Film Analysis: The Day I Snapped

The Day I Snapped, this is a film that shows the stories of people who have been struggling with stress, tiredness and mental illness. The film portrays how they felt when they finally snapped. There are many men and women who are talked about throughout this film but I focused on two of them, one male and one female. Mike, is the male that has been working 14 hour days, not taking his meal breaks so that he is able to get more work done, he is very stress and tired, and just simply exhausted. These are all characteristics and actions that can lead to a mental illness.

While mike was working he would start to think that if he was to take a lunch break then people would think he wasn’t working enough, causing him to stop taking it and work straight through. This led to him becoming exhausted at work and because of that he was making more mistakes, then this led to him staying at work even longer each day to do the work that he needed to do and then fix the mistakes he had made on top of it. Mike was also struggling to balance his work and home life so he began to not want to go out or even hangout with his children. Then one day on the way to work he wasn’t feeling very well so he got off the train and got on a new one to come home because something just felt wrong. He then blacked out and when he woke up he was taken off the train, everyone thought he had a heart attack when in reality he was just overly stressed and they ended up calling it and executive burnout. His home doctor then put him on anti-depressants and told him he needed to be out of work for 6 months, but because his work wouldn’t allow this he ended up going back to work just after three weeks (Real Stories, 2017). Due to returning back to work so soon he was unable to cope and was dismissed from work. Mike is showing all of the symptoms that can be associated with a mental illness. He has high levels of stress and anxiety from work, he can’t balance his home and work life so he pushed his kids and wife away and they ended up leaving him, causing him to feel more stress, guilt, and feelings of inadequacy.

The next person that I looked at was a female, Linda, she was a social worker who wanted to do all of these nice things to help people but it was emotionally and physically exhausting for her. She was told to take time off from work and she did but she soon returned after only 8 weeks off. She has 10 years and more of experience but when she returned back to work the same man who she was trying to help get out of the hospital before she had left was still there. When she saw this she realized that she couldn’t do it anymore because she couldn’t even help this one old man. Linda was also struggling with getting out of bed in the morning and would argue with her husband and kids all the time for no reason at all and because of all of this she wished that she was dead. She was so set on death being the best option for her because there was no reason for her to even be living. So, one night she had some brandy and she took some pills trying to commit suicide, she then woke up in the hospital a day later furious that she was not dead. Linda shows all the signs of a mental illness (Real Stories, 2017). She is just stressed, emotionally and physically exhausted, and would rather be dead than alive. After she was released from the hospital, her children and husband were so traumatized and would always wonder if she was going to do this again and because they were all unable to cope they separated. Linda is now accepting that she will never be returning to work and is trying be a housewife and take care of her children. All of this could have been prevented if she would have just sought out help when she had the feeling of not wanted to be alive and feeling drained (Real Stories, 2017).

Recognizing Symptoms, this is a phase of becoming mentally ill, and this is what Mike started to see. He didn’t want to believe it but he was starting to see that he was pushing away his wife and kids and just simply being stressed out all the time. He would even snap on his children when they would ask him to do things like hangout with him. Mike also begins to show phase 5, rendering of accounts, when he checks himself out of the hospital. When this happens his wife has their family doctor come over and try to explain to him that he needs help but he refused to listen and believe it so he kept pushing it off. The doctor then prescribed him anti-depressants but after a little while he was experiencing phase 6, paradox of normalcy, with not knowing if the pills were actually working or not. He wanted to take himself off the pills because he thought they weren’t helping but didn’t just in case he needed them. This could be considered as phase 6 because the book reads, “should the mental disorder continue and the disordered persons accounts be rejected, the person will find that his or her madness will be normalized” (Cockerham, 2017). Him not wanting to take the medicine because he is debating if he is mentally ill or not could be seen as this phase just to a lesser extent. Linda, the other person that I looked at in this film also shows the phases of becoming mentally ill.

The main phase that I noticed right from the beginning is phase two, recognition symptoms. Linda notices that when she goes back to work that she is unable to perform the necessary job function that she needs to do with the elderly man in the hospital, because she believes her intelligence and thinking is just not there anymore, therefore, she leaves her job. Looking at all of the models that are used both Mike and Linda would best fit the sociological model, this is because this takes all of the social factors that are being contributed in the world around us besides just the basic criteria that needs to be met. Mikes symptoms of work and his work environment are definitely a main component of his mental illness and the same goes for Linda with her work environment causing a great deal of stress and that is why the sociological model will be the best fit for these two. Overall, I truly enjoyed viewing this film. It helped me too see how so many people are struggling with mental illnesses and the effects of not reaching out and asking for help. The film ended with such a great message and one that stuck with me. This woman said “everybody can find their way through” (Real Stories, 2017). This shows that there is hope out there for everyone and gives you this little take away message from the film.