Why is it Important to Talk about Mental Health?

This blog is a labour of love, and it will always be free. Over 1,000 people read every post which is incredible. And if just 100 people donate €2 it means that I’ll be able to continue doing all of this for another year. So if you like the work, it would mean the world to me if you considered making a donation. Thank you to everyone who already has this year. There’s no expectations, as ever, and I hope you have a lovely week. Donate here

There is also now a Thoughts Too Loud Podcast!

Normalise the chat around mental health. Normalise the conversation. I say these things a lot. But why do I say it? What exactly do I mean?

We’re not good at these conversations. This isn’t our fault. We’ve been socialised for generations to avoid conversations about mental health. In the past people have been stigmatised, shamed, fired, ostracised, institutionalised for talking openly about their mental health struggles.

And so now, although we’re more understanding and accepting as a society, we’re still wary of these conversations. We’re wary and we’re reluctant. So we’re not used to these chats. They’re not familiar, we’re not comfortable with them.

So, when nobody around us is talking about the variety of things that could be affecting their mental health, we naturally assume that nobody else is struggling like we’re struggling. Nobody else is feeling low, or anxious, or lonely, or out of place. So we feel isolated, because nobody is talking about these things then nobody else must be struggling.

But the truth is, we all have things that are making our minds less than ideal places to be. Some days these are big things, other days they are small. Either way, we all have things that make us feel uncomfortable.

But if none of us are talking about these things to each other, then none of us can really know if anyone else feels the same as us. The same way that I need to ask you what your plans are in order to schedule in time to meet you, I can’t know how you’re feeling without asking. But we don’t ask. Because we’re uncomfortable with the conversation.

So all of us are feeling badly together, but separately. We’re compartmentalising our mental struggles. We’re all encouraging others to talk without ever actually talking ourselves. And this lack of conversation is causing bad days and weeks to appear as massive black marks on our lives. Because we think we’re the only ones struggling. We think we’re outliers, failures. But we’re not. Everyone around us is also dealing with things. They just don’t talk about them. And so the cycle continues.

The only way to break the cycle, as I see it, is to just talk about our mental health. Make these conversations normal. Make them mundane. Because if we know that how we’re feeling right now is actually a fairly common way to feel, then it won’t feel like such a catastrophe. It will feel like a natural ebb and flow. Because we all get low at times. We all have bad weeks, bad months. But if no one is ever talking about it, we conclude that there’s something wrong with us.

But in reality we’re just being human, feeling human things.