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Mental Health Week this year runs from Sunday 9 Oct - Saturday 15 Oct.
The aim of the week is to raise awareness and reduce stigma of mental health.
I often wonder if the "general public" are aware that it's Mental Health Week, it seems to get a lot of air time, but am I only noticing because of my involvement with the mental health sector..
I'm keen to hear from you -
Do you think it's effective?
If you could change one misconception about mental illness, what would it be?
If you missed out on our Smashing Stigma webinar featuring SANE Australia speakers, you can find it here. You can also watch Dov's inspiring story and hope for greater awareness about mental illness below.
I am annoyed to see emphasis placed, yet again, so strongly on us asking ourselves to 'speak out more/ better, you can't get help if we can't heaaaar yoooouuuu'.
Yeah. About that. Open your freaking eyes and ears. Be open, as family, friends,colleagues,teachers, shoppers in the market. Be open about listening, and caring, without judgement.
I am so tired of hearing that stigma begins with internalised fear of ourselves. It is a fear of ANYONE mentally ill. And we know everyone feels the same. Therefore, we know that if we speak out, we will be left out, feared, tossed aside. Society as a whole does not know how to listen without judgement,does not know how to ask why their sister or friend just acted so strangely and hurtful. We go, "oh, well they aren't worth having around!!" and regardless of how much that person has been valuable and supportive in the past, we abandon them. It's the same reason domestic violence has become such an insidious and prevalent ailment in society. We DO see people when they get ill or controlled by external influences. We DO see people get emotional and raw. We don't know how to act in any way other than judgement. I am no saint, there are times I have too.
It's like, R U OK poster still on fridge at work. It says all the right things, but is my wider workplace, and wider society, understanding or seeing the instances in which they have and do judge? Everytime a child dies of domestic violence or neglect, the news media encourage community rage and judgement against the parents. We know their names. Often where they were living!! But do we know that family's intimate history? Do we hear how that mother or father may have been suffering? And too damn scared to acknowledge it, for fear of society's judgement upon their choice to become a parent? "Oh all these people in the world who can't have kids, and these other people should never have been allowed to!!!" Don't we all know that mental illness doesn't discriminate?? That hormonal changes in pregnancy make mothers in particular,vulnerable to feelings and struggles that weren't there before?? Why is it so hard to mourn and be devastated for those kids, and to want better for them, seek justice, AND seek justice for whatever struggles the parent went through? Are we saying that there are just that many psychopaths among us, and there is no help to solve that, that we just clean up the mess and hate on them? Is it so hard to understand that when experiencing thoughts or tactile feedback not grounded in reality, does not immediately make one fearful or angry? That maybe finding yourself all alone with it each day, gives food to paranoia and heightened emotional response? That having people around us we can trust, and that don't judge, are so valuable, and that for some, arguably many, with psychotic symptoms, the judgement and ostracisation from society is more scary and hurtful than thoughts that are invasive or coming to beleive you are an ethereal pixie beyond pollutants and chemicals and atoms, that can call upon the room to spin and float you up. Because as frustrating as it was that no one was allowing me to starve my way pure, it had nothing on how scared and angry I get now,as a parent, struggling to find a psych who will not dismiss my previous diagnosis and psychotic experience, and simply say 'you are fine now? What you want me for?'. How about, so that I simply have eyes on me and support systems and mechanisms in place to best provide for my kids if I was ever to get that sick again?
WHY IS THAT SO HARD???
So whenever I see those news stories and the lynching they incite, I get scared and doubt my worth, doubt my parenting, encourage food for invasive thoughts to snack on.
I say campaigns that depict what happens, and what the alternative, less judgement, looks like.
Also, I feel mental illness is like on of the least considered intersections when it comes to social justice movements. We need to jump in on that. I have been. It's empowering to have your eyes widened, to see how systemic oppression works to make sure we are not cared for. To have words to put to abuse and oppression we suffer: gaslighting, silencing (this is so prevalent, SANE does well to have peer written articles. But how many other organisations speak for us without consultation, and in process drowning out and watering down our voices and direct experience??), tone policing (helloooo psychiatrist! Looking at you!! Hello friends in school,looking at you! Partner, I love you, but looking at you! I imagine those with BPD cop this. Me, i cop "just tell me more nicely and I will help!!" while i'm screaming inside and feeling like you need to tear your skin off to feel less floaty and urgent! Meanwhile, I told you all week that I was struggling to cope with a, b, and c!!
Anyway. So I hate 'the big stigma' teardown campaign. I dislike the male campaign at the moment as it targets the victims, rather than asking society to accept men have freaking emotions, allow for that and listen without judgement.
And as for campaign awareness days and weeks, it's wasted money unless you have a budget mahoosive enough to drown out the rest of the organisations vying for that space. It's a flooded market.
In response to: Re: Is Mental Health Week effective?
Unknown userMember
Re: Is Mental Health Week effective?
I can see where you are coming .All I see in the human race is a bunch of hypocrites.I went for a job interview in June the interviewer stated how the workplace was high in respect,integrity , workplace bullying.I had a medical,and another "functional"fitness test.I came out of the functional test with employees sitting there who I said "hello"to.One followed me out the door stating he was getting a bandaid for the tester who had cut herself.He waited until he got me outside to abuse me stating that I was doing more than 20 kms when I entered the site.It was 1.5 hours,before and I couldn't remember and apologized if I did but he was too busy giving me a lecture as he had premeditated this sitting there waiting for me to come out of my test.I was greatly disturbed by this and knew I couldn't work there.Sent a email ,got a phone call stating I failed the third test.The way this employee was I was distressed when I left there and knew he would be riding me if I returned.I knew with my problems I could not work there as I left a workplace 4 years ago after 20 years due to being bullied day before my 40th.He could've said it in a respectful way,I felt like a w****,and at the age of 44 I'm not a young noon.As a visitor to the site it was disgusting.So yes,all the policies workplaces have on bullying,respect are not practiced which is sad.Yes you can see the hypocrisy in Mental Health,Week,Suicide Prevention,RU OK?because there is a bastardization that occurs in society in many ways.
I made my decision,4 years ago when I went downhill (lol) with anxiety/depression if I take my life and I told my mother the other day to remind her that it is my wish that I don't want a funeral service or family,I don't want anyone having the hide to cry due to the trauma I have experienced from friends and family and people in general.Im not doing this to hurt anyone,but I have been so sickened with the hypocrisy I have seen.This might be disturbing to many but I don't have kids or a partner and have been alienated from people for the past few years due to m.i., and unemployment. I'm not saying I don't talk to people but I avoid those that I know are not genuine,are gossips,or who I know can't wait to put their judgemental views on you.I am sick from those who have put me down in my lifetime to make themselves feel good.Its pathetic.I don't want these kind of people at my funeral in a small town there is plenty of them.My psychologist challenges thoughts like these,state you can't stop people gossiping after I told her that I have had to tell 3 women off who come up asking invasive questions,and knowing they are not genuine but pure gossips.I told the psychologist I have a right to privacy,she couldn't see where I was coming from yet in the previous session stated she doesn't put things on her Facebook page due to clients googling her.What is the difference to what I said about my right to non disclosure of my life? Hypocrisy? Therefore her notes on me are flawed?
It's like "getting help",which can be a violating process,with notes written by these so called experts that you wonder are helping you but their own pockets and egos.In January a doctor read out the mental health nurse wrote about me that I "lacked intimate relationships".A doctor had re out this to me before and I felt humiliated and embarrassed and wondered how this was helping me.Plus to me ,if you are going to read out notes to the client make sure they were with the client being the reader in mind.Needless to say I left,wrote a text to the Mental Health Nurse the next morning who I had a lot of respect for after being with him for over 3 years, in which I stated what I just said about humiliation.I went shopping,pullled up in my garage and had police and then Ambulance.I had to defend myself,cop treated me like a criminal .They could see I was OK, mind you I covered myself.I found a psychologist two months later,but have not got much faith in anyone.Duty of care leaves a lot to be desired.
So yes,you can see Mental Health Week with its flaws like everything else in life...
In response to: Re: Is Mental Health Week effective?
Unknown userMember
Re: Is Mental Health Week effective?
In response to: Is Mental Health Week effective?
Unknown userMember
Re: Is Mental Health Week effective?
Hi'@sehnsucht and @Former-Member thankyou for both of your posts . Agree with so much and loved it all written out so honestly. Too exhausted and can't think straight enough to formulate a proper reply.. But wanted you to know I've read your posts. Lj
In response to: Re: Is Mental Health Week effective?
SehnsuchtSenior Contributor
Re: Is Mental Health Week effective?
Lisajane,
Hope you find some rest. Hugs!
Back here today, to give feedback that today's Facebook post from Sane is so amazing. Not just the debunking violence myth (I dream of one day being able to disclose shizoaffective in order to recieve help, not prejudice!), but the comment with link to an amazing read on how to be helpful and address stigma of male conversations. Unlike everything else I had read this week, the message that as a community or friend or colleague we need to be vocal about our doors being open and listening ears on, so much this. More of the like, please!
I know I complain a lot when organisations victim blame and dismiss and the like, and Sane isn't immune to doing this from time to time, but on the whole the reason I follow Sane as an organisation and participate in these forums, is because you are listening. Peer written articles, amplifying the voices of those with lived experience, this alone is such a BIG difference. It really is appreciated. x
In response to: Is Mental Health Week effective?
espritSenior Contributor
Re: Is Mental Health Week effective?
I wish they would report on the systems on place to help people who suffer from mental illness. Lots of our community are the most vulnerable. Talk is cheap do something constructive. They could look at how public hospitals can help in crisis more effectively. What about the cost of psychology sessions. Ect ect.
In response to: Re: Is Mental Health Week effective?
Unknown userMember
Re: Is Mental Health Week effective?
Yes,pity we can't practice what we preach.Mental Health Week is a "pleasant,non-confronting, comfortable"way to approach and make society aware of mental health issues .We put trust in a system that often fails individuals with devastating consequences due to its flaws.We can only hope it has helped people in dilemma or distress about their own mental health or concern over someone they love.
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