How to fill in the content of mental health files

The information is authentic and traceable, the content is suitable for the purpose of the file, and the privacy boundaries are clear. There is no need to deliberately create a "completely healthy" perfect fake file, and there is no need to fill in all private psychological-related experiences without reservation.

When I worked as a psychology teacher in a middle school two years ago, I met a boy who was in his second year of high school. When he was filling out the file for screening at the school, he was afraid that he would be labeled as having a "psychological problem" by his classmates and teachers. This caused him to suffer from insomnia, inability to concentrate, and even occasional suicidal thoughts that had lasted for more than two months. The condition of his head was all filled with "none". By the time the class teacher found traces of self-mutilation on his arms and found him, his depression had reached a level that required medication intervention. If we had filled in the file truthfully when filling out the file, we would have intervened in advance to provide counseling, and it would not have developed to such a serious level.

But conversely, it does not mean that everything should be written down. When the community was doing psychological consultation for the elderly living alone, a new social worker did not understand the confidentiality rules and directly filled in the content of an aunt in private that "sometimes I feel that life is boring" in the public community ledger. Later, when the building team leader came to visit, he accidentally let it slip. The aunt felt that the entire community knew that she was "unable to think about it." She refused to answer the community's psychological service calls for half a year, but instead closed herself off even more. In fact, files for different purposes have completely different contents. If it is a regular psychological screening file for schools or units, you only need to fill in objective information related to the current status - such as whether you have been depressed for more than two weeks, sleeping or eating abnormally in the past six months, whether you have been diagnosed with a mental illness, and what you are taking. Related drugs, and core information such as whether immediate family members have relevant genetic medical history are enough. If the other party has not explicitly requested it or signed a formal confidentiality agreement with you about particularly personal content such as childhood trauma and special emotional experiences, you don’t need to take the initiative to mention it. This is not called non-cooperation, but is responsible for your own privacy.

Nowadays, the industry has different views on the collection scale of psychological files. One group believes that the more detailed the information is collected, the higher the accuracy will be when providing you with psychological services. Another group believes that excessive collection of sensitive information will increase the risk of leakage and make people afraid to tell the truth. So before you fill it out, you can ask more about "Who can check this file in the future, how long it will be kept, and what it is mainly used for." Once you have figured it out, it is not too late to start writing.

In addition, don’t think that it’s finalized once you fill it out once. Your mental state is inherently changing. You may have had test anxiety when you filled it out last year, but you have adjusted it this year. You can change it when you update your file next time. Don’t let the old tags follow you all the time. There was an Internet employee who came for consultation before. When he was hired, he truthfully filled in that he had suffered from mild depression and had recovered. Later, during the annual psychological screening, he forgot to update this part of the content. HR even talked to him specifically to talk to him because he was worried that he would be too stressed by the project. In fact, he had already recovered well, and he went back to provide an update to resolve the misunderstanding.

To put it bluntly, this file is like your mental "health manual". The core is to facilitate yourself and the psychologist you are in contact with to understand your status. There is no need to put too much psychological burden on you. Just fill it out truthfully and as needed.