Heidi Stevens: Surgeon general confirms what parents know. Young people are in crisis.

The U.S. surgeon general released a rare public advisory Dec. 7 confirming what parents know in our bones: Kids are in crisis.

“The challenges today’s generation of young people face are unprecedented and uniquely hard to navigate,” Surgeon General Vivek H. Murthy wrote. “And the effect these challenges have had on their mental health is devastating.”

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From 2009 to 2019, the proportion of high school students reporting persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness increased by 40%, the advisory states. The share seriously considering attempting suicide increased by 36%, and the share creating a suicide plan increased by 44%.

There were more than 6,600 deaths by suicide among 10-24 year olds in 2020, according to the advisory, and Black children are now nearly twice as likely to die by suicide than white children.

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Research found that depressive and anxiety symptoms doubled during the pandemic, with 25% of young people experiencing depressive symptoms and 20% experiencing anxiety symptoms, the advisory reports.

But if we want to truly understand what kids are enduring, it’s important not to overlook the landscape in which the pandemic has played out.

“During the pandemic,” the advisory states, “young people also experienced other challenges that may have affected their mental and emotional wellbeing: the national reckoning over the deaths of Black Americans at the hands of police officers, including the murder of George Floyd; COVID-related violence against Asian Americans; gun violence; an increasingly polarized political dialogue; growing concerns about climate change; and emotionally-charged misinformation.”

The advisory, which you can read at hhs.gov/sites/default/files/surgeon-general-youth-mental-health-advisory.pdf, is not without hope.

“There is some cause for optimism,” Murthy writes. “According to more than 50 years of research, increases in distress symptoms are common during disasters, but most people cope well and do not go on to develop mental health disorders. Several measures of distress that increased early in the pandemic appear to have returned to pre-pandemic levels by mid-2020. … In addition, some young people thrived during the pandemic: They got more sleep, spent more quality time with family, experienced less academic stress and bullying, had more flexible schedules, and improved their coping skills.”

The 53-page advisory lists steps for families, schools and health care providers to take on behalf of young people. It lists online resources for guidance on recognizing warning signs and finding mental health professionals. It calls for expanding school-based mental health workforces. (Yes. Please.)

I’m going to throw in one more resource.

Brene Brown — the research professor at the University of Houston with a master’s degree in social work and five No. 1 New York Times bestsellers — has a new book out called “Atlas of the Heart.” In it, she writes:

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“We need hope like we need air. To live without hope is to risk suffocating on hopelessness and despair, risk being crushed by the belief that there is no way out of what is holding us back, no way to get to what we desperately need.”

(From 2009 to 2019, remember, the proportion of high school students reporting persistent sadness or hopelessness increased by 40%.)

“Hope is a function of struggle,” Brown writes. “We develop hope not during the easy or comfortable times, but through adversity and discomfort. Hope is forged when our goals, pathways and agency are tested and when change is actually possible.”

It’s also learned behavior, she writes, and children most often learn it (or don’t) from their parents.

She writes about permanence (the feeling that our struggle will never end, that tomorrow will be no different from today) and pervasiveness (the feeling that whatever we’re up against has stained or changed every single thing in our life, that nothing good is left). Both can turn hopelessness into despair.

“When I’m really scared, worried, overwhelmed, stressed about what’s happening and trying to find perspective,” she writes, “I ask myself: Will this issue be a big deal in five minutes? Five hours? Five days? Five months? Five years?”

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That strikes me as a powerful tool.

Brown also writes about belonging.

“Love and belonging are irreducible needs for all people,” she writes. “In the absence of these experiences, there is always suffering.”

She once asked a group of eighth-graders to explain the difference between belonging and fitting in. For many tweens and teens, she writes, belonging or not belonging feels like life or death.

She asked an illustrator to re-create some of their statements on posters, which she includes in her book. The feeling of not belonging in your own family, it turns out, can be worse than anything.

“Not belonging at school is really hard. But it’s NOTHING compared to what it feels like when you don’t belong at HOME.”

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“Not being as cool or popular as your parents want you to be.”

“Not being good at the same things your parents were good at.”

“Your parents not liking who you are and what you like to do.”

I know from talking to adolescent therapists that parents’ well-intentioned advice can sometimes come across as disappointment or shame.

“It’s very hard not to jump in and say, ‘Yeah but you’re just sitting in your room! If you would just go out! Go to the football game! That’s easy! You’re going to see people there!’ ” family therapist John Duffy, with whom I do a podcast, told me recently. “And fine. That may be true. But if a kid’s not heard, they’re going to know — and they’re going to be right — ‘You don’t really get it. You’re not hearing me here. I’m having a really hard time.’”

Brown was on Glennon Doyle’s “We Can Do Hard Things” podcast recently, and Doyle closed the episode, as she often does, with a plea: Can you give us one easy thing we can do to help our people?

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“When we see someone in struggle, reframe ‘I‘m here to fix’ to ‘I’m here to walk with,’” Brown said. “When I see my kids suffering and they say, ‘This happened at school and it was so painful’ and I jump in to fix it rather than sitting in the pain with them, I have severed connection for the sake of control. … When we see someone struggle, especially someone we care about, say, ‘My job is to be in connection with, not to fix.’”

Earlier in the episode, Brown talked about not making her high school’s drill team, and how her disappointment was amplified by what she perceived as her parents’ shame.

“All I really needed was for one of my parents to say, ‘(Screw) that drill team.’ And, ‘God, that sucks.’”

Empathy. Connection. Belonging.

These are not systemic fixes. They’re not solutions to a mental health crisis. They’re not replacements for getting our kids access to mental health professionals, which is every bit as important as access to pediatricians and dentists and other experts in their physical wellbeing

But they’re nudges away from isolation, where hopelessness and despair can flourish. They’re nudges toward each other. And I will seize them and hang on to them like life preservers and let them buoy me and my family. And maybe they can help buoy you and yours too.

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Heidi Stevens is a Tribune News Service columnist. You can reach her at heidikstevens@gmail.com, find her on Twitter @heidistevens13 or join her Heidi Stevens’ Balancing Act Facebook group.

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