Power of Difficult Conversations Mental Health Grief
[Music]
i survived depression
and i completely dealt with suicidal
thoughts
i mean that’s great news but in those
moments
i felt like i was all alone i mean how
could i
as a man into me that i was struggling
with mental health issues
in a society like ours that glorifies
the suppression of emotions
through statements like be a man
or only white people have mental health
problems
or even stop driving like a woman
i thought i’d be shooting myself in the
foot
if i spoke to people about it
and true to my thoughts those were some
of the responses i got when i spoke to
my friends about my struggles
this is no different from my friend who
was blamed for staying in an abusive
relationship
or even the news article i read where
the police blamed a disabled woman
for being raped simply because she had
been told not to enter the rooms of men
somewhere last year i had a discussion
with two of my friends
about the existence of ethnic privilege
it mostly presents itself during
inter-ethnic marriages particularly
between
members of the airway ethnic group and
members of the akhan ethnic group
so one of my friends told me the story
of how
her cousin’s girlfriend had to leave the
relationship
simply because her akan family
simply couldn’t reconcile why should
like to stay
in a relationship with someone from the
airway ethnic group
some have purported that this dates back
to the plebiscites of 1956
where a majority of the french westing
togaland
voted 58 to join then gold coast
according to the united nations
interestingly
a large part of the southern part of
westing togaland
voted against joining ghana and by the
way
the part of ghana was predominantly
occupied by members of the airway ethnic
group
this caused people to douse their
legions of os
to the idea of ghana it was further
exacerbated during the regime
of the late flight lieutenant jerry john
rawlings
as chairman of the pndc he was accused
of promoting airway agenda
to the detriment of other ethnic groups
simply because his mother was aware
even as we stop to reflect
we should be able to learn from our past
mistakes
we should be able to question the status
quo
do these things promote our development
as a people
similarly in a discussion i had in the
last quarter of last year with some
friends
i came across the story of an
unconquerable family
a mother ms agnes nyamite
and her son david maxwell
their story is one of disappointments in
the ghanian educational system
because in contrary to article 29
4 of the constitution 1992
so many schools turn down their little
girl because she lives with down
syndrome
their story is one that highlights the
ignorance that plagues our communities
because their father and husband
abandoned them
in his excuse none of these things
are found in his ancestry so it
definitely had to be from the side of
the mother according to him
their story is one of struggle and hope
even in their quest to combat the
innuendos and degrading stairs from
passes by
their story is even similar to the story
of essen amdra
a mental health advocate for eshinam
pastors attributed harmonic episodes to
pay back for some evil her father did
even worse she lost her job
because the school authorities simply
couldn’t reconcile
her bipolar condition with her job
as a teacher essenam represents one of
very few people who are able to speak up
about their issues
because for many families to talk about
such things
is simply anathema it represents some
some some sort of indelible stain which
threatens their social standing
so they would rather never speak about
it
but why then should we even have
difficult conversations
one it serves us some form of therapy
another therapist once said the aim of
therapy
is not to fix you because you were never
broken
rather it serves as some form of
catharsis
an unburdening of a way these people
never asked to carry
such conversations also highlight to
these people
setting internal and external resources
available to them
to help them deal with their issues
last year my family was finally able to
get some closure on the events that led
to the demise of my father
and afterwards after my mother was
able to recount the events that led to
his demise
i was finally able to tell my family
about my struggle with mental health
and the relief i felt was indescribable
of course the future still looks
daunting but now it looks surmountable
in the words of a songwriter those those
years were fire
but now i’m gold 2.
by engaging in meaningful conversations
we’ve managed to impose meaning in an
otherwise chaotic world
these were the words of dr matthias male
a psychologist in the university of
arizona
in a study he conducted which involved
79 college students
who helped them to compile what he calls
an acoustic diary of their day
in the study they were electronically
activated recorders with lapel
microphones
which recorded 30 second snippets
of conversations every 12.5 minutes
for four days at the end of the study
it was discovered that the happiest
person engaged
in twice as many substantial
conversations
and one-third the amount of small talk
as the unhappiest person in the study
small talk represented only 10 percent
of the happiest person’s conversations
dr mel concludes that even though
there’s not a cause and effect
relationship established
it is clear that a bond is created with
the interactive partner being spoken to
he says that
interpersonal connection and this high
level of
interconnectedness are core foundations
to happiness thus substantive
conversations
actually have the power to make us
happier people
thirdly for us as a people
difficult conversations contributes to
our well-being
and make us more resilient to national
crisis
there’s a phenomenon known as the nordic
exceptionalism
according to the world happiness report
since 2013
the five nordic nations sweden norway
iceland finland and denmark have
always been amongst the top 10 happiest
nations in the world
in a bid to discover the course of this
phenomenon
it was found that according to the
report
that institutional quality freedom
all contribute to life satisfaction
but even more importantly these nordic
nations
experience high levels of
interconnectedness
and social cohesion
these high levels of interconnectedness
and social cohesion
are what doctor mathias mill proposes
are achieved through
meaningful substantive and i dare say
difficult conversations so how then do
we harness the power of difficult
conversations
one i propose a remodeling of the
ghanaian educational system
and possibly the african educational
system
to include institutional training
on topics such as how to live with
people with disabilities
in 2010 the ghana national
housing and population census revealed
that
some 737 743 people
ghanaians were living with disabilities
and this represents a three percent of
the country’s population
a significant number we cannot keep
overlooking
we must teach and intentionally learn
that to be different is okay
ms agnes told a story of how
a little boy and her daughter told this
class
called her mad because she did not know
he had no idea
was he meant to live with down syndrome
impressively
she took the opportunity to educate the
little boy on what it means to live with
down syndrome
which has gone a very long way to affect
how
her daughter told her is viewed and
treated
in society among these three percent
who knows maybe our very own angela
bachier
who in 2013 became spain’s city
councillor
in spite of living with down syndrome or
our very own
brian russell mohica a 27 year old man
who ran for congress in peru
despite living with down syndrome or
even
our very own stephen hawkings two
instead of asking how are you maybe try
asking what is your story
instead of talking about the weather
which quite honestly affords do a pretty
good job of updating us on
maybe talk about your struggles
especially for men
in an article by abdullah tanko for bmc
public health
it was revealed that from 1997 to 2019
85.92 of the victims of suicide
have been men 62.27 percent
of these people actually earned fairly
good salaries
which meant that finances was not the
major cause of suicide
in our parts of the world contrary to
popular belief
rather 44.44 percent was
attributed to marital and relationship
issues
and oh by the way mental health issues
accounted for 18.06
of the causes of suicide but why men
even though research shows that women
show more symptoms of depression
than men actually they cope
better with the symptoms of suicide why
because women ordinarily will open up
about their struggles and seek help
when men would rather exude bravado in
such situations
but we as men need to instigate their
paradigm shift
that is okay to appear vulnerable
sometimes
it’s okay to appear weak and it’s okay
to ask for emotional health
for creatures as ephemeral as human
beings we order to ourselves to live
life to the fullest
why keep quiet about your struggles and
suffer in silence
when you could share to receive help and
possibly help somebody else
in that situation we owe it to ourselves
to recognize our biases through our
stories
we owe it to ourselves to capitalize on
the things that make us one
and minimize the things that seemingly
separate us
like ethnicity in spite of how daunting
they may seem
i leave you with the words of william
anders henley
and he says the menace of the years
finds us and shall find us unafraid
it matters not how straight the gate or
how
charge of punishment the scrolls i am
master of my fate
i’m capting of my destiny we will
rewrite our stories
thank you