Checking in with mentally ill friend can be critical
People need support as well as treatment, say Rahul Sharma and Austin Mardon.
In any given year, 20 per cent of the Canadian population experiences mental illness. These people are sons, daughters, mothers, fathers and colleagues.
Even the most experienced caretakers know that dealing with individuals with mental illness can be tricky. Their emotional fragility often culminates into outbursts that can sever their closest relationships if the illness is severe or prolonged. In such cases, isolation perpetuates the problem.
Well-meaning mental health professionals can’t fill this social void. Their motivation is to get the individual to comply with treatment; they are not the person’s friends. Therefore, support from family, friends, and colleagues is critical.
Sometimes just checking in to see if the person is taking their meds makes a difference. Simple gestures show that someone cares, especially if that person hasn’t been paid to do so. A genuine and compassionate smile can mean a lot to someone living in darkness. Such interactions can’t “cure” something as complex as mental illness, but they are assuredly not a waste of time.
A person living with mental illness has different relationships with their family, friends, and colleagues than their mental health professionals or their “treatment team.” However, all these relationships are important. As the saying goes, “No man (or person) is an island.” An older individual may have a significant other or dependents. A younger person has parents who would (one hopes) want to see their child achieve something rather than become a ward of the state.
Many prominent historical figures who have suffered from mental illness have contributed immensely to modern society — Isaac Newton, Ludwig van Beethoven, Abraham Lincoln, Virginia Woolf and Winston Churchill are just a few of many. Perhaps others with mental illness could contribute, too. Why not? Recently, many celebrities have come forward with their struggles with mental illness. Although these people may have suffered alone, they all had a core group around them for support.
Mother Teresa once said “loneliness and the feeling of being unwanted are the most terrible poverty.” Despite our nation’s great wealth and access to health care, Canadians with mental illness are no strangers to this brand of poverty. Canada currently ranks seventh of 156 countries in the Happiness Index based on factors such as corruption and availability of services. But is material prosperity an adequate measure of happiness and mental well-being ?
Countries with relatively less material affluence, as measured by GDP, tend to have stronger communal/family ties. Certain African tribes share child-rearing duties between families, as opposed to institutionalized forms of care such as daycare, out-of-school care, etc. The nation of Bhutan has been a leader in this area. Since 1971, Bhutan has measured Gross National Happiness as an alternative to Gross National Product. The prime minister stated that “the notion of progress goes well beyond lack of income or consumption, to include nonmonetary aspects such as weak social connections, the psychological cost of alienation and isolation, the exposure to risks and the experience of vulnerability.”
These factors need to be coupled with economic and technological progress, as such progress cannot, by itself, stand in for psychosocial ties.
If Canadians adopted a perspective of happiness that cultivated stronger relationships, the results would be profound.
A fifth of our country’s population lives with mental illness. We should provide them the support they need to flourish.
There’s so much potential.
Simple gestures show that someone cares, especially if that person isn’t paid to do so. A genuine and compassionate smile can mean a lot to someone living in darkness.