The Mental Health Crisis

Writer: Nashera James

Childhood, a time where we fall, get bruised, make friends, navigate through our identity issues, and simply try to survive. I believe I recognized myself to be a person at the age of 5 years old, I wasn’t sure, but as time permits, that’s when I remember being aware of myself.

I cried a lot when I was a child, and by a lot, I mean, once I was breathing, I was crying. I didn’t grow out of the crying phase until I was in my late thirties, that’s how much and how long I cried. In Jamaica, when you cry as much as I did, you get teased, scolded and or ignored; you were labeled as attention seeking, spoiled, co-dependent or just annoying,

When I became a preteen, I cried in a more profound way, a more meaningful way, because by then, I heard and saw and felt things, physical things, emotional things and mental things. My attention to detail was peaked by the age of 10, I missed nothing, I was self-aware and spatially aware. I heard that I was ugly, stupid, idiotic, rude, lazy, disgusting that I would never amount to much, those words, the intentionality and purpose of them, began to occupy my mind, they squatted for years in every corner of every thought that I had… This is the beginning of my mental decline.

Mental issues are frowned upon in several cultures, they are not validated nor recognized and because of that, there are no treatment plans. Depression is as active as the mind is active, anxiety is a blood pumping motor skill stopping, vertigo induced state of being. A dark room, withdrawal from friends, little to no responses, not being able to brush your teeth and shower, the inability to take care of the children, uncontrollable crying, a place that is so dark and damp, even a glitter of light, looks like charcoal. A hue of hopelessness, the feeling of death looming, suffocation. It’s not laziness, it’s not for attention, it is the literal actual stimulus response to an imminent loss of self, loss of mind, your mind which controls your body, has malfunctioned and there is nothing you can do about it.

Q & A

How do you handle depression and anxiety?

Would you recognize depression in someone and what would you do to help?

Do you think mental health issues are real or are people pretending?

Join us next week as we continue in a series of “The Mental Health Crisis” expression, solution and prevention. How can we heal the wounded mind?