Children’s Mental Health Awareness week: the focus is on the importance of belonging: helping children and young people feel safe, valued and supported in their everyday environments.
The aim of the week is to encourage a sense of belonging – in friendships, in school, and in our communities. When we feel that we belong, it helps us feel connected to one another and also empowers us to go out into the world and create positive change.
We can cultivate a sense of belonging in children by doing the following:
Build Strong, Secure Relationships
Be emotionally available, Validate feelings and Repair quickly after conflict
Communicate Unconditional Acceptance
Children need to know: “You are loved and valued- not because of what you do, but because of who you are.”
Create Family Identity and Traditions
Develop small traditions (Friday movie night, Sunday pancakes), share family stories (“When you were little…”), and use inclusive language: “In our family, we help each other.” Children feel rooted when they feel part of something bigger.
Encourage Contribution
Belonging deepens when children feel needed. Give age-appropriate responsibilities, let them help solve problems, ask for their opinions and ideas.
Foster Inclusion beyond the Home
Help children build belonging in school and community: Encourage involvement in clubs, sports, arts, or service, teach empathy and inclusive behaviour, talk openly about differences (culture, abilities, and personalities), model how to welcome others.
Celebrate Individual Strengths
Belonging doesn’t require sameness. Notice effort and growth, not just outcomes, highlight unique qualities: “You really notice when others feel left out”, avoid comparison between siblings or peers. Children should feel both connected and distinct.
Normalize Mistakes and Struggles
If children feel they must be perfect to belong, they’ll hide parts of themselves. Share your own mistakes, say, “Everyone messes up sometimes”, emphasize learning over performance. Psychological safety strengthens belonging.
Model Belonging in Your Own Life
Remember: Children do as you do, they do not do what you say. Children watch how adults maintain friendships, handle conflict, speak about others and include or exclude others. When they see healthy belonging modelled, they internalize it.
Every year, Teen Suicide Prevention Week invites us to talk about youth mental health, and rightly so. In South Africa, suicide remains one of the leading causes of death among young people, and thousands of teens attempt suicide every year.
But what if prevention isn’t only about spotting warning signs?
What if part of the problem is how we understand teenage distress, and what we assume strength looks like? At Vista Clinic, where teens aged 16 years and older are admitted and supported, we see first-hand that many young people don’t fit the stereotypes we expect. Often, the teens most at risk are the ones least likely to raise alarms.
The Reality Behind the Statistics
Recent South African data shows that over 7 400 children under the age of 18 were treated for suicide attempts within a nine-month period, highlighting the scale of distress among our youth. These numbers are alarming, but they don’t explain why so many teens are struggling in silence.
Many teens who struggle don’t appear distressed. They attend school, meet expectations, and often support others, all while quietly battling feelings they don’t know how to express.
Something we often miss: A teen who doesn’t “act out” may still be deeply overwhelmed. Silence is not the absence of pain it’s often a sign of it.
2. The Pressure to Be Resilient
We praise resilience, independence, and toughness. While these qualities can be healthy, they can also send an unintended message: “Don’t struggle. Don’t need help.” For teens, especially those nearing adulthood, asking for support can feel like failure, not relief. At Vista Clinic, many teens describe feeling relieved when they realize that needing help does not mean they are weak. It means they are human.
3. Identity Strain in a Comparison-Driven World
Today’s teens are forming identities in a world of constant comparison: academically, socially, physically, and digitally. Social media amplifies the sense that everyone else is coping better, achieving more, and feeling happier. This can create a quiet but persistent belief: “Something must be wrong with me.”
Unchecked, that belief can become dangerous.
The Subtle Signals Adults Often Overlook
Teen distress doesn’t always look dramatic. It often shows up as:
Withdrawal without obvious sadness
Perfectionism and fear of disappointing others
Emotional numbness rather than visible distress
Reluctance to talk about the future
A sudden insistence on handling everything alone
These signs are easy to miss, especially in teens who are high-functioning or responsible.
What Actually Helps: Practical, Human-Centered Prevention
Shift the Question
Instead of “Are you okay?” try: “What’s been weighing on you lately?”
This invites honesty rather than a reflexive “I’m fine.”
Normalise Emotional Language
Teens are more likely to speak when feelings are treated as normal, not problems to be fixed.
Simple statements like: “That sounds really hard.” “It makes sense you’d feel this way.” can open doors.
Create Predictable Points of Connection
Consistency matters more than intensity. Regular check-ins, shared routines, and calm presence build safety over time.
Acknowledge Digital Stress
Online experiences shape real emotions. Asking about social media pressures shows teens that their world is being taken seriously.
Professional Support Matters – Especially Early
For some teens, support from family and school is not enough. Early professional intervention can prevent a crisis from becoming a tragedy. At Vista Clinic, we admit and support teens 16 years and older, offering structured, compassionate, and evidence-based mental health care. Our multidisciplinary team understands the complexity of adolescence and works alongside young people and their families to restore stability, dignity, and hope.
Seeking help is not a last resort — it is a protective step.
A Different Way to Think About Prevention
Teen suicide prevention isn’t only about watching for danger signs. It’s about creating environments where teens don’t feel they have to hide their pain in the first place. When we listen differently, respond with empathy, and take emotional distress seriously (even when it’s quiet) we move closer to real prevention.
This Teen Suicide Prevention Week, let’s remember: Not all suffering is loud. Not all strength is visible. And asking for help can be the bravest step a teen takes.
Concerned About a Teen’s Mental Health?
If you’re worried about a young person in your life, early support can make a meaningful difference.
Vista Clinic admits teens aged 16 and older and offers professional, compassionate mental health care in a safe and supportive environment.
We live in a world where almost everything we see online looks real – sometimes too real. Perfect faces. Perfect bodies. Perfect lives. Viral videos that seem impossible. News stories that feel shocking. Voices that sound familiar. But more and more of what we consume on our screens is created, edited or enhanced by artificial intelligence (AI). And while AI brings exciting opportunities, it also quietly affects how we think, feel, compare ourselves, and trust what we see.
So how does this impact our mental health – and how can we protect ourselves?
When Reality Gets Blurred
AI can now:
Create realistic photos of people who don’t exist
Generate videos of people saying things they never said
Edit bodies, faces and environments to look “perfect”
Write convincing fake news and stories
Mimic voices of loved ones or public figures
This makes it harder than ever to tell what’s real and what’s not.
Our brains are wired to trust what we see. When our eyes tell us something is real, our emotions respond as if it is real – even if logically we know it might be fake.
This can create confusion, mistrust, anxiety and self-doubt.
The Hidden Mental Health Effects
1. Comparison and Self-Esteem
When AI-generated bodies, faces and lifestyles flood our feeds, we compare ourselves to an impossible standard.
This can lead to:
Low self-esteem
Body image struggles
Feeling “not good enough”
Increased anxiety and depression
We forget that many of these images were never human to begin with.
2. Anxiety and Mistrust
If videos, voices and photos can be faked, we start questioning everything.
This can create:
Fear of being deceived
Difficulty trusting information
Paranoia or constant doubt
Emotional exhaustion from overthinking
Our nervous system is not built for a world where reality feels uncertain.
3. Information Overload and Burnout
AI makes content faster, louder and more addictive. Algorithms push emotionally charged posts because they grab attention.
This can cause:
Constant scrolling and overstimulation
Difficulty switching off
Sleep problems
Mental fatigue and burnout
Our minds need rest – but the digital world never sleeps.
How Do We Tell the Difference?
While AI is becoming more advanced, there are still clues:
Look for unnatural facial expressions or blinking
Check for strange hands, fingers or body proportions
Watch for voices that sound slightly robotic or emotionless
Be cautious of shocking stories without credible sources
Reverse image search when something feels “off”
Follow trusted, verified news platforms
And most importantly: pause before reacting emotionally.
If something triggers strong fear, anger or excitement — that’s often when manipulation is most effective.
What Can We Do to Protect Our Mental Health?
1. Practice Digital Mindfulness
Be aware of how content makes you feel. If you notice anxiety, comparison or overwhelm, log off and reset.
2. Limit Your Screen Time
Set boundaries:
No scrolling before bed
Take regular social media breaks
Replace scrolling with movement, nature or real connection
3. Remember: Not Everything Is Real
That perfect body? AI. That flawless skin? Filters. That viral video? Possibly generated.
Real life is beautifully imperfect and that’s what makes it human.
4. Talk About It
Share your concerns with friends, family or a mental health professional. You are not alone in feeling overwhelmed by this new digital world.
5. Strengthen Your Real-World Identity
Invest in relationships, hobbies, exercise, creativity and rest. The stronger your real-world foundation, the less power digital illusions have over you.
The Takeaway
AI is not the enemy, but unconscious consumption is.
We are entering a new era where seeing is no longer believing. Our mental health now depends on awareness, boundaries, and compassion for ourselves.
In a world of artificial perfection, choose real connection. In a world of fake stories, choose truth. In a world of endless noise, choose your peace.
Your mind deserves safety, clarity and rest.
At Vista Clinic, we continuously educate both our staff and patients about the risks and potential dangers of artificial intelligence from believing everything we see online to clicking on suspicious links or trusting unverified content.
To bring this message home in a memorable (and light-hearted) way, our HR Department creatively produced an AI-generated video. The goal was not only to give everyone a good laugh, but also to highlight just how realistic AI content can look and why staying alert, questioning what we see, and thinking before we click is more important than ever.
Living with Schizophrenia is not easy. It is not something that can be wished away. As we have just celebrated awareness of Schizophrenia in the last few days, we realize that for many people living with Schizophrenia, it’s about accepting, learning how to live with and guiding others about the mental illness which is often greatly misunderstood.
A young lady shares her story:
“I knew something was wrong – I just did not know exactly what. It felt like I was losing myself. I felt so out of touch with myself, almost as if I was watching myself doing things but not really feeling anything. I was so scared that others will notice too, so I started withdrawing from my friends. Later I did not bother to spend time with my parents or siblings as I preferred staying indoors and preferably in my room all by myself.
I finally went to see my doctor where we ticked all the boxes: showing signs of delusion (I constantly believed someone was out to “get” me); hallucinations (I heard voices and at first it was just mild but it became more prominent over time); disorganized speech (I constantly embarrassed myself in meetings by responding with completely unrelated answers); withdrawal (I became scared of myself as I was not sure what I would respond like in different situations and stayed away from friends, family and colleagues in order not to embarrass myself). I stopped playing hockey and lost complete interest in playing chess and used a back injury as an excuse not to engage in my favourite sport.
I remember the day I shared with my parents that I sought professional help because I was just not feeling myself. My mom looked at me in utter shock while my dad pretended that he did not hear me at all. I realised that my relationships will be affected with my diagnosis and that I may need to prepare myself for a lot of explanation and knowledge about what I am going through.
Two years down the line, I am still here. Some days are better than others, but I have learnt with the necessary support and most importantly taking care of myself is so important. I see my doctor every month, I use my medication as prescribed. I have the most amazing Psychologist who helped me through the most difficult time of just accepting my illness and to even explain to my family about Schizophrenia and how it impacts our lives. I have joined a support group and don’t feel ready yet to play hockey again but I do enjoy a game of chess here and there. I had to take some time off work once or twice, but I pace myself and it is going much better now that I am using medication suited for me and working from home on the days that I don’t feel so good. I could laugh and debunk the myth of “people with Schizophrenia are dangerous” when my little niece came with a plastic sword and armour to protect herself from me because she heard from school that people with Schizophrenia can be very dangerous. I assured her that the only thing I needed was for her to still love me and support me and be understanding of what I may be going through”.
Upon concluding my interaction with this young lady, the best advice she shared was getting support from her doctor, Psychologist, family, friends and those going through a similar experience. She emphasized how important it is to take her medication regularly so that she can stick to her routine on a daily basis. She shared that she was never someone who exercised regularly or was too bothered with eating healthy. This all changed once she learnt that all those healthy habits lifted her mood and gave her courage to get through the day step by step and little by little. In therapy she learnt how to relax more, how to challenge irrational thoughts and also how to journal if things became just too much for her.
Schizophrenia is a complex mental illness which impacts people’s entire lives. It has been found that factors like genetics, environmental factors and brain chemistry contributes to the development of Schizophrenia. The best we can do is to try and understand and support those living with the illness in order to maintain healthy relationships with the individual and provide them with the opportunity to still live a good quality life.
