World Mental Health Day 2018

I was in my first year of post-graduation at Srishti, on a weekend was going towards MG road (as that was the easiest place to travel from Yelahanka) in our favorite bus G-9. I was sitting at the window seat and the seat next to mine was vacant. At the next stop, a lady who seemed to be in her early 50s came and sat next to me. She initiated a small talk asking me where was I from and it eventually lead to her talking about her daughter. Gradually She opened up about how her daughter tried to kill herself due to some relationship problems and how she suffered. The way she spoke it felt like she had a lot to say and no one had ever heard her out. As a mother of a daughter who was herself in pain, maybe she didn’t want to open up to her own family to avoid any further stress. I heard her out, even though I couldn’t understand most of the things as she wasn’t well versed with English and spoke in Kannada in-between. I kept listening and as she spoke I could actually see it on her face that she felt relieved. Seemed like she had been trying to vent out since long. In return, I told her how strong she had been and glad that her daughter had become better. Before getting down at her stop which was before mine, she offered to treat me, thanked me for listening to her and wished me all the luck for my career. That one bus ride made me realize how people just want to be Heard, maybe they are not looking for solutions but only looking for someone to lend a patient ear and hear them out.

From being a patient listener to what people have to say, to have faced certain things in life myself, it’s pretty understood that Everyone goes through highs and lows in their lives and that’s totally normal. We always talk about that “it’s okay to talk” and okay to share but it’s okay to talk to whom? .. are we really there if a person needs to talk? We might not be there to understand or lend a patient ear to someone who really needs to be heard, maybe because we are too busy with our own personal problems, or just don’t want the vibe to get negative… and the worst case, instead of helping the person we might ruin it even further by making fun of other person’s problems.

What might affect you won’t necessarily affect the other person and vice versa as each individual has their own sensitivity levels and that’s completely okay. But I’ll tell you what’s not okay, judging a person for their problems and not hearing them out, that’s not okay. With all the campaigns running around saying It’s okay to talk, I feel It would make more sense to have a campaign around “it’s important to hear out someone in need”. The Least you can do is to lend someone a patient ear even if you can’t help them because that matters. Trust me it really does.

Here is a little piece I had written on how people might think everything is okay with someone when it actually might not be the case.

OKAY

A feeling of heaviness in my heart
But hollowness in my chest
Something trying to tear me apart
And nothing was at rest
What was it, that was difficult to say
But I told myself all will be okay.

Tears rolled down without a reason
Mom asked, hey what’s wrong hon?
Was it the change or the bad day
It’s just a phase sweetie, all will be okay.

Felt something eating me from inside
Nothing improved, no matter how many times I cried
Annoyed friends got an ice cream sundae
Binge on it and all will be okay.

Concerned and worried he held my hand
Why was I sad, even he didn’t understand
Hard to explain, didn’t know what to say
Although he promised me all will be okay.

Was surely not some physical pain,
Felt insane inside but I looked all sane
Had the sudden urge to turn the day grey
But the next moment I was all okay.

Exhausted, tired and my body felt so sore
Let’s end all of it, couldn’t take it anymore
Drowning in a pool of blood, there I lay
Telling myself that all will be okay.

Half dead with fainting eyes I could see
The bunch of people gathered around me
All horrified, all they could do was pray
They were telling each other, all will be okay.

-Komal Singh

Cheers to all the people who have battled through the tough times. I would just end this by saying #IamHereToHear 🙂