The last spring month is memorable for its significant campaign called “Mental Health Awareness”. It was first celebrated in 1949 with the intention to convey an important message: people are not alone in their battle with mental health issues and they must be supported, not mistreated.
Mental health is associated with various spheres of our lives, including the surrogacy journey. Let’s deep-dive into the history behind this campaign and the importance of mental well-being while pursuing the surrogacy path.
Read this blog post and find out:
- How are Beers’ personal story and Mental Health Awareness campaign interrelated?
- What is the main topic of MHA Month 2022?
- Challenges for single parents and postpartum depression through the prism of mental health.
Origins of Mental Health Awareness Month
Mental Health Awareness Month is tightly connected with the name Clifford Whittingham Beers. This gentleman has a truly inspiring background story.
Beers was born in 1876 in Connecticut, and he had 4 siblings who all suffered from various kinds of mental illness. Naturally, all 5 kids including Clifford were admitted to medical institutions for receiving treatment. Here he came to a tremendous conclusion that the mental health field has room for maltreatment from the medical staff side.
Later on, Beers published a book “A mind that found itself” about his own experience of hospitalization and the abusive doctors’ attitude he faced. Fortunately, his voice was heard and a long reformation process in terms of mental health perception has begun.
This courageous fight for being treated as a human despite being mental health patient has laid a foundation for Mental Health Awareness Month.
Every MHA Month is Unique
There’s a tradition each year to choose a particular mental topic that will be addressed throughout the awareness month. This May the main focus is on the feeling of loneliness, its impact on our mental health, and how we can raise this issue publicly and help people surrounding us to feel less lonely.
Loneliness may seem not as serious as depression for example, but it indeed negatively affects millions of people throughout the globe every year and provokes issues with mental health. According to the 2020 Cigna report, three in five Americans (61%) report feeling lonely and the tendency is even growing.
World Center of Baby also deals with the loneliness of particular intended parents who may not receive proper support from their family concerning the choice to opt for surrogacy or who think that their marital status or gender might be a serious barrier on the way to joyful parenthood. Either way, our skillful psychological staff stands on guard for your mental health and tries its best to support you on each stage of the surrogacy journey.
Single Parenting Issues
When we speak about loneliness, we cannot avoid mentioning single parents and their path to receiving a child through surrogacy. Without a doubt, it takes a great deal of bravery to decide to have kids without a life partner on your own. At World Center of Baby we believe that you may or may not be single by choice, but becoming a parent is completely your choice.
Our team deeply understands that a single parent might experience extreme loneliness while selecting the right fertility clinic, finding a reliable egg/sperm donor, immersing in surrogacy regulation for single parents, and trying to calculate all possible risks. Adding to that, all expenses and further financial maintenance of a child purely lie on your shoulders.
It may seem that you are indeed paving the way to your dream alone. So we are here to remind you that WCOB can help you make your choice to become a parent in the easiest way possible. Here our skilled specialists tackle each IP situation as unique and offer the smoothest way out based on your particular circumstances. It goes without saying that we establish trust with intended parents by sharing risks and leading the path to a brighter future together, shoulder to shoulder.
Surrogacy & Mental Health
Surrogacy journey and mental health are in fact interrelated. Some surrogate mothers might face postpartum depression whereas intended parents may experience anxiety disorders when e.g. the first IVF attempt isn’t successful.
Although World Center of Baby, fortunately, hasn’t dealt with such occurrences, our experienced medical team is always here for the sake of IPs to ensure that they are mentally prepared for the surrogacy journey. We also cater to the psychological needs of our surrogates so they can make a smooth transition to their daily life after helping a struggling couple to receive a child.
In the honor of Mental Health Awareness, please don’t forget the significance of not overlooking your mental problems and talking about them because there are always people nearby who are ready to hear your story and offer a hand of help.
