On Tuesday Dec 5, the Grand Rapids Community College Campus Activities Board (CAB) hosted “Stressed AF”, a discussion on anxiety, stress, and mental health led by Educational Speaker Patrick MacIntyre.
MacIntyre’s presentation featured an interactive stress panel in which he asked students to volunteer and play brain stress exercises to practice their stress management.
One of the interactive exercises was for two people to speak into microphones. As a form of improvisation (improv), you were supposed to finish a sentence with the catch of saying only one word per sentence. For example, “The Lions will hopefully win the Super Bowl,” and as said one person can only say the first, third, fifth, and so on words while the second person says the second, fourth, and sixth word.
After the session, MacIntyre talked about the purpose of Stressed AF.
“The whole point is to be able to give everybody an idea of how stress works in your body,” MacIntyre said. “…So you’re aware of it, and then give you actionable steps to mitigate the effects stress has, to reduce it, not get rid of it, but just how to learn to live happily with the stress, because we have to, can’t get rid of it.”
MacIntyre says that he has been speaking at colleges for almost 20 years and doing stress shows for about two years now.
In the discussion, MacIntyre shared that 75% of mental health issues begin by age 24, 39% of college students experience a significant mental health issue and eight out of 10 college students experience frequent bouts of stress. Anxiety is defined as sudden overwhelming fear for no reason, extreme difficulty in concentrating or staying still, or drastic changes in mood, behavior, personality or sleeping habits.
MacIntyre also talked about U.S. suicide rates. It is the 11th leading cause of death for all age groups in 2021, the second leading cause of death in people between the ages of 10-34, and the leading cause of death for veterans and active-duty service members.
Statistically, one person dies every eleven minutes from suicide, 12.3 million people seriously thought about suicide, 3.5 million people made a plan for suicide and 1.7 million people attempted suicide. Factors of suicide include depression, loss of friend, family member, job, traumatic brain injury, or post tramatic stress disorder (PSTD). Other factors include substance abuse, being deployed, not being deployed and stressful events with a feeling of loss.
When talking to someone wanting to attempt or having feelings of suicide, MacIntyre said it’s best to talk to them correctly by asking open ended questions, show that you are listening, accept what they say without agreeing or disagreeing and acknowledge their courage to talk about it.
MacIntyre also shared resources in case of a mental health crisis or other emergency situations including:
Trevor Project LGBTQ+ Crisis Hotline: Text: HOME to 741741
Mental Health and Suicide Prevention Hotline: Dial 988
Emergency Services: Dial 911
Collegiate Reporter Kevin Lopez contributed to this story.
