Did you know that according to the National Institutes of Health (NIH), six million men suffer from depression in the United States every year, and men commit suicide four times more often than women?
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), in 2023, it was estimated that one in four adults in the U.S. will experience a mental illness. An untreated mental illness can negatively affect an individual’s emotional, behavioral and physical well-being.
In short, men, it’s time to prioritize your mental health.
“A lot of times people have been going through really hard things and making it through on their own by white-knuckling it. There isn’t a need to do that necessarily because there are people to talk to to help with this,” said Joseph Forrest, a Licensed Master Social Worker and Therapist who focuses on substance use disorders, trauma and individual therapy for anxiety, depression, and bipolar disorder.
Additionally, the CDC article, in 2024, found that women were more likely than men to have received either medication, counseling, or therapy treatment from a mental health professional.
According to Forrest, he believes the majority of men who find themselves dealing with severe mental health experiences are often victims of self-isolation, having a lack of space for emotional conversations, or difficulty finding the necessary or relevant support among their peers.
“As men, we do not tend to have as many relationships where we are free to talk about emotions as a backdrop,” Forrest said. “It is isolation versus loneliness. This sense that you are on your own, or that other people are not going through a similar experience. It is also hard with social media. We see the small snippet, and we extrapolate that this person feels this way all the time, or this person is amazing, and so why am I dealing with this difficulty.”
While mental health problems vary in the length of their affliction, mental illness is largely shown as a problem that develops years before adulthood. According to Jonathan Edwards, a Social Work Services Manager at Corner Health Center in Ypsilanti and a former Behavioral Health Therapist, the trend of men fighting mental health issues begins during their teenage to young adult years. Corner Health offers mental health care and services for young people ages 12 to 25.
“We see a lot of adolescents who are responding to imperfect parenting that they have received, and like males, we often are socialized to grin and bear it. So resentment and anger fester,” Edwards said. “If that is not addressed, by 25, we take that into our older adult male relationships, and it starts to look different.”
According to the NIH, American men are less likely to seek mental health services due to cultural stigmas and standards of masculinity. The article found that nearly 90% of young people aged between 18 and 24 dealt with anxiety in their daily lives. The article also found that nearly 50% of mental health problems occur before age 18, which jumps to over 60% occurring before age 25.
However, while both Edwards and Forrest highly recommend that men find therapy, both offer various ways that men can combat their mental illnesses through therapeutic activities, with Edwards recommending developing daily structures and to journal, which he says will assist with easing the strain of the difficulties that come with mental illnesses.
“I like to talk about it (Therapy) like the corner in boxing,” Edwards said. “You could fight from round to round without going to the corner and talking to a coach who can see it from a different perspective and getting a breather. You probably could fight, but you would lose a lot more matches than you would otherwise.”
In addition to finding a structure which benefits your lifestyle, both Forrest and Edwards say it is important to find community. Forrest notes that establishing yourself in a community with shared goals or activities can provide those necessary connections and invite more candid conversations to be a relief against mental illnesses.
“The other way to approach this, I think, is to look at: Are there relationships that you have that could be strengthened or could be intentionally strengthened? So, for example, let’s say you’ve got a group of friends that you talk to, and it usually stays surface level. I guess that if you’re feeling isolated and you wish that there was some way to break through this and talk to those other guys about deeper things, they’re probably feeling the same way,” Forrest said. “Maybe by being a little bit vulnerable yourself, you can invite other people that you already know to shift that relationship as well.”
Antonio Cooper is a freelance journalist from Detroit, Michigan. His coverage of music festivals and interviews with local celebrities appeared in The E-Current Magazine, The Detroit Metro Times, XXL Magazine, RichMagDigital, The Ann Arbor Observer, and Pop Magazine.
