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The World Health Organization

theaveragejoeSenior Contributor01 May 2018, 10:23 am AEST

The World Health Organization

Hi There, I have a question to make: I have noticed that when I come to the SANE website I am greeted with : Mental Illness is Real. I find the term Illness inappropriate from my experience and certainly something that is not conducive to recovery given that the term "mental illness" sounds pretty permanent.

I have come across numerous articles by the World Health Organization that seem to prefer and use the term "Mental Disorders".

I have argued this before here but for some reason I have not been able to persuade anyone that maybe it would be helpful to use mental disorder in the place of mental illness. Mental illness seem to have very negative connotations from my perspective.

Any feedback is much appreciated.

Here is the article from the World Health Organization:

http://www.who.int/whr/2001/media_centre/press_release/en/

3 replies

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In response to: The World Health Organization

Unknown userMember01 May 2018, 10:31 am AEST

Re: The World Health Organization

Hi @theaveragejoe,

Thanks for sharing that link and your perspective more generally. Language can be very powerful and I agree that thinking about connotations is important. If you're interested in making a more formal inquiry/ statement about this, we can put you in touch with our communications team. Im sure they'd find your ideas around this valuable.

In response to: The World Health Organization

CheerBearSenior Contributor01 May 2018, 2:20 pm AEST

Re: The World Health Organization

Hi @theaveragejoe. I found this a really interesting idea to think about.

The language used in relation to mental health sometimes bugs me. I can imagine that the term 'mental illness', just as any other words or terms, may mean different things to different people and bring about different responses for us.

For me, I struggle with viewing my mental health challenges as an "illness". I think part of that is that it viewing it as an illness makes me think of medical treatment and management as being the best/only way to approach recovery from that perspective, as other illnesses are traditionally treated. Maybe that's why I don't really like it when it suggested that I am 'unwell' or 'sick' also. I wonder how much the specific diagnosis/es we may have plays into how we feel about terms to describe mental health, like the term "mental illness".

I am not sure whether using the term 'disorder' would work better than illness for me personally though. I feel comfortable with 'mental health related challenges/issues'.

I enjoyed reading the article you shared and hearing your thoughts.

In response to: The World Health Organization

utopiaSenior Contributor02 May 2018, 8:33 pm AEST

Re: The World Health Organization

@theaveragejoe.
Isn't it interesting how we view and feel about different words.
I actually prefer the term mental illness - as to me it's like a physical illness but of the brain.
Whereas the term 'Disorder' to me sounds like something not common and maybe to be shunned.
It's an interesting topic to explore further.
I'm guessing that our like or dislike of words, may well relate to how those words are used within our individual communities and possibly even from our earliest experiences of those words.

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