Euphoria is a groundbreaking series that reflects on the lives of teenagers in today's society. It puts an extra focus on analyzing the mental health of the show’s characters with a variety of situations influencing their mental health. It’s getting a massive audience that even crashed HBO for the viewing of the first episode of the second season.
**SPOILERS AHEAD IF YOU HAVE NOT WATCHED EUPHORIA SEASON 1 AND THE FIRST 3 EPISODES OF SEASON 2**
Anchor Therapy is a counseling center in Hoboken, NJ with psychotherapists specialized in helping children, teens, adults, and couples with anxiety, depression, relationship issues, trauma, and life transitions. Anchor Therapy is accepting new clients and is now providing in-person sessions and telehealth (video/phone) sessions to residents of New Jersey and New York.
Euphoria brings to light numerous issues in today's society, including drug abuse, domestic violence, sexual identities, anxiety, depression, and complicated relationships. It shows raw, provoking scenes in order to break through society’s tendency of using overly-positive language, instead of realistic dialogue, regarding mental health struggles. Euphoria highlights how younger generations are now more exposed to traumatic situations at such young ages.
Traumatic events are incidents that can leave lasting effects on someone's mental health. This can lead to Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), which many of the characters are experiencing in Euphoria.
Symptoms of PTSD include:
Re-experiencing type symptoms
Reliving the event
Flashbacks
Triggers
Nightmares
Avoidance
Staying busy
Cognitive and mood symptoms
Depression
Anxiety
Hypervigilance
Feeling on edge
Rue’s Mental Health:
The main character Rue faces many struggles throughout the series. She is recovering from a drug addiction that caused her to overdose. Rue was then able to get sober for a while, but she recently relapsed. The show gives us insight into what goes through her head when she is put in different, stressful situations. The theme that recurs in her situation is that she doesn’t care about her life, or have the desire to be alive. Rue has been through an extensive amount of traumatic situations at a young age, such as the death of her father and being prescribed many medications for mental health disorders. These situations caused her to grow up faster than she should have and ignited her struggles with drug addiction. The traumatic events that she faced shaped who she became and the way that she viewed the world. She could no longer be optimistic in her current mental state.
Nate’s Mental Health:
Nate Jacobs is the antagonist throughout the series. Nate is a very aggressive and manipulative character within almost all of his portrayed relationships. We are first introduced to him by his relationship with Maddy which grows extremely toxic in the first season. Nate is known for severely attacking a man then making the victim confess to a crime he did not commit, stalking and harassing other characters, and being physically harmful.
We learn that this behavior has been developing from a young age because of issues with his father. We learn that Mr. Jacobs, Nate’s father, secretly records himself having sexual intercourse with different men which Nate had discovered at a very young age. This trauma causes him to adopt negative behaviors against those with authority, those he views as potential “threats,” and women. In other words, the relationship with his father deeply affected the way he acts and views the world while also giving him narcissistic characteristics. In many scenes, it is evident that Mr. Jacobs' personality is reflected in his son. Nate also has the pressure of keeping all of his dad's secrets from the community and even his mom. This puts Nate under a tremendous amount of stress, leading to his abusive behavior towards the women in his life, like his ex-girlfriend Maddy.Nate is also a master manipulator in many instances, being especially evident in the new season.
Cassie’s Mental Health:
Cassie Howard is another character experiencing mental health issues and trauma of her own which Nate uses to his advantage. Her father abandoned her when she was a young girl due to his drug addiction and gave her false hope he would return. Furthermore, she was mistreated by every man in her life but felt that she loved them all. She also made a major life decision, having an abortion at the end of last season. While under the influence of alcohol, Cassie stated, “I keep making mistakes and not learning from them” while talking to Nate which made him excited. The two end up having sex even though he previously dated Cassie’s best friend, Maddy. Due to this incident, Cassie goes through a depressive state due to the guilt and feeling of being a “bad person,” however still looks to Nate for the love and attention she wants. He reciprocates, but also says to Cassie “How are you ever going to look Maddy in the eye again?” while being intimate. He also said to her if Maddy found out, she would kill Cassie. This statement depicts his manipulative manner because he knows Cassie will think the situation is solely her fault, but she does not have the strength to leave it. Instead, it makes her more dependent on Nate. Cassie is reliant on Nate for many reasons. Not only does Cassie not want Maddy to find out about her and Nate’s relationship, but she also feels too guilty to reconcile with her ex-boyfriend and she does not have a stable family life. This all causes Cassie a lot of stress which causes her to obsess over her new relationship with Nate.
Fez’s Mental Health:
Another prominent character in the show is Fez, a friend of Rue’s who sells drugs. He and Rue have a close relationship even though Rue struggles with drug addiction. Fez was raised by his grandmother who was involved in criminal activity as well. Fez has a younger brother named Ash who followed in the family’s footsteps as a drug dealer.
The series shows how Fez was exposed to this lifestyle at a young age, explaining why he followed this path. Fez is the primary guardian of his little brother so he has the pressure of keeping their family afloat with finances. Fez and Ash had to become adults before their time because their parents were not responsible or active in their lives. When Nate gives Rue and her friends problems, Fez steps into the ‘big brother’ role to protect them. When the situation doesn’t go as Fez planned and Nate continues to harass his friends, Fez gets violent with Nate, almost beating him to death. From Fez’s traumatic and violent upbringing, violence is all he knows to solve problems.
All of these characters have different backgrounds and unique issues that they face, but the viewers connect with the characters and their struggles. This show is meant for a mature audience because of its language and sexual images, but it aids tremendously in erasing the mental health stigma by creating an open platform for discussion. The show is eye-opening to the viewers and allows fans to see parts of themselves in the show’s characters. As a society, we know that some children are exposed to trauma at a very young age. The show does a great job of showing how one’s mental health can be affected by childhood experiences, providing flashbacks to the characters’ childhoods. By Euphoria making these characters relatable, the audience feels connected and is reminded that they are not alone in their mental health struggles.
Mary Mayo
is a first year intern with Anchor Therapy. She is graduating from the University of Delaware in the Spring as a senior with a degree in Human Services.
