What I’m about to say should be seen as a public service announcement. There seems to be a noticeable deterioration of society’s mental health.
I say this because it is rearing its head more and more at the top of the food chain, particularly celebrities.
A good friend of mine who practises clinical psychology was telling me the other day that he is seeing an increase in patients at the facility where he volunteers his services.
The scary thing is, it’s regular people holding down fairly regular jobs, who are seeking help to manage their mental health. And the common thread seems to be that it’s all linked to the pressures of living in a time when just about everything is volatile. From food and petrol prices, to politics, electricity, job security, and even personal safety.
Our conversation started out with the story of Laura Dickason, the Pretoria woman on trial for suffocating her three young children to death, shortly after the family emigrated to New Zealand almost exactly two years ago.
We talked about her mental state and how the tragedy must have affected her husband. My friend said something quite profound: “These are two medical professionals and they couldn’t deal with the pressures of life. What hope does the average person have?”
The statement hit home even more when we talked about the obvious struggles that both Britney Spears and Kanye West have had over the years.
A few days later, Sinead O’Connor died and I was reminded of the years that I followed her struggles leading up to that very public breakdown while she was live on Facebook. It took her years to find some balance .
I just read that one of my favourite performers, a French-Belgian EDM musician named Stromae has had to cancel his world tour because of mental health issues.
These are all people who seemingly have it all and can certainly afford the best treatment available. But we live in troubled times and much of the pressures are out of our control load shedding, unemployment, cost of living, gangsterism and so on.
The last time I wrote about this during the Covid lockdown, new statistics showed that one in five young teens in the Western Cape had attempted suicide in the previous year.
It points to a serious breakdown in mental health services to citizens in general, but to our young people in particular.
While a lot of it is out of our hands, what we can control is how we interact with these challenges. We can slow down and stop competing with Instagram lifestyles, where we are only ever shown the glam and gloss. And we can start taking care of each other and paying attention to when our friends and relatives are struggling .