Supporting Women’s Mental Health

Each year, the world celebrates International Women’s Day on March 8 to promote women’s rights, health and wellbeing. Officially, they day is meant to mark the progress make toward gender equality, while raising awareness of the challenges women continue to face around the world.

Mental Health
On of the challenges women face is mental health, including emotional, psychological, and social wellbeing. Many factors beyond genetics can affect a person’s mental health and wellbeing.

Social determinants of health
The conditions in which a person is born, grows, works, lives and ages – all contribute to their overall health and wellness. These social determinants of health encompass gender norms, roles and relations, as well as your financial wellbeing, and access to quality education and health care. In more cultures around the world, women continue to face greater challenges than men in each of these areas.

Women are more likely that men to:

• Experience physical and sexual abuse and violence
• Live in poverty
• Be unemployed or underemployed
• Be in lower-paying, high-stress jobs
• Hold fewer political, economic, social or cultural leadership and decision-making positions
• Have mental health concerns, including depression, anxiety, eating disorders and post-traumatic stress disorder.

This is all to say: While you likely cannot solve global systemic issues alone, you can help support the women in your life.