Within Cygnet we have a number of CAMHS (Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service) facilities spread across the country, so we understand the challenges of young peoples’ mental health in this rapidly changing world.
Recently at one of our values roadshows we were discussing Trust, one of our CAMHS service managers made a point that really stood out. They said that for a lot of the young people we care for, a breakdown in trust somewhere along the line has contributed to their need for mental health support. While everyone in the room knew the importance of Trust in the therapeutic relationship we think it really brought home to us the role of Trust more widely in mental health.
Trust is uncertain because, like self-confidence, it can be very hard to build and very easy to damage. It’s also very subjective, so where an individual may think they deserve to be trusted because their actions demonstrate that they are trustworthy, another person could be seeing that behaviour in a very different light.
If we accept that Trust is a key factor in how we go about helping people who are hoping to improve their mental health, and we accept that it is already difficult to build and maintain, then when we look at the changing world in which we live the situation becomes even more complicated.
We are currently living through a time of very rapid change, in an age of social media and 24/7 news, world leaders no longer have the luxury of time to spend considering their approach to challenges that arise. As citizens of the world we have access to far more information about the reality of situations than we ever had even twenty years ago. But does this knowledge help us to trust those who have power over our lives, or could it be contributing to an erosion of that trust?
Here at Cygnet we don’t have all the answers, but by trying to understand the world that is waiting for our young people as they go through their formative years, we can at least start building relationships that can be the foundation upon which they can build for their future.