Blog Post Six

Men’s Mental Health in Latin x Communities

For this blog, I decided to focus my attention on a community that is important to me and that I can bring some insight to as well, and that is the Latinx community. I wanted to focus my attention here because there are certain cultural aspects that lead to people to not ask for help and get the proper resources for their mental health.

For this blog I went to the websites for NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Health) and the MHA (Mental Health America) and looked specifically into Latinos and mental health.

According to the MHA site says that 8.9 million Latinos live in the United States and because there are so many Latinx people I believe it is important to understand the reasons that they might struggle to reach out and get the help that they need.

One of the things that is mentioned on the NAMI website is the lack of information and misunderstanding about Mental Health. This is an important issue because if a group of people do not have the information to identify the signs of mental health conditions that need to be addressed, then they won’t know to seek professional help. There’s this inherent fear of being seen as “crazy” especially if someone was to need psychiatric help. That can be medication or counseling. It can be very difficult to grow up with the mentality that needing help is a weakness. It can be very detrimental for people of the Latin X community but especially for the men who are meant to be the head of the household and have everything together all the time.

The website also mentions Privacy concerns which is a big deal in the Latin x community. Problems are dealt with at home and at home only. Letting others know can indicate that you’ve failed and that can definitely be a difficult pill to swallow. Many people are not aware of the confidentiality agreements that exist. Knowing that could potentially open people up to the idea of reaching out.

Another important obstacle that presents itself in this community is the language barrier that exists. Many of the Latinos that live within the U.S. do not speak English or speak it at a level that does not allow them to be transparent with doctors about their struggles and coming up with a game plan to improve their health.

There is also the question of not having health insurance which is common because Latinos tend to work low-wage jobs or be self-employed. And because a lot of immigrants are afraid of getting deported they are less likely to seek insurance .

There are many more issues that Latinos have to deal with in order to get the help that they need but first the person has to get over the cultural expectations and norms that exist and limit the communities chance of improving.

The only way that I can see change in the future is for people to speak out. The more people in this community can share their stories and their struggles the more others will begin to speak up. We need to show others that getting help and admitting vulnerability is a show of strength.