Hiding in Plain Sight: Youth Mental Illness

Maclayn explains how simple, everyday interactions sparked pronounced feelings of sadness and anxiety in him as early as the third grade. “Random things that just happened throughout my day. Things like if somebody smiled at me and I didn't smile back. I just started feeling different from all my other friends and like, my crowd.”

“I always felt like I needed to hide something.. I had so much that I was hiding from everybody,” Lydia says of the constant fear of having her drug use discovered – and how punishments like getting grounded or having her phone taken away had little effect. “Nothing was enough to stop me from taking what I wanted.”

Leah explains how her depression and anxiety led her down a familiar path. “We tried smoking weed. We tried doing Xanax, and our classmate had cocaine. The fact that I told myself I never wanted to be my mother, and then here I was on my way to being my mother.”

We all deal with things in different ways. And we're all introduced to different things. Maybe it was an initial choice, or maybe it wasn't your choice. But the continued use and overuse of things like prescription drugs, exercise, even porn becomes self-medication – coping mechanisms that make it hard to imagine living without.

The US is in an ongoing crisis. Young people all across the country have been swept into addiction, with 50% of teens saying that they’ve misused a drug at least once.

“The things my ancestors went through, it’s shown through alcohol abuse, addictions, non-stable families, toxic relationships… That’s the burden that indigenous youth deal with every day.” Alexis discusses the generational trauma and stigma associated with being an indigenous person in America.

Young people and their family and friends talk about how they came to acknowledge and accept the reality of their mental illnesses and, most importantly, start talking about them. They describe their work with providers to determine a diagnosis and the treatments they received, and the added stigma of racial or gender discrimination. Throughout, the young people inspire with their resilience.

Explores the traumas and triggers of more than twenty young people’s childhood and adolescent years — including the impact of stigma and social media. They find words to describe the symptoms of depression, anxiety, mania, eating disorders, addiction, self-harm, and suicide ideation. Their stories, with family and friends, demonstrate there are ways out of “the storm” of mental illness.

Follow the journeys of more than 20 young Americans from all over the country and all walks of life, who have struggled with thoughts and feelings that have troubled—and, at times—overwhelmed them. The film presents an unstinting look at both the seemingly insurmountable obstacles faced by those who live with mental disorders and the hope that many have found after that storm.

Ken Burns presents a major new public television documentary, Hiding in Plain Sight: Youth Mental Illness. The film gives voice to the experiences of young people who struggle with mental health challenges and focuses on the importance of awareness and empathy.