This Mental Health Simulation was very informational and helpful. I have never interviewed a patient who was suicidal, had depression, or anxiety to the extent that these patients had. At first, I was scared to talk to them because I didn’t know what to ask them. I wanted this exercise to be successful and non-intrusive. I know it can be hard to talk other people about struggles you may be going through but I think that once I figured out how to ask questions without being too intrusive, there was very effective communication. There weren’t any specific challenges that I did not anticipate but I think that this was a very rewarding and eye opening exercise. Going into this, I knew there was going to be real life actors and I wasn’t sure whether they would portray the diagnoses of these people with these diagnoses but they were really good at acting. I learned that a lot of the mental health nursing process is about observation. You have to really observe your patient because their appearance, their behavior, their mood and affect, and thought process are some of the most insightful things about a patient. You can figure so much out about a person just by looking at them and listening to how they talk. Now I feel able to talk patients with these diagnoses. During my Mental Health Observation day, I talked to a woman who had schizophrenia but during this time I couldn’t tell that she had schizophrenia. The only thing I noticed that was strange about her was that the stories she was telling me about her life differed from her chart. Both the observation day and the simulation day, helped me get a glimpse to what real life patients would look like and how to respond to them and engage in an effective way.