these issues--and when to seek advice, or leave things be if our loved ones are unable to listen or share. And she does all this in a lovingly colored, graphic style accessible to both students and adults.  11-year olds might feel a bit into the weeds when she explains dendrites (2), synapses and such, but if they hang in, she makes it work.

The very first chapter is titled “Stigma.”  What a great place to start!  “This word comes up a lot when we talk about mental health…The origin of the word comes from ancient Greek…A stigma was once a way for someone in power to physically mark an enslaved, oppressed, or otherwise controlled person. Stigma is now a word in modern society for an INVISIBLE [emphasis in original] mark on a person that makes us think of something negative.”  A clear example for us adults in the room may be taken from recent news headlines, in which Stormy Daniels is, without exception, listed as “Porn star Stormy Daniels.”  We can see how power works, too, as Donald Trump has never been described in the news as “rapist Donald Trump.” 

Chapter 2 describes the inner workings of the brain. “THE BRAIN IS BEYOND COMPLEX! [emphasis in original] The human brain is like an orchestra! Different regions perform different types of processing…much like the individual musicians who must read the music, play their instruments, and adapt to the sounds that others make.  The brain has many interconnected systems working in harmony with one another.” She continues with “SEE INSIDE YOUR BRAIIN’S EMOTIONAL EQUIPMENT.” [emphasis in original]   Both left and right brain hemispheres are discussed as she continues with the hind brain, the limbic system, and the cortex.  The limbic system might be the most difficult for students to understand.

In Chapter 3, the author deals with how the mind works by taking the reader ‘inner tubing’ with a Fwoop and a splash!  Each chapter has a ‘question map’ asking questions the chapter will answer; in this one, those range from “What is consciousness and unconsciousness?” to “What are some common negative thoughts traps?” and “What is mindfulness?”

Subsequent chapters are titled: “Fear, Coping, Substance Use and Addiction, Depression, Suicide and CRISIS Prevention,” and “Getting Help.” There’s also a glossary listing additional resources.  Read more, below, on why we need to provide mental health information to students much earlier than was previously thought, especially after the pandemic that affected all of us in myriad ways large and small.

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(1) Bean explains that “substance abuse” is judgmental; she prefers not to use it.

 (2) The word dendrite comes from the Greek word dendron  for tree, which is how they look under a microscope.  Dendrites are branched, protoplasmic extensions of nerve cells. They propagate electrochemical stimulation received from other neural cells of the cell body, called soma (which simply translates as body). They receive electrical stimulation via synapses located throughout the dendritic tree; synapses allow neurons to activate other neurons, thus sending information to those areas of the brain where the information is processed.  Whew.   Author Bean makes all this much more understandable than I have here!

 --"Whether it’s from stress, anxiety, depression, or thoughts of suicide, the mental health of America’s adolescents and teens has grown steadily worse for more than a decade, with the COVID-19 pandemic exacerbating the trend…Forty-two percent of high school students in 2021 reported feeling so sad or hopeless for at least two consecutive weeks in the previous year that they stopped engaging in their usual activities, up from 26 percent in 2009. Girls and LGBTQ+ young people are particularly likely to report those feelings. Thoughts of suicide, suicide attempts, and actual suicides among young people have also risen in that period, with Black children nearly two times more likely than their white peers to die by suicide, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s biennial Youth Risk Behavior Survey and CDC statistics. Depression and anxiety among young people, by some measures, doubled as the COVID-19 pandemic dragged on.

“Ninety-three percent of school health workers say they’ve seen an increase in students with anxiety since 2019, and 42 percent say they’ve seen more students with eating disorders, according to a March survey by the EdWeek Research Center that included school nurses, psychologists, social workers, health teachers, and others in school-based health roles.

"But the upward trend in adolescents’ mental health problems was already underway before pandemic shutdowns.

“An EdWeek Research Center survey last year found 37 percent of teens felt anxious when thinking about climate change, and more than a third felt afraid. In another EdWeek Research Center survey, from August and September, 43 percent of high school students said events and issues in the news caused them anxiety or stress at least some of the time.

“More research is needed, but some studies have at least established an association between excessive social media use and poor mental health in young people.

"One 2019 study of 12- to 15-year-olds found that those who spent more than three hours daily on social media were twice as likely as peers who spent less time to report poor mental health, including symptoms of depression and anxiety. Another study of college-age students found improvements in their mental health when they limited social media use to 30 minutes a day or less. And a 2019 study of 14-year-olds in the United Kingdom found a correlation between greater social media use and poor sleep habits, poor body image, and a higher likelihood of experiencing online harassment, particularly among girls.

“Adolescents naturally compare themselves to other people and often find themselves lacking, but when you’re comparing yourself to a curated profile, it’s easier to get FOMO [fear of missing out],” Offner said. “It’s easier to feel inadequate.”
 
“When COVID-19 hit and shut down school buildings, it introduced many triggers for poor mental health at the same time. Young people were apart from friends and social connections, they suddenly had little structure and routine, and more of their lives went online. Many families were under added financial stress, and many young people endured the trauma of losing loved ones to COVID-19.

One “…[P]revention strategy is to teach children strategies to identify, regulate, and manage their emotions—which is happening more and more as schools invest in social-emotional learning—akin to teaching them about physical health and nutrition."  See: https://www.edweek.org/leadership/why-america-has-a-youth-mental-health-crisis-and-how-schools-can-help/2023/10?s_kwcid=AL!6416!3!602270476281!!!g!!&utm_source=goog&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=ew+dynamic+recent&ccid=dynamic+ads+recent+articles&ccag=recent+articles+dynamic
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This is precisely why this book is being reviewed here.  It should also be noted that in this article I learned that the last federal push for mental health was shortly after WWII!--and aimed only at adult mental health, especially for vets returning from war.

--"Suicide remains one of the leading causes of death among adolescents in the US. From 2018 to 2021, suicide was the second leading cause of death for adolescents aged 10 to 14 years and the third leading cause of death among those aged 15 to 19 years. Suicide is linked to numerous, overlapping factors and paths of marginalization, including mental health conditions, historical and intergenerational trauma, discrimination, neighborhood deprivation, accessibility to lethal means, exposure to violence and abuse, and, more recently, the COVID-19 pandemic. Although older and male adolescents have historically had higher suicide rates than younger and female adolescents, respectively, recent evidence suggests these gaps may be closing as suicide rates are increasing more rapidly for female adolescents than male adolescents. Previous reports identified racial and ethnic differences in adolescent suicide; in recent years, the adolescent suicide rate among Black and Asian and Pacific Islander individuals has increased rapidly, whereas the rate among White individuals has decreased. [Emphasis added] Race and ethnicity are social constructs; hence, racial and ethnic differences in health may be driven by social determinants, environment, and systems of oppression and marginalization that produce disparities in health and longevity. 

“Historically, firearms have been the leading means of adolescent suicide mortality; however, asphyxiation is becoming increasingly common. Other common methods of suicide include poisoning and jumping, and methods may vary by demographic characteristics. For instance, among racial and ethnic minoritized male youths, firearms are becoming an increasingly common method of suicide. “ --excerpt, Trends in Adolescent Suicide by Method in the US, 1999-2020, March 29, 2024, https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2816956

Finally, as should be obvious but somehow ISN’T, when our kids suffer, we spiral, ourselves.

 --“The children are in crisis. But the families are also in crisis,” said Robin Gurwitch, a professor in psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Duke University. “They are struggling to figure out how best to help their children in a system that doesn’t come with a manual.”  Read further at: https://dailymontanan.com/2024/01/01/parents-see-own-health-spiral-as-their-kids-mental-health-worsens/