“After facing a four-month waiting period and inconsistent communication with YMHC, the institutional care that was supposed to support me ended up compounded the anxiety I originally had.”

I’ll never forget how nervous I felt during my first YMHC intake appointments. Walking through those doors as a first year student seemed like an admittance of failure, but I knew I needed the care. After facing a four-month waiting period and inconsistent communication with YMHC, the institutional care that Read more…

“I had just come back from study abroad, there was a death in my family, and it was just a really tough time. During the time that I had to wait to get paired with someone, my mental health deteriorated a lot.”

If I had 500 fewer hours in the school year, the first things to go would be taking care of myself and a lot of unpaid extracurriculars. For example, I am one of the student coordinators of FOOT, which is an unpaid job. I put in a lot of time Read more…

“During the first semester of my first year I found myself bogged down in work, in sleeplessness, and loneliness. It wasn’t until I returned home for break that I realized how unhealthy the first semester was for me—how depressed I was.”

During the first semester of my first year I found myself bogged down in work, in sleeplessness, and loneliness. It wasn’t until I returned home for break that I realized how unhealthy the first semester was for me—how depressed I was. When I felt terrible, I treated it as a Read more…

“For me, the rhetoric that bean bag chairs, stress balls, and donut-filled study breaks can somehow be a panacea for mental health problems has been harmful.”

Upon arriving at Yale I was immediately bombarded with a slew of mental health resources—there’s The Good Life Center, groups like Hack Mental Health, an undergraduate publication about mental health, and seemingly endless events during reading period to help me relax. While I appreciate the breadth of resources available, it’s Read more…