Mental illness isn’t a uniquely modern phenomenon. In fact, the ways in which modern cultures both understand and deal with mental illnesses have gone through a radical transformation.
In the earlier stages ( in USA ), people who had mental illnesses were placed in institutions that had similarities to jails. Once inside, they weren’t given the opportunity to leave, at all. Some facilities had terrible procedural rules that allowed people with illnesses to be treated in ways that were unspeakably cruel.Placing the mentally ill in facilities allowed the rest of the community to ignore the problem. If a person was placed a in an institution like so, they may not have come back to visit or shared stories of any visits they did make. The people just seemed to disappear. But this began to change in the late 1880s, due to the work of a writer named Nelly Bly. She posed as a mentally ill woman and she documented everything that happened to her. There afterwards was turned into a book.
In the early part of the 1900s, experts began to try to understand what might make a person behave in an such a way, and what kinds of thoughts and opinions they may possess. Sigmund Freud developed a number of theories and he created therapies that aimed to help people who might once have been placed in one of the torturous facilities. So practitioners began dabbling in radical cures in the 1930s. Examples being electroshock therapy and insulin induced comas. Hoping to eliminate mental illnesses altogether with one big gesture as Freud was taking time to come up with a solid resolution.
Nowadays, services are available to provide people with the help they need to manage their conditions. It’s clear that people have options for treatment today through community resources that didn’t exist a decade or so ago.
Mental Health Is Your Wealth 