The mental health talking shop – is it just hot air?

We are hearing a lot about mental health at the moment. It seems that everyone has an opinion on it, or wants to share their own personal lived experience. Whilst this is a good thing in general in terms of raising awareness and changing the stigma around it, I also have massive issues with what is going on.  

The first is that many of the people talking about mental health are celebrities and business leaders talking about how they have overcome their challenges. Inspiring stuff indeed.

However, the cynical part of me thinks that the ones talking are usually highly successful people whose mental health conditions - although valid - have not really held them back too far, otherwise they would not be celebrities or business leaders. 

I could go further and suggest that some (but by all means not all), are even using or trading off their mental health condition to further their career or public appeal. Or, having been successful in another industry, are now trying to use their profile to make money out of mental health. 

The majority of issues that these celebrities are talking about are common or mild mental health conditions (anxiety, depression, panic). Whilst often undoubtedly debilitating for people suffering, these are very different in severity to conditions such as bipolar or schizophrenia, which may require long term psychological / psychiatric support and mood stabilising medication. 

The narrative being built by the current discussion and by campaigns such as ‘Time to Talk Day’ and ‘Time to Change’ is that ‘all you need to do is talk about mental health to solve it’. That is just not true for people suffering from long term, chronic and severe mental health conditions who need ongoing support. It could even be an insult to them to hear that. The reality too is that a lot of these people are not in the workplace as they would not have been employed in the first place. Or if they have, discrimination for their condition is sadly common. A Business in The Community report showed that if you came forward and talked about your condition, you were more likely to be discriminated against… 

And the celebrities and business leaders talking about their lived experience are often the ones who can afford private therapists to help them; the majority of the population can’t. I’m not sure it is that helpful hearing how somebody else managed their condition if that option is not available for you. 

Which leads me to my next point. As well as the narrative around mental health being that you ‘just need to talk about it’, there is an assumption that once you recognise you have a condition, you can go and get it sorted. Many of the awareness campaigns and first aid approaches suggest signposting people to help. The issue is that we have spent 30 years cutting NHS mental health provision, and that within organisations the chat, is not backed up with spend on mental health providers. We are signposting people to services and support that really doesn’t exist. Worse, the chat is leading to more people coming forward to the services that don’t exist… 

I really fear that we are creating a problem for ourselves. We need to be balancing the discussion and talk with actual targeted spend on talking therapies, acute provision, and speedy access to psychologists and psychiatrists. Too often now the quick and easy solution is to put people onto medication and point them to a commoditised CBT-based counselling services as the waitlist for talking therapies is long. That’s if an individual gets any support at all. 

We need to be clear what messages we are giving around mental health, and why. And following through with action and investment at an organisational and societal level. 

Next blog I’ll be looking at how you move from all talk no action, to actually making a difference in mental health in your organisation. Join me then and I can help you make use of the talking shop… 

Do you want support and guidance with an expert in the field? Mentorship with Amy McKeown is available - check out more info HERE