Listen to thisWhen I was younger, I’d have to make an excuse to leave the room whenever sex scenes came on the television. I learned to sniff out at a bedroom scene within 30 seconds and escape to make tea, or feign a yawn and head off to bed.
There are many things it’s difficult to talk about with parents. Mental health, apparently, is one of them. Given that one in 10 young people experience mental health issues, it is worrying that 55% of parents in the UK have not discussed mental health at all with their children, according to a new study from the Department of Health and Time to Change. Even more shocking is that 45% of parents interviewed said they haven’t had this conversation because mental health “is not an issue”.
More than 850,000 children aged between 5 and 16 in the UK have a mental illness. Child and adolescent mental health services are struggling with soaring referrals and admissions. It is thought that half of diagnosable conditions manifest before the age of 14 and 75% by 21. A study in October found 62% of teens had searched for information about depression on the internet.
It is difficult enough to experience a mental health condition or episode at any age, but these issues can have a particularly serious impact on teenagers’ futures. A-levels don’t wait for you to pull out of depression. Months of education can be missed as you battle an eating disorder or recover from an episode of psychosis.
When the stigma that surrounds mental illness is still so prevalent in society, it’s no wonder so many parents feel uncomfortable discussing the topic. They might have had their own struggles, adding to their unease. But mental health shouldn’t be a taboo subject, and the sooner children learn this the better.
It is much better to raise the topic of mental health before an episode occurs, since talking or accepting help can be especially hard when you’re in the grip of illness.
Nobody is suggesting it is easy. Every parent must know the desperate feeling of not being able to help their child in pain. So anything you can do to educate a child about issues that may occur, increasing their chance of communicating if they do have trouble, is positive.
Parents – please talk to your kids about mental health, just as you would about sexuality, or race, or gender or physical health. Talk to them about your mental health; about their mental health. Talking might be awkward, but the alternative? It doesn’t bear thinking about.
Hannah Jane Parkinson
1 December
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/dec/01/parents-mental-health-children-depression
