Mental illnesses in India have had a longstanding history of being looked down upon, ignored, trivialized, and highly stigmatized. Acceptance is often replaced with religious rituals, denial, name calling and victim blaming. “If only he/she would just go out more”, “if only he/she would go out less”, “if only they would pray”, “if only they would make more of an effort in relationships” or “try harder to be happy” are often pieces of advice that individuals suffering from mental illnesses receive.
People are still far from understanding and accepting the biological basis of all kinds of mood and psychotic disorders. It is still not understood that mental health problems, too, need to be given equal importance and treated the same as any physiological illness. Mental health literacy is extremely low in our country. Even today, if a layman is asked about depression,they would not be able to specify it’s biological or chemical basis but would simply label it as being extremely sad.
Stigma is often associated with things that a larger part of the society cannot comprehend. To remove this stigma, people need to be educated about the basics of mental health. “Out of sight is out of mind” is a good way to describe how people react to mental illnesses in India, just because they cannot be seen as a rash, a cut, high body temperature or a runny nose, does not mean it doesn’t exist. Due to this, patients suffering from mental disorders are often isolated, institutionalized, misunderstood and blamed,which traps them in a vicious cycle of their illness. Stigma or the mark of disgrace that is associated with all things psychological can be of two kinds: social and self. As the name suggests, social stigma is one which is apparent in the society at large where people around the patient refuse to accept their illness and furthermore make jokes about it or trivialize it. Self-stigma, on the other hand, originates within oneself regarding the difficulties that the individual faces.
A major chunk of our population consists of people who are afraid to seek help for their own self because of the kinds of prejudices that have been engrained into their minds about mental health difficulties. People who must stop and think before accepting their illness because “what will others think of them?”. Parents who could very well know their child is not doing well mentally but will still wait till the last possible moment just because they cannot accept the finger pointing and name calling that would be associated with the disease. This may come as a surprise, but this stigma sits strong at a wide range of people in our country. They may be educated or uneducated, from metropolitan cities or the most rural of villages; they may even have a close family member or friend suffering from a mental illness. The tags that come along with a diagnosis are cruel; they are demoralizing and unhelpful for the patient, their doctors and therapists, and their families and loved ones. The view of complete negativity with which mental illnesses are seen inhibits any sort of progress that should be made towards accepting mental health as an integral part of our day to day functioning.
A study conducted by the WHO suggested that 4 out of 5 people in low to middle level income countries such as India, do not seek help even for a seriously debilitating mental disorder. If the statistic from Reddy et al’s study (2013) is considered, that means that there are crores of people all over our country who are ashamed, ignorant or simply uninformed about their serious conditions. They wake up every morning, with no fault of their own, wondering why their lives have to be as they are, why they can’t just be happy,why the voices in their head just won’t stop, why they won’t stop having this extreme anxiety that feels like they are going to die,why they see things that other people can’t see. And they go to bed every night, feeling ashamed, feeling like absolute laughing stocks and feeling like failures. When all they need to know, and accept is simply that they are unwell.
Having a myth that “Talking won’t change it.But sometimes one needs, to tell someone; often, though, one wants to escape those horrified feelings, to escape oneself, so there was no pain, no fear, no ugliness. So one should not remain silent and work towards destigmatizing mental health.
It’s the time for everyone to understand that, ‘silence’ is an indicator of having mental health issue.We all must have an understanding that “Sadness,disappointment, and severe challenge are events in life, not life itself.”
“Unexpressed emotions will never die. They are buried alive and will come forth later in uglier ways.”Therefore it is imperative to have an adequate expression of emotions and seek professional help as and when required without any delay.
“Anything that’s human is mentionable, and anything that is mentionable can be more manageable. When we can talk about our feelings, they become less overwhelming, less upsetting, and less scary.” –Fred Rogers
“Don’t give in to stigma. A diagnosis does not determine who you are or what you can do!”Talking about mental health can give us freedom to seek help, find people who can relate, and move toward well-being.Let’s continue the conversation about mental health. Together, we can work to stop the stigma surrounding issues many of us face!