We ignore mental health at our peril
THE Daily Express and Mind have joined forces to put mental health front and centre of the conversation.
Our By Your Side Christmas crusade aims to raise a significant sum so the UK’s leading mental health charity can continue to give life-saving support.
Last year Mind faced its highest level of demand since it started in 1946, after being approached by 20 million – about a third of the population.
The charity’s Infoline receives 8,000 calls a month, equal to 11 every hour. There are 1.6 million people waiting for mental health treatment. Three in five said their mental health got worse in lockdown. A third did not seek help.
Mind wants the Government to commit £1.459billion to treat children and young people over the next three years.
FIFTEEN-year-old Hollie was so unhappy that her worried family took her to the doctor but they were told the waiting list for counselling was nine months.
Her desperation intensified until she attempted to end her life. Luckily she was discovered in time and her life was saved. She was taken to a psychiatric hospital.
But while she was there, she tried to end her life again. She said the nurses were cross with her – it was inconvenient, now they would have so much paperwork. They left her alone in a room with only her telephone. She rang Childline.
She tells me that the first call lasted around 45 minutes, and the careful, nonjudgmental reassurance a Childline counsellor gave her inspired the dawning of hope that her acute misery might pass in time.
Over the following months, still struggling with despair, she spoke to the children’s helpline regularly. Even when she left hospital, for two years she found it impossible to speak to anyone else and became mute.
When she needed to pour out her feelings she would go down to a shed in the garden and ring Childline. In time the counsellors worked to increase her confidence and give her the strength to reach out for help.
At last she was able to find the face-toface counselling she needed, and the depression and anxiety receded. Now she is a Childline Ambassador, filled with confidence, and is taking a degree at university.
Thirty-five years ago when we launched
Childline, Hollie’s story would have been rare. Counsellors who have been with Childline for decades say in the early days they hardly ever spoke to a suicidal child.
In 2006 when Childline merged with the NSPCC over three months we had nine calls from children who wanted to end their lives. Of course, the counsellors took each of them extremely seriously.
In those days the majority of calls were from children experiencing abuse, neglect or bullying. Over the past decade they – and online contacts – have changed dramatically. From April to August this year, more than one third of the contacts Childline received were about mental and emotional health. Even more worrying, another 12 per cent of the contacts from youngsters talked of suicidal thoughts.
A volunteer told me: “When I started working with Childline it was rare to get one suicidal child ringing us in an evening, now it’s common to receive four or five in every two-hour shift.”
They are dealing with a tsunami of despair. We have developed enhanced training for our counsellors to help these children. But at the same time we have to wonder why they feel as they do, and have to turn to Childline as a last resort?
For many of them, there is nowhere else to go. One girl, aged 17, told us: “I have been feeling suicidal for months. Me and my mum called the doctor’s but they told me to wait to see how I feel in another month and call them back. The suicidal thoughts are now daily and it feels like it’s getting too much for me.”
There are professionals working in CAMHS (Children and Adolescent
Mental Health Services) but they are completely overwhelmed. There is an urgent need for more resources in our mental health services.
A 16-year-old girl told Childline: “I’ve been really bad lately as I struggle a lot and am not getting any therapy. I was meant to be put on the waiting list for CAMHS four months ago, but I never got referred. It feels like nobody cares and I am struggling.”
Eating disorders are increasing exponentially, and they can be lethal. A 15-year-old said: “I spend a lot of time every day looking at mirrors and the parts of my body I hate, especially my stomach. I’m constantly comparing myself to others. I’m not really sure how I could get help.”
For some young people, the pandemic also hit their mental health. A 16-year-old told us: “Until lockdown happened life was easy but I developed anxiety surrounding the idea of death. I struggle with my self-image and hate the way my body looks. I have felt unwell for the past few months.”
Serious mental health issues are not restricted to the young. Since the pandemic struck, The Silver Line Helpline has dealt with many calls from older people who feel desperately anxious and are trying to deal with their fears alone.There is still a stigma that prevents many of the older generation talking about mental health issues.
One caller I talk to is in her nineties and lives alone, suffering from acute agoraphobia, which imprisons her in her flat. She is ashamed of being, as she says, “so daft”. I tell her that far from being daft, she is incredibly brave. But I am indignant on her behalf that she has never been offered counselling.
I had a talented friend, a young woman who worked with me on The Silver Line. Her passion and commitment were inspiring, and we never failed to make each other laugh, even at the toughest times. But she had suffered for years from anorexia, and the isolation created by lockdown turned her illness into a fatal condition, so we lost her. Not a day goes by without my remembering her.
Mental health is crucial to our national health.We forget that at our peril.
‘It was rare to get a suicidal child ringing us...now it’s four or five every twohour shift’