Pressure point

Experts say we need to know how many young people are being driven to desperation - by the pressures of modern life.--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

It's after warnings that there's a big gap in the data, that charities and services need, to work out how to deliver help.

Judith Robertson is the Programme Director for SeeMe Scotland:

Data is expected to be published by the Government in 2016, but there are calls to find out about the scale of the problem now.

Claire is 33. She suffers from depression and has done since the age of 13.---------------------------------------------------------------------------

She struggled through school and then university, while battling an eating disorder, and coping with self-harming.

She spoke to us:

"In 2006, one of my close friends committed suicide and I think that was a big wake-up call for me as well that I needed to change what I was doing. It’s taken a long long time. It’s like, I’m not at the point where someday I would say I’ll never ever going to do it again, and every so often I do relapse.”

"Nobody within my class had any experience with mental health issues maybe like they just wouldn’t admit to it, so it was very lonely and very isolating because I didn’t have anyone to talk to, nobody knew what to do. Even the teachers were kind of a bit puzzled didn’t know how to handle it.”

"The way that I was spoken to wasn’t the same as if I’d gone in for a broken leg or something. They were very critical of me and I kind of felt like just wasting their time and feeling like they could have been better doing something else rather than having to patch me up for something I’d done to myself.”

Now, we're launching our own investigation into the pressures on young people, and the affect it has on their state of mind.

Head to our survey page, to be a part of it.

You can hear an interview with Brian Donnelly from the Respect Me Scotland charity below.

You can also listen to Claire’s full story…