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We’re not frightened anymore
Posted Friday 15 June 2012
MPs capped off yesterday’s monumental mental health debate by agreeing on a motion: that this house has considered the matter of mental health.
You could see it as a classic example of the slightly odd, outmoded things that they do in Parliament, which rarely make sense to the rest of us. But yesterday’s debate was a thoroughly modern affair – giving us a glimpse of a better future as well.
Why? For the very first time, MPs stood up and spoke out on record, about having mental health problems themselves.
Of course, this really shouldn’t be a big deal.
In an ideal world, we wouldn’t raise an eyebrow about Kevan Jones MP's depression, or Charles Walker MP’s obsessive compulsive disorder. We shouldn’t be remotely surprised that Sarah Woollaston MP and Andrea Leadsom MP experienced postnatal depression.
But as everybody knows, we still live in a world where we’re often afraid to say we’ve got a mental health problem. We’re afraid that colleagues might whisper behind our backs, or that we won’t stand a chance of getting promoted. We sometimes worry that friends will stop calling, or even that our own families will see us differently.
Mind has been fighting against mental health stigma for decades now, and thousands of you have joined us in that fight. I’ve often noticed that when one person talks about their experience of mental health, sure enough others will follow - it’s a very common occurrence. Yesterday this common occurrence took place in a most uncommon place.
MPs have been far slower to take up the fight, fearing media headlines and a very public backlash. But yesterday, four of them took a chance. It almost felt that each one who spoke emboldened another to do the same.
First, Kevan Jones opened up about the deep depression he had in the 90s. He told MPs that he had thought “very long and hard” about whether to speak publicly. In the end he concluded:
Whether it will affect how people view me, I do not know; and frankly I do not care because if it helps other people who have depression or who have suffered from it in the past, then, good.
Next Charles Walker declared himself “a practicing fruitcake for 31 years”, describing the way that OCD can “smack you right in the face” and has at times taken him to some very dark places. He too had been terrified to admit to having a mental health problem, but he stood up and told the house: I am not frightened anymore.
Shortly afterwards, Dr Sarah Woollaston spoke about the severe panic attacks she had experienced. Andrea Leadsom admitted:
I suffered from post-natal depression. It is unbelievable how awful you feel when you are sitting with your tiny baby in your arms and your baby cries and so do you. You cannot even make yourself a cup of tea. You just feel so utterly useless.
I commend all four MPs for speaking out yesterday, and I commend the celebrities, sport stars, and members of the public who have done the same thing.
It means we’re a step closer to a world where we can ask for help when we need it, where we don’t need to pretend we’re fine, and where we don't need to struggle on in silence.
The debate covered many other issues too, ranging from welfare to cuts, and MPs highlighted the excellent work done by local organisations.
The momentum around this debate should inspire us all to keep fighting. Whether or not your MP was involved, why not drop them a line to let them know what needs to happen next.
Paul Farmer is Mind's Chief Executive
30 Comments
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This is all very well and good, but do any of these MPs know what it is like to go through the degradation of the WCA and numerous ATOS assessments? Also in this day and age (thanks largely to a number of celebrities opening up about their own mental health issues) conditions such as depression, anxiety and OCD are generally becoming more accepted. What about less well-known condtions such as borderline personality disorder? Given the amount of stigma and sheer nastiness which exists against conditions such as this (and I speak from first-hand experience) I imagine that not many MPs or celebrities would be willing to open up in the same way if they were diagnosed with a condition such as this one.
Ending stigma against some mental illness is an incredibly good step forwards, but the same needs to be applied to ALL kinds of mental illness.
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"...we don't need to struggle on in silence".
So does this mean the determined media campaign by certain MP's to discredit sick, disabled and unemployed people will stop?
Does this mean the discredited welfare assessments which are making people feel suicidal and pushing people into crisis will be halted and rewritten?
Does this mean PIP will be rewritten so that it actually covers mental health?
Does this mean cuts to services bolstered by short term access only ideology will be rethought?
Does this mean the thousands being discharged back to GP with no community support will now get support without having to be suicidal/homicidal? [correction, homicidal].
Does this mean people will be able to access crisis services, CAB, legal aid and social housing?
Does this mean that those who need to remain doing chosen voluntary work for viable stability will allowed to do so? Or those who really cannot work will be left alone instead of pushed through assessments every 6 months?
Does this mean that there will be meaningful employment support?
[Access to Work doesn't really cover mental health, pre-employment questionnaires are no 'victory' because gaps of years cannot be concealed and employers are not idiots they work it out, CMHT employment support doesn't go beyond shelf stacking and after discharge has to be paid for]
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Speaking out is one thing - celebrities/sports stars typically have less to lose - they don't tend to have to worry about income/housing and don't tend to use NHS mental health services. They wouldn't 'come out' about having a PD, there's even a certain 'glamour' about Bipolar and creativity, and they invariably get showered with awards. For more ordinary people living with the fear of assessments, not being able to access a service or being offered a single treatment for 6 months maximum the reality is grittier, and speaking out is a massive risk.
For MP's granted, they have much more to lose than celebrities by speaking out because traditionally mental health has been fair game within parliament as a term of abuse and put down, i.e. 'loony left' through to suggesting that any heinous crime is 'psychotic' despite the person not having been diagnosed as such. So I commend them for speaking out, that takes courage, look at how John Prescott was ridiculed for speaking of Bulimia.
But at the same time I can’t feel too elated given how government policies of the last and current government have decimated services and placed people with mental health problems especially at the bottom of the pile in a far worse position than ever before in the last 20 years.
Disability hate crime is up and there's entrenched discrimination within parliament, so unless our elected representatives actually represent what we need it doesn’t make any difference whether they have firsthand experience or not. -
It's Mind and other charities and the media who get this so wrong. If you all stopped fawning and fussing over people when they talk about their mental health, it wouldn't be anything out of the ordinary. The "Stephen Fry effect" is incredibly damaging to us mere mortals.
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I'm getting tired of high profile people talking about their so called mental health problems seeing as we never get a voice at all. As for personalitiy disorders well they wouldn't touch that one with a barge pole. Some of us are stuck with that label for life, excluded from any help and branded as 'bad' even though we became ill because of what so called 'normal' people have done to us.
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'We're not frightened anymore' is ironic as a title as I think so many people with mental distress are terrified. The fear isn't of speaking out anymore but all the changes to the health services, welfare and society.
I also agree that Time to Change has not changed the discrimination and stigma against personality disorder. There is no greater awareness of PD as a result of the campaign. It may be encouraged and a relief to talk about depression for instance, but with borderline personality disorder it is less straightforward. At times you do feel blamed for having those traits whcih aren't seen as a mental illness. Not many members of the public have heard of BPD and would think it meant 'almost' having a personality disorder. Then the times they would see PD are when crimes, suicides and legal trials are reported - so hardly in a context where understanding and support are going to occur. The discrimination can exist within the services meant to treat mental health problems and even where places have specialist teams for PD there can be a tendency to talk about those with this diagnosis as a different species who are not able to respond to anything else but their one model of support, eg a therapeutic community and no individual or alternative support with that.
Mental health service users are facing a really tough time, may not be 'service users' for much longer now that is judged to be dependency. It is the equivalent of releasing people from asylums but having no support in place in the community - yet this is seen as doing us all a favour so we can normalise.
MPs need to hear what is happening on the ground to services, benefits, reduced employment chances - as that would really be walking in the shoes of many of us. -
I think a lot of the comments are unfairly negative and unconstructive.
What happened last week in the House of Commons is a step forward but only a start, a platform on which to build to change the things we all want to change. Attacking those in public life who have been brave and decent enough to make that start might make some people feel a bit better about the injustices they undoubtedly face but it actually achieves nothing.
This is a time for everyone with an interest in mental health to play as team not to score own goals.
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The comments are not a personal attack on MP's with experience of mental health problems, Mind's CEO himself resigned from a committee because it was impossible for him to play as a team with parliament. People feel silenced enough without being told they shouldn't speak on a charity website about wanting political discrimination to stop and reasonable access to health & social care, welfare and housing. Service users have as much chance of 'scoring own goals' as winning the lottery, or having any influence on policy.
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http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2012/jun/18/mental-illness-people-help
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All credit to the MPs who did speak out - I wouldn't have wanted to take that note away from them. I just think that a new celebration is relatively short lived when so many people affected by mental distress are still worried about their own futures (or those of their relatives). Where there are these distinguished MPs interested in mental health and understanding then we also need their support to make sure that people's health and rights do improve and are not diminished. It could help to take this moment to continue to raise awareness but that includes the reality of different types of mental distress and and the challenges of the years ahead. Speaking out followed by action is even better than testimonies, that's when we can see the difference we can make together.
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Many people (myself included) have had their personalities and heads affected and even destroyed by the anti-humane, anti human societies we find ourselves born to. It seems to be all about 'self' preservation at the expense of someone else. whether income, education, housing, achievements, career, even the person you get hitched too. All competitive, all expected to join in, all assumed norms. And if you could bet on the outcomes of all this competition to prove that you were the one of the best, I'd be a multi millionaire. Cause you can guarantee that wealth and a certain accent will invariably get you to where you want to be over merit and competency every time. Just look at the make up of those 'supposedly' representing the population in our so called 'democracy'. This privilege, this gathering of wealth, this protection of me and my own by walking over everyone else permeates our society. To dismiss these issues as having little or nothing to do mental health ensures we will still be campaigning in a hundred years from now on exactly the same issues as we do now. To say these issues are above our pay grade is to close our eyes and things will get no better.
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Thanks for all of your comments. We agree that there is still a long way to go until all mental health discrimination is ended. That’s why we’ll continue to fight for better awareness and understanding – for all mental health problems - through Time to Change, and through our campaigning and media work. We’re also working hard to ensure that MPs themselves have a better understanding of mental health, so that they can support and represent us properly in Parliament. Last week’s debate won’t bring an immediate resolution to the failings of Work Capability Assessment (WCA). However we were encouraged by the fact so many of the MPs that took part in the debate were critical of the WCA and PIP, and many more MPs spoke about the problems in the test during today’s disability benefits and social care debate. Mind will continue to call for improvements as set out in last month’s blog, 'welfare - where to from here?'.
Louise, Parliamentary Manager, Mind. -
"when one person talks about their experience of mental health, sure enough others will follow... Yesterday this common occurrence took place in a most uncommon place."
No, it wasn't talking about their mental health that was the big thing, it was talking about their mental illness. So long as we feel the need to be euphemistic and talk about mental health when we mean mental illness, we're buying into the notion that mental illness is something to be ashamed of.
It's been done locally when new hospitals and clinics have been built. You can have a 'hospital' or a 'clinic' when it's for a physical condition, but increasingly you have to have a 'centre' when it's for a mental condition.
As a linguist, I'd say that if you don't align the language, you'll never align the attitudes.
Also, it's about time we stopped talking all the time about mental health rather than individual conditions. The more press releases there are about different conditions, the more the media will get the hang of the idea that there isn't one thing called 'mental health' but a whole variety of illnesses, disorders and conditions. Imagine if someone was campaigning for some generic 'physical health' to be treated!
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http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2012/jun/20/jobcentre-supervisors-suicide-risk-benefit-claimants
Even the DWP cannot hide the damage of ESA but not to worry they will smile as they put the sick on workfare and means testing.
Sounds to me reading this memo a lot of people are frightened but its all good for us according to the welfare reformers.
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I wish to support the debate in the House on 14 June wholeheartedly. Together with the London School of Economics report and the Moral Maze on Radio 4 last night, at last awareness of mental health illness is being raised. It is a devastating diagnosis and can ruin many lives. The research and treatment must receive more NHS funding. The hospital conditions must be much improved with a more holistic approach and activities to relieve the hours of boredom. Psychological talking therapies have to be increased and more widely available. I have written in support to my own MP and Nicky Morgan, Loughborough MP, who started the debate, plus Kevan Jones, Charles Wheeler, Sarah Wollaston and Andrea Leadsom who spoke of their own experiences in the debate. I have also written to Gavin Barwell praising his forthcoming Bill on discrimination and stigma in mental health. Please also support their good work in raising the profile of this vital matter and keep the momentum going to obtain better and more support for sufferers of mental health illness and their carers. Thank you.
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So it's now going to become trendy to admit to a mental health condition is it? Along with having a designer-clothing-clad baby (preferably aquired abroad), a certain make of handbag, admitting to having been in rehab, growing your own veg, getting to work on a bike, supporting a charitable cause... There is nothing 'trendy' about living with bipolar. Especially when you're too poorly to hold down a job, or have been rejected by the 'World of Work' for being a 'possible danger to others'! I agree with the person who posted further up - they have no idea what being bullied by the DWP and their attack dog ATOS is like. I'm hoping something good will come out of this, but am rather sceptical.
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I can't see someone like Kerry Katona having the sheer joy (ha!) of going through Work Capability Assessments when she can get money for parading her so-called bipolarity on This Morning and the like.
This writer is still waiting for her benefit money to be sorted out.
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I am glad to hear that mental health is finally being discussed in the Houses of Parliament and even to the extent that some of the MP's have felt able to come out with their own experiences with mental illness. I have recently completed a project at college in which I discussed how by raising the awareness and understanding of mental health, I believe that it would help to reduce the stigma surrounding mental illness.
I took my project to my local MP and discussed with him my recommendations that are to introduce compulsory lessons on mental health in secondary schools, in PSHE lessons that secondary schools currently have. I believe that young people are the key of removing the majority of the stigma surrounding mental illness as by helping to get them to understand and be aware they will pass this down through future generations.
I would be interested to here from other people their opinions on this as I am still in contact with my local MP and am determined to make a change for the future surrounding mehtal health.
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Mindreader, you point out very well the hidden discrimination that occurs when individuals try to return to work, that of employers identifying periods of sickness; it is an issue which must be focused on. I fought to return to work after 5 years off sick and now 15 years later find my sickness record thrown in my face when I apply for a new post. I am so saddened by the attitudes of employers for exacerbating and sometimes increasing stigma due to there poor understanding of mental health issues.
I wrote to my MP about the problems that maintain mental illness twice and on both occassions the written reply did not even mention my main concerns! I am 51 now and after becoming ill during my 20's am wondering if stigma and discrimination will be dealt with in my life time. I don't want to sound negative but being kicked down so many times this is how society makes you feel! -
Whilst I applaud MPs for speaking about their own problems, I wonder why these issues were not raised when the Welfare Reform Bill was going through? PIPs does not seem to recognise mental health needs like avoiding social isolation and engaging in activities outside the home.
It is easy for celebs etc to talk about their problems. But, like the "one in four suffer mental illness" thing it can seem as if it is belittling serious conditions, especially to those of us who struggle on a daily basis with acute problems. I understand that the "one in four" statistic included persons who had "felt down for a fortnight". You wouldn't say pneumonia wasn't so bad because the majority of us have suffered a cold. Or lump all physical illness together as one thing, as an earlier commenter pointed out.
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many people today are 'keeping going' with the help of anti-depressants- if only someone had advised me 20 odd years ago that they are addictive! What has been a particularly depressing experience is to be 'summonsed' by the health centre for 'review' every 3 months, to try & persuade you to give up the offending tablet! Fortunately now I am 60 that has since been cut to yearly review- is that ageism??
when i was first prescribed seroxat/paroxitine, 'talking therapies' were not an option. please could we put emphasis on the need for communication in all our efforts to put mental illhealth on the agenda of those who wield power in health circles. -
This is proving to be an excellent debate and I really agree with you Betty Blue and concerned citizen. I really can't speak for these MP's but I am so tired of the way mental illness is being trivialised and even normalised. Beleive me psychotic symptoms are just NOT normal, they are frightening. Clinical depression is not normal it is devastating. Claire Fox mentioned on the moral maze last night that when she worked in mental health the biggest complaint people put to her was having a next door neighbour say 'Oh yes I've been feeling a bit down lately'. I really fear now that the 'worried well' who have normal feelings of unhappiness (perhaps due to the recession) will be crowding out services leaving those who really need help out in the cold. I really do not know what I think of people speaking out but I do know this, many people with serious mental health issues do their best to HIDE their problems not 'come out'. We speak on blogs like this because it is safe but the last thing we would do is speak to the world about it. No one apart from my GP, mental health, and my husband (and this blog as it it pretty annoymous) know I have BDP and I want it to stay that way.
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Perhaps I am being a little too positive but I was heartened by the debate and by all but one of the contributors - guess which that one was? Police in stab vests and psychiatrist protected only by a blouse came into it....
I also have written to Kevan Jones and Charles Walker to congratulate them for "coming out" - and to my MP .T
he Minister for Health and the Shadow Secretary of State speaking from the same hymn book, great! MPs from all parties and constituencies demonstrating that they recognise the range and amount of mental illness from personal and constituency experience, fantastic.
And as a bit of a humorist myself, I will treasure the following contribution from LD MP John Pugh, for years to come:
"In the 18th century, it was possible to cross the river to Bedlam and gawp at people gesticulating, ranting, performing odd rituals, talking to no one in particular, exhibiting delusory beliefs in their own power, or expressing paranoid fears about their foes. The nearest 21st-century equivalent is probably Prime Minister’s Question Time." As we all know, "fair words butter no parsnips" and as far as governments are concerned - there is no such thing as "joined up thinking". However - Mental Illness is the last taboo that I can think of and perhaps this debate with other changes in mental health legislation can act as a catylyst for change. With every campaign, whether racism, sexism, discrimination against for people with physical disabilities, homosexuality, apartheid up to democratisation movements in the Middle East - there is a TIPPING POINT! It would be nice to think that we are nearly there.
I've made a commitment to speak out - and having lived and worked in Wales for many years, knowing Wales falls behind England in mental health improvements and with a current consultation on mental health taking part, I have been involved in petitioning the Welsh government... ongoing! -
A few, a very few MPs being open about their mental health is to be welcomed. It is a start. If lifetime prevalence figures are accurate there are a great many more who are not so brave. I would expect to find a good number with alcohol abuse problems and some users of illegal drugs, as well - so there is a way to go.
No. For me, this grandstanding has taken attention away from, what is to me, the really significant happening of the last few days, the publication of the report by the London School of Economics Mental Health Policy Group (http://cep.lse.ac.uk/pubs/download/special/cepsp26.pdf). Possibly though taken together, and with some of the other media interest, this is one of the greatest opportunities for improving services for the treatment of the whole spectrum of mental ill health.
That leads to the question - How can the MH community best capitalise on this?
I think a copy of that report should be compulsory reading for every Health Commissioner, and MP and for every local councillor as they are going to be far more closely involved with commissioning in the future, not to forget the government mandarins (all of them because they shift departments) but especially those in Health. -
Nutcracker Sweet,
You mention Bedlam and the Victorian past time whereby leisurely rides with the horse and buggy to 'gawp' the local insane asylums was genteel weekend entertainment. Through the work of campaigners, (like the Quakers for instance,) Radical legislation towards the end of the nineteenth century put an end to this past time. People in asylums were no longer regarded as 'inmates' (prisoners) but were from then reffered to and regarded as 'patients'. Through legislation, all newly built asylums were required to have walls no higher than a patient could be hindered from peering out/over. This was to reinforce the fact that asylums were not prisons. The other intersting thing I discovered was the fact that under the same 19th century legislation all new asylums were to be positioned in such a way that no public view could be had of the main housing and quarters of patients from the public road. This was to protect patients from the gawping Victorians who had made a bussiness of charging for days out to gawp. This is why when you visit an old Victorian asylum you will usually find a bending (original) access road from entrance to the main building. To hide it from the public gaze. Of course this had it down sides too. It is, I believe, where the term 'going or gone round the bend' first originated along with terms like 'the big house'. The term 'asylum' used for these places was given with the express intention of conveying the true meaning of the word, i.e. a refuge from a cruel and dangerous world. Anyway thats my understanding. Of course there was a lot still not right and I wonder how far we've come since then? -
At least MP's can speak out, as Linda observes, ordinary people don't feel able to other than in a low key way, and those who have been more public have consequently suffered for doing so.
How did those MP's vote on welfare reform?
I'm sorry what is Time for Change doing?
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I watched the debate and was very impressed about al the topics brought forward by the MP's. Alot of mention was made about talking therapies and the requiirement for more therapists and opportunities for people to access such help, In the debate the was no mention of therapist being properly and legally regulated by law such as other health providers, which would offer some safeguard to 'service users'. At present there is no goverment regulatory body to govern therapist and there needs to be and in that incorporate a proper and sensitive complaints procedure for when things go wrong. Membership to associations is insufficient. If talking therapies is to be on the increase then something positive needs to be done to protect those who at the most vulnerable seek help.
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I applaud the MP’s that spoke out about their own mental health problems and I praise them on their bravery. I hope this goes a long way in reducing the stigma around mental illness.
I felt that MP’s in this debate really do care about people with mental health difficulties and want to make a difference to how these people are treated. I just hope that positive changes come around sooner rather than later for the sake of those who are suffering and the families and friends who care for them.
Severe mental illness, when not properly treated, destroys lives.
My daughter has a devastatingly severe eating disorder and terrible depression. Negative thoughts around food dominate her life and eating scares her.
My daughter was functioning as normally as any of her friends throughout childhood and into early adolescence.
My daughter believes that mental illness can happen to anyone and at 12 years of age it happened to her and it scared her and that fear has never gone away.
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There's no change in policy and accessing support has never been harder.
'Talking therapies' means 6 -12 sessions of CBT -
Seems to me like MPs with serious mental health problems must never use the NHS or else they are winners in the NHS postcode lottery.
The shutting down of many mental health institutions means that many mental health patients in a duff postcode lottery area have to prove a medical need for beds. How discriminatory is that? Even children and young adults can be subject to this.
In the shadow of a complaint about lack of services the NHS mental health system now feels like Nazi Germany to me.
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