Mahdis Habibinia | Executive Editor, Online
Featured Image: While Bell Let’s Talk Day encourages people to open a dialogue about mental health, it doesn’t adequately prepare regular people to have this discussion. | Courtesy of Pexels
Today is the ninth annual “Bell Let’s Talk Day,” an advocacy program by Bell Canada to promote mental health education, research, awareness, and to end the social stigma associated with mental health.
This is a charity fundraiser hosted by Canadian Olympian and Bell Let’s Talk Spokesperson, Clara Hughes. She said in a recent interview: “We turn up the mental health volume on Bell Let’s Talk Day, letting all those who struggle know they have our support and can reach out for help without fear. At the same time, Bell increases its funding of Canadian mental health programs with each message of support you send.”
Today, Bell will donate five cents to these initiatives for every applicable text, call, tweet, social media video view, and use of their Facebook frame or Snapchat filter.
More than $86.5 million has been raised to fund mental health initiatives since 2010, when this fundraiser first started. The money raised by Bell Canada from this day (and other smaller-scale events) are distributed across a variety of organizations in Canada to help create a stigma-free country.
Last year, there was a total of 138,383,995 interactions.
Students, teachers, politicians, parents, teens, sports teams, pets, and celebrities alike across the nation get involved with the initiative each year. Some of these people include Celine Dion, Shania Twain, William Shatner, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Astronaut Chris Hadfield, the Toronto Maple Leafs, and the Toronto Raptors just to name a few.
According to Bell, two out of three people with a mental illness suffer in silence because they fear judgement and rejection.
The company advocates five ways to “end the stigma and start a conversation:” choosing words carefully, (instead of ‘crazy’ using ‘person with mental illness’) educating yourself, being kind and letting someone know you’re there for them, being a good listener and asking how to help, and being open to a conversation so you can talk about it.
Essentially, it’s all about language, and speech.
Alexandra Rutherford, York associate professor of psychology in the history and theory of psychology graduate program, says: “There is lots of research that shows how negative speech affects mental health and contributes to social alienation. Being the target of racist statements, for example, has been connected to higher rates of depression and anxiety. There are research programs in social psychology that show how activating negative stereotypes about race and gender affect people’s abilities to accomplish tasks, and so on.”
Although Bell has outlined its five ways one can end the stigma, supported 2,235,043 crisis and distress lines, and has 1,451,270 trained staff and volunteers, what about the average person (who is more accessible than a counsellor or trained staff) who isn’t trained to know how to react in a particularly stressful situation?
Bell Let’s Talk has taken many progressive steps towards ending the stigma around mental health, educating the nation, and getting people with mental illnesses to open up. But what it doesn’t address is how one might respond to a particularly tense conversation with someone suffering from a mental illness.
The average person will not know how to respond effectively if someone has just disclosed a particularly personal piece of information. Offering a listening ear and asking how to help will only go so far, and referring them to a counsellor, a distress centre, or other third-party expert will run the risk of ‘passing them off.’
What is one to do in a particularly unique and stressful situation, when Bell’s five ways to help someone seem to be of little help to a person with planned thoughts of self-harm? What are some essentials that Bell is not addressing?
So, let’s talk.
It’s easy to follow these textbook instructions. But it’s hard to be empathetic and share the feelings of a person struggling with a mental illness, if you do not share that same illness. Or simply, if you do not have personal insight into their particular struggles. How can one relate, and in effect, lead a productive conversation?
Everyone is different. Each mental illness is unique. And each case requires its own solution.
Some people want to help, but don’t know how to, beyond following a script. This runs the risk of having a counterproductive conversation in particularly-stressful cases—something the script does not prepare them for.
The responses you receive in these conversations that Bell encourages may cause the ‘average’ person some nervousness, and you will have to know how to deal with that first, before continuing on with the conversation to help the other person—another critical issue Bell does not address. You can educate yourself on the difficulties of mental health—be kind, and start a conversation—but you cannot pour from an empty cup.
The reality is, if these conversations are encouraging openness about mental health issues, some discussions may take a dark turn. Even after educating oneself, the average person is not equipped with the tools or expertise to steer a particularly dark conversation in a helpful way—and the average person is more accessible than a counsellor or expert at any given time.
“I was trained in paediatrics,” explains a third-year nursing student at York’s Wellness Hub who wishes to remain anonymous. “So what we can do is refer them to resources, in that case.”
“But at least we’re accepting, at least we’re talking to people,” explains a third-year nursing student. “For example, a few years back people would think mental illness is associated with somebody who is physically violent and wouldn’t want to have a conversation with them. So at least we’re engaging in conversation and accepting. It’s a start.”
Many initiatives and organizations outline specific ways one can help another during these types of conversations.
According to FindYourWords, you have to be able to ask the tough questions. When someone you know is having thoughts of self-harm, or is in emotional pain, ask them directly about the thoughts they are having. To the best of your abilities, keep them safe and reassured that they are not alone. Help them connect to a support system that they can reach out to for help, for example a therapist, family member, or friends. FindYourWords also encourages following up with the person to make sure they are okay and to show that you care.
Although Bell encourages people to listen, and talk, they neglect to outline the type of questions to ask in the conversations they are encouraging.
Psychology Today also recommends direct questions, but more importantly, reflecting on the person’s words and feelings can help, too. When you suspect someone is in trouble, if you’re concerned, you should ask directly if they are having thoughts about self-harm.
“You should really listen and try to hear what people in crisis are feeling. What is the present crisis as they see it? You should reflect back to them what you are hearing to show that you really want to understand,” writes Lisa Firestone, Ph.D.
More specific questions include asking the person struggling with mental health what has made them feel better in the past, and offering to do those things in the moment.
“You can take a walk with them, or just sit and breathe together, anything that will help them start to calm down. This might mean just sitting and being with them in their pain. It is important not to leave them alone,” says Firestone.
And amidst conversations of a really dark nature, you can always walk with them to the resources that are better equipped to handle the rest of the conversation. This includes counselling services, as well.
Some students have even suggested Bell Let’s Talk Day could be more inclusive about its interactions. The third-year female nursing students explains that the #BellLetsTalk hashtag should further extend into other, more common, terms such as #mentalillness, or #mentalhealth. “With only #BellLetsTalk, some people might not know what that is,” they explain.
Despite Bell’s accomplishments, students believe there is more that can be done. “They can raise five cents to ten cents.”
“Are they just giving funds to other groups and initiatives? Well, Bell can have their own organization, too, instead of just giving funds to existing initiatives,” agrees the third-year nursing student.
Most of Bell’s partnerships and programs are targeted towards raising and promoting awareness of mental health as well as funding to help support existing initiatives, not particularly starting their own initiative and expanding the number of resources available.
So perhaps, the next steps in improving the stigma surrounding mental health and helping those who open up is making professional resources more accessible, and educating the average person on how to talk to someone beyond Bell’s five-step script. After all, you don’t want to say the wrong thing.
“I show a video in one of my classes where people describe how the use of language that reflects negative attitudes about people with mental illness—or ‘mental health stuff’ as we say in class—undermines them and makes them doubt their self-worth,” explains Rutherford. “Language—and speech—have powerful effects on our mental health.”
And what’s York doing about this issue, you may ask? In support of Bell Let’s Talk Day, York is also hosting numerous events today for YU Let’s Talk Day to help speed up some of the goals surrounding mental health awareness.
Calumet College and Stong College are offering a variety of drop-in events throughout the day for students to gain free access to information about mental health and resources.
“You don’t have to be an expert to talk and to listen, and often, it’s the little things that make a big difference,” explains the Mental Health and Wellness site at York.
So for now, let’s just…talk.
York Counselling couldn’t be reached at time of publication.
