She's brilliant, well-educated, charming, and loaded with experience in all aspects of her profession.

The problem is her emotional state, which, even with therapy and medication, is always one meltdown away from another pink slip.

Another friend who went to school with me passed all the same exams I did. Yet she hasn't worked in 20 years.

Depression keeps her at home, struggling to get out of bed each morning and to fill the days with meaning. Shame at her apparent failure paralyses her efforts.

A third friend has worked at the same job for decades but finds no joy in it — or in anything, to be honest.

He'd like to retire and is eligible to do so. Yet a dark cloud sits over his ability to make decisions.

He keeps hoping the choice to leave his job will be taken out of his hands by forces outside of his control.

Chances are we all know people who suffer from poor mental health of one kind or another.

Mental health and resilience

The World Health Organisation defines mental health as more than the absence of mental disorders.

Mental wellness is the state of being able to cope with life stressors, to learn and to work well, and to contribute to family and community in a way that provides a certain amount of fulfillment.

To be sure, not all of us tap dance to work on Monday morning. And in some seasons of life, our circumstances may be far from carefree.

I've had jobs I heartily disliked, bosses I couldn't please, relationships fraught with conflict, financial precarity that filled the nights with anxiety.

I've endured low periods that kept me in emotional or career stasis for longer than was good for anyone concerned.

But given enough time and support, I managed to squirm out of difficulty and back into the sunshine. Being able to find safe passage through dark times is a feature of mental well-being and resilience.

For a variety of reasons, that resilience doesn't function adequately for everyone — or perhaps for anyone under the wrong circumstances.

Genetics, grief, displacement from home, disability, substance abuse, and trauma are just a few of the factors that can make mental resilience nearly impossible.

There's little encouragement in being browbeaten by religious messages that tell us our job is to share good news with confidence, to exhibit joy without a hint of fear.

Biblical examples

Does the Bible have any examples of people who struggle with mental darkness?

Job instantly springs to mind, crying out on his dung heap in losses without consolation.

The priest Ezekiel, in exile in Babylon, demonstrates symptoms of a troubled mental state, including catatonia, paralysis, and what might be described as hallucinations — unless you prefer to call them visions.

Jeremiah suffers profound melancholy at the needless destruction of his community and rejection by his allies. We might call Jeremiah paranoid too, if his enemies weren't really out to get him.

Many psalm writers compose lamentations that give poignant voice to a community-wide sense of desolation and loss of hope.

Mary Magdalene, we're told, was possessed of seven demons before she met Jesus.

And plenty of other folks in her generation suffered similar excruciating afflictions, bound up in disordered mental states that tormented them and likewise robbed them of communal support.

Doubtless there were others, though scripture doesn't linger on their stories. Jacob's lone daughter, Dinah, for example.

After being sexually assaulted by the prince of Shechem and becoming her brothers' excuse to wreak vengeance on the entire community, Dinah never marries or bears children, as we learn later in the catalogue of descendants.

We can imagine her young trauma, followed by years of scandal, shame, and isolation, made trust and recovery difficult. It's likely the rest of Dinah's story was as unhappy as the part we know.

Or consider Hagar, Sarah's maid.

Hagar was a foreign woman enslaved in a wandering Aramean tent community. She was presented to Abraham, the head of his tribe, as a sort of parting gift by her people.

Handed once more to Abraham by Sarah as a means to an end—bearing an heir in Sarah's stead — this young woman is obliged to have relations with a very old man who hopes for a son.

After Hagar bears one, she's subsequently beaten and abused by a jealous Sarah.

Later, when Sarah finally bears her own child, Hagar and her son, Ishmael, are both driven from the community into the wilderness.

Isn't it likely that Hagar wrestled through some darkness? Wouldn't her son, rejected by his father, impoverished, and raised in the wild, carry his own mental scarring?

It's Job, of course, whose depression is most celebrated — if you can use the word celebrate in the same sentence as depression.

Job endures sleepless nights, during which all the monsters of his tragedy come out to haunt him. Read more

• Alice Camille is the author of Working Toward Sainthood (Twenty-Third Publications) and other titles available at www.alicecamille.com.

ACPeds President Dr. Michael Artigues said the organization's review of the referenced research points to "what many who practice medicine intuitively understand, that young patients experiencing gender dysphoria deserve help in accepting and loving themselves as they are, not interventions that destroy their healthy bodies and put them on track of medicalization for life."

The principal authors of the research review, led by ACPeds Vice President Jane Anderson, expressed their grave concern.

They said "that parents, along with health care and educational professionals who support the transgender ‘transition' of children and adolescents are, in fact, contributing to increased depression.

"They do this by appearing to validate to the children that ‘something is wrong with their body and biological sex.'"

The paediatricians concluded that "there is no long-term evidence that current ‘gender affirming' medication and surgical protocols benefit their mental well-being.

"High rates of suicide attempts and/or completions in those who have received ‘gender affirming' interventions indicate that at minimum, long-term controlled trials should be conducted if these interventions are to be continued."

In lieu of social affirmation, medical intervention, or surgical mutilation of children and adolescents identifying as transgender or gender nonconforming, the pediatricians recommended:

That "intensive psychotherapy for the individual and family to determine and hopefully treat the underlying etiology of their gender incongruence."

The pediatricians also said "more attention and support should be afforded to individuals seeking help in detransitioning after having made a decision during their formative adolescent years with lifelong consequences."

"We urge medical professionals and parents to affirm the truth about childhood gender dysphoria in the presence of harmful thoughts and address the underlying mental illness, adverse events, and family dysfunction," Anderson emphasised.

Burgeoning mental illness

Youth who identify as a gender other than their biological sex have high rates of mental health issues "regardless of any affirmation of their gender identities," the group said.

"This is particularly serious given the exponential increase in the number of adolescents identifying as ‘transgender' in the past decade," they continued. Continue reading

• Joseph Bukuras is a journalist at the Catholic News Agency.

The National Survey of Mental Health and Wellbeing provides a country-wide snapshot of the prevalence and impact of mental health conditions in the community.

Conducted by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS), it's the first of its kind in 15 years and shows that mental health disorders have surged among Australia's youth, with young women having the highest rates.

The ABS found that nearly two in five people aged 16 to 24 had a mental disorder in 2020-21 and for females specifically, it was one in four (24.6 per cent). Findings also showed that women experienced higher rates of anxiety disorders than men at 21 per cent compared to 12.4 per cent.

Almost half of Australians identifying as LGBTQI+ had also experienced symptoms of a mental health disorder in 2020-2021.

Dr Ruth Vine, the federal government's deputy chief medical officer for mental health, says that the levels of distress in young people, especially anxiety, were "puzzling people around the world", and that it pre-dated Covid. She cited social media as a concern for young people but said that global concerns were also a factor.

The Covid-19 crisis had large effects on collective health, with one in five Australians reporting a mental health disorder during the first two years of the pandemic, including 3.3 million people with anxiety disorders.

Speaking to the higher rates of mental health disorders among women and their correlation to the effects of Covid-19, Chief executive of the Australian Psychological Society, Dr Zena Burgess, says, "Typically, women are more likely to have additional stress on top of the pandemic, such as more housework, poverty, job insecurity, sexual abuse and family violence."

"The combination of these factors makes it far more likely that women disproportionately suffer from anxiety and mental health disorders than men."

While women of all ages were at higher risk for all mental illnesses - other than substance abuse - compared to men, the survey also found that women were more likely to seek help for their mental health, with 55 per cent reporting they see a mental health professional.

The ability to seek professional help is imperative to mending this mental health crisis and Assistant Minister for Mental Health and Suicide Prevention, Emma McBride, says that demand for mental health support has surged to record levels across the country. Continue reading

We should not continue to simply stand by devouring headlines that clearly delineate the spiral of a mentally ill man. Read more

Father Roberto Malgesini, 51, who cared for immigrants and other needy people in the northern city of Como, had been stabbed to death.

A Tunisian immigrant, who police said was mentally ill, turned himself in to authorities.

The man was known to Malgesini, who had let him sleep in a room for the homeless run by the parish.

The morning Malgesini was killed, he was expected at a breakfast for the homeless.

In 2019, he was fined by local police for feeding people living under the portico of a former church.

A diocesan statement said "in the face of this tragedy, the Church of Como is clinging to prayer for its priest Fr. Roberto and for the person who struck him to death."

The local newspaper quoted a volunteer who worked with Malgesini, as saying "he was a person who lived the Gospel daily, in every moment of the day. An exceptional expression of our community."

Fr. Andrea Messaggi said: "Roberto was a simple person. He just wanted to be a priest and years ago he made this wish explicit to the former bishop of Como."

"For this he was sent to St. Rocco, where every morning he brought hot breakfasts to the least of us. Here everyone knew him, they all loved him."

Roberto Bernasconi, director of the diocesan branch of Caritas, says Malgesini was "a meek person."

"He devoted his whole life to the least, he was aware of the risks he ran," Bernasconi said.

"The city and the world did not understand his mission."

Pope Francis on Wednesday also paid tribute to the priest.

Speaking at the end of his weekly general audience, Francis said Malgesini was killed "by a needy person who he was helping, a person who was mentally ill".

Francis praised the "martyrdom of this witness of charity towards the most poor (and) all the priests, nuns, laymen and laywomen who work with needy people who are discarded by society."

He then asked the audience of about 500 people in a Vatican courtyard to observe a minute of silent prayer for Malgesini.

Meanwhile, a far-right politician Matteo Salvini called for a "vendetta."

Source

• Reuters
• Catholic World Report
• Image: Stand for Christians - S4C News

Deacon George Labelle was tackled by Eisel, 28, while the clergyman offered a homily Feb. 22 at St. Coleman Catholic Church in Pompano Beach, about 40 miles north of Miami.

"The Archdiocese is grateful no one was seriously injured during this frightening incident. The immediate response from parishioners allowed the deacon to continue with the Mass," the Archdiocese of Miami said, according to the Miami Herald. Read more

This panel, unbeknownst to me, had been scheduled as the pinnacle event at the end of a week filled with much-anticipated conversations and workshops.

After what turned into a febrile debate about the merits of the biomedical model of mental illness (essentially, that mental illnesses are caused by chemical imbalances in the brain), audience members began forming a line to ask questions.

It turned out, most of their questions were for me and a majority of them were some version of, "My [insert family member here] doesn't believe you need to go to a doctor for any of that ‘mental stuff," you just need to pray harder. How do I respond to that?"

These were questions I'd been wrestling with for years.

I had maybe five minutes to respond.

Here is what I said:

"The Church has a long history of responding to distress - the term ‘mental illness' is relatively recent - with exorcism, which has morphed into the belief that sick people don't have enough faith.

"What that basically says is that those who suffer from mental, emotional, physical or spiritual distress are not only ineligible for God's grace since they would need to do something more (pray) to get it, but they are so lacking because they're suffering.

"I'd remind your family member, gently of course, that Christ says the exact opposite - it is the sick who need a doctor."

Perhaps the reason this was the most common question I received is because the Church as a whole has remained largely silent on mental illness even as the culture has become a safer place for those with lived experience to share their stories.

To be clear, mental illness remains highly stigmatized in the culture, too, but I've only been to one church where the pastor openly preached about it and have felt more comfortable talking about my own lived experience with nonbelievers than with those Christians.

Silence breeds ignorance, fosters misinformation and encourages fear.

There has been great theological work done on theology of race, gender, even disability; there is still not systematic theology of mental illness.

Because the Church has continued to ignore mental health, its members legitimately don't know how to respond to mental-health issues.

Those without specific training in psychology, counseling, social work and other such fields probably care very much for their friends or family members who are suffering, but they likely feel unequipped to help and worry that they may do more harm they good.

It makes sense that they would turn to the One they believe is all-powerful and all wise.

But this is one reason why my generation (I'm a Millennial, albeit an ‘old' one) is leaving the body in droves: praying for people with mental illness, whether privately in your own home, briefly after service or in extended prayer ministry (which, in my experience, often turns into a bombardment of exhortations to forgive one's traumatizer), is not working.

It's not that I think prayer is necessarily ineffective for mental and emotional distress.

It's also not that I think all mental-health issues are purely physical and lack any spiritual or relational component.

But Jesus didn't actually pray for the sick - not in the "let me pray on this and get back to you" way that many of us who have lived experienced of mental-health challenges have experienced from well-meaning church folk.

Jesus healed the sick.

He didn't use prayer as an excuse to detach from relationship or as a reason to delay responding to those in distress, physical or otherwise.

And he expects us to do the same. He did not tell us to pray for the sick, He told us to "Heal the sick..." Continue reading

• Megan Wildhood is a creative writer, scuba diver and saxophone player working at a crisis center in Seattle,WA. She is currently working on a novel narrated by a character with a mental-health diagnosis. She has a Bachelor of Arts in Christian Theology Megan wants to connect with readers, activists and weary humans around issues of mental health, challenging dysfunctional systems conflict and defiant hope.
• Image: www.meganwildhood.com

One striking thing about modern Western societies is how quickly bioethical practices that would once have been shocking quickly become unremarkable.

It happened with abortion, it happened with embryo selection, and now it is happening with euthanasia.

Last week it emerged that during 2016 and 2017 three children in Belgium were given euthanasia, and the media reaction was one giant shrug.

As far as I am aware it has barely been reported outside Christian and pro-life circles.

Pro-lifers who warn against weakening the legal protection offered to all human life are often accused of believing in the supposed "slippery slope fallacy".

But the Belgian experience, over the 16 years since euthanasia was introduced, suggests that logical slippery slopes do exist.

Once you have conceded into law a particular ethical principle - say, "intentional killing is a legitimate treatment option for patients who request it, or whose best interests demand it" - it is very difficult to control the further application of that principle, because of the way the law works, with a high value attached to precedent and equal treatment.

By the internal logic of the pro-euthanasia position, any law or ruling permitting some form of euthanasia carries within it the seeds of its own extension.

If someone with a prognosis of six months is eligible, why not someone with a prognosis of nine months?

If someone who wants to die because of unbearable physical pain, why not someone with unbearable existential pain? And so on.

Euthanasing the mentally ill

The direction of travel in Belgium has been clear for a long time.

Euthanasia was introduced in 2002 under fairly liberal conditions - for example, the legislation permitted what Belgian law calls "emancipated minors" to have access to it.

The numbers taking advantage, steady for a long time at somewhat under 1,500 per year, have recently started to increase.

The law allowing children to be killed was introduced in 2013.

There are many red flags in the Belgian experience for those willing to see them.

The controversy over a request almost granted to the rapist and murderer Frank Van den Bleeken, who claimed he was "suffering unbearably", is one such (Van den Bleeken was at first given permission to seek euthanasia at the hands of doctors; the decision was later overturned).

A 2015 study looking at 100 patients who requested euthanasia found that 90 had at least one psychiatric disorder. Continue reading

• Image: The Conversation

A report from UK think-tank Education Policy Institute (EPI) states that children in the UK have a higher rate of extreme usage (37.8 percent of all UK 15 year olds) than other countries.

Only Chile reported more.

The think-tank examined the relation between social media use (including online time) and mental illness:

While twelve percent of children who spend no time on social networking websites on a normal school day have symptoms of mental ill health, that figure rises to 27 percent for those who are on the sites for three or more hours a day.

There's no clear indication as to whether the extra time online was a catalyst for mental health issues, or if it was the other way around.

The majority of children, whether extreme users or not, reported anxiety whenever there wasn't an internet connection.

Nevertheless, these are indicators of association and do not necessarily prove that social media causes harm to young people's well-being.

For example, it could be that someone already experiencing a mental health problem is more likely to use social media, or that there are other relevant factors.

Extreme internet users are far more likely to be bullied as well; 18-percent reported they'd had negative things spread about them versus only 7-percent of those who reported being online three hours or less during school days.

The study also cautioned against simply restricting a child's access, claiming that this could actually hurt kids in the long run by preventing them from learning the skills they needed to cope with stressful events online.

Instead, parents and schools should be more concerned with teaching children to cope. The researchers even ask Parliament to get involved:

The role of government should be to work with the industry, schools and families to help improve young people's emotional well-being and resilience and to ensure children are taught and supported to learn digital skills as they start to navigate social media for the first time. Continue reading

Sources

• The Next Web article by Tristan Greene
• Image: PsychCentral

In retrospect, she was hell-bent on self-harm. I don't know what her body did to offend her, but for the last half decade of her life she punished it without remission.

She extended the maltreatment to her immediate family, excoriating her mother, defaming her father, denouncing them to her brother and sister.

Then she moved out "to be free", and spent the next subsidised 18 months resisting every available mode of occupation or trade or pastime, insisting that all she really wanted to do was to "come home" - the home where the seeds of persecution and victimisation were allegedly sown, the home where anorexia took root and bulimia blossomed, the home where even she had begun to see that she was ill.

Yes, from time to time she accepted that she was ill and presented herself to those who could provide custodial intervention and sufficient carbohydrates to enable her to insist that she never had been other than entirely well, and whose domestic or institutional havens she would then renounce so that she could starve herself into the commencement of the next cycle.

Every tactic contradictory, every endeavour repercussive, obviously she was on the path to self-destruction. In retrospect.

Every spate of professional counselling added to her education in the methodology of professional counselling. Each medical intervention augmented her command of its jargon.

On her last admittance to Toronto's prime psychiatric facility, sufficiently refreshed by a few days of its available stodge, she opposed remaining there long enough for a diagnosis to be accomplished, and she argued for her release at an official tribunal during which she held her own against a panel of psychiatrists, social workers and ward supervisors for four hours - a hospital record for duration - and ended the marathon by offering to return on a voluntary basis to provide art instruction to the inmates who, unlike her, needed to be incarcerated and, in her estimation, were bored. Continue reading

• Jack Winter's granddaughter Emma committed suicide when she was 21.
• In New Zealand help is available from Lifeline New Zealand, 0800 543 354

For counselling and support

• Need to talk? Free call or text 1737 any time
• Lifeline - 0800 543 354
• Samaritans - 0800 726 666
• Chinese Lifeline - 0800 888 880
  (for people who speak Mandarin or Cantonese)
• Youthline - 0800 376 633, free text 234 or email talk@youthline.co.nz
  (for young people, and their parents, whanau and friends)
• What's Up - 0800 942 8787
  (for 5-18 year olds; 1 pm to 11 pm)
• The Lowdown - visit the website, email team@thelowdown.co.nz or free text 5626 (emails and text messages will be responded to between 12 noon and 12 midnight)
• SPARX - an online self-help tool that teaches young people the key skills needed to help combat depression and anxiety.

Yet plagues of anxiety, stress, depression, social phobia, eating disorders, self-harm and loneliness now strike people down all over the world. The latest, catastrophic figures for children's mental health in England reflect a global crisis.

There are plenty of secondary reasons for this distress, but it seems to me that the underlying cause is everywhere the same: human beings, the ultrasocial mammals, whose brains are wired to respond to other people, are being peeled apart.

Economic and technological change play a major role, but so does ideology.

Though our wellbeing is inextricably linked to the lives of others, everywhere we are told that we will prosper through competitive self-interest and extreme individualism.

In Britain, men who have spent their entire lives in quadrangles - at school, at college, at the bar, in parliament - instruct us to stand on our own two feet.

The education system becomes more brutally competitive by the year.

Employment is a fight to the near-death with a multitude of other desperate people chasing ever fewer jobs. The modern overseers of the poor ascribe individual blame to economic circumstance. Endless competitions on television feed impossible aspirations as real opportunities contract.

Consumerism fills the social void. But far from curing the disease of isolation, it intensifies social comparison to the point at which, having consumed all else, we start to prey upon ourselves.

Social media brings us together and drives us apart, allowing us precisely to quantify our social standing, and to see that other people have more friends and followers than we do.

As Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett has brilliantly documented, girls and young women routinely alter the photos they post to make themselves look smoother and slimmer.

Some phones, using their "beauty" settings, do it for you without asking; now you can become your own thinspiration. Welcome to the post-Hobbesian dystopia: a war of everyone against themselves. Continue reading

• George Monbiot is the author of the bestselling books The Age of Consent: A Manifesto for a New World Order and Captive State: The Corporate Takeover of Britain.

When I was 17, I was diagnosed with Chronic Depression (yeah, we're diving straight in) but I believe that if I'd had the guts to see my doctor earlier, it would've been diagnosed when I was 13, or maybe even earlier.

I suffered from Insomnia throughout high school - most weeks surviving on as little as 20-30 hours sleep a week (along with some naps during class) and just recently, my doctor has begun to suspect I'm Bipolar.

Why am I tell you all of this? Because it's absolutely nothing to be ashamed of. It's part of my story, my journey through life. Yeah, maybe it's a bit more messy than your story, or maybe it's less messy and you're thinking that I should stop being so dramatic.

Either way, mental illness is something that needs to be talked about so sit down, close your mouth, and pay attention. Please.

‘My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?'
When I was at my sickest, I was a very angry person. Here I was, a girl who had been baptised, had my First Communion, and I thought God was awesome! Then out of nowhere, He messed with the chemicals in my brain and ditched me, or at least that's what it felt like.

As a person with a mental illness, it can be very easy to feel like you've been abandoned by God or even worse, find yourself hating Him. Not only is this awful because God deserves our love, not our hate, but also because it can be so detrimental to recovery.

Having anger at your mental illness does nothing but fuel it. The day I realized that is the day my recovery began and though I hadn't found my faith at that time, it was also the day I stopped hating God.

Letting go of the anger and the hate made me light enough to start the uphill journey to being healthy - before that it was like I was trying to drag a massive cement block up the hill with me, not impossible but a whole lot harder! Continue reading

• Danielle Robb works as a Youth Consumer Advisor in Child and Adolescent Mental Health which allows her to use her experience with mental illness to improve other young people's journeys.

It was not a typical start to an end-of-year prizegiving speech, but that's exactly what Timaru's Roncalli College head boy Josh Batchelor wanted.

The popular 18-year-old stood in front of hundreds of people on Thursday night to announce that he had spent his final year of school battling depression. Continue reading

For years, he was to me a poster-child for depression. Laughter became his shield, as it has for many who suffer from mental anguish, but he still was internally haunted. I know in my own struggles with depression, comedy was exactly what I used before discovering the toxic cocktail of food, porn, and booze (really, just don't do it).

A little secret of mine is that my first real writing gig was a weekly satirical column in the Eugene Comic News and I got to meet a lot of comedic writers through that.

All of them struggled with some form of mental anguish.

So it is that many wonder how a man who is so funny, so full of life, and with so much adoration, could be depressed.

When I hear people asking that, I swing between having no answer to wanting to hit my head against a book case.

The same question was asked again when Mother Teresa was "outed" as having dealt with some heavy dark nights of the soul.

No one could figure out how a holy woman could feel God's presence, act in great charity, and yet feel the pains of depression.

Then there's my personal life

One of the most jovial friends I ever had killed himself after his wife left him several years ago, and just a week ago another close friend attempted to take his own life.

I've recently been public about my own struggles with MDD and how many times I stared down that abyss where death seemed like it would be the only relief.

At one point, medication and a lot of counselling is the only thing that made me turn away from it, along with some deep religious experiences that I can only call miraculous.

Yet, you'd never guess that from meeting me in person.

The depressed look nothing like that

The average depressed person is not wearing black eye-liner and writing emo lyrics for a crappy band.

Sure, I went through a phase of listening to a lot of punk and metal, but I generally don't wear all black.

Instead, those who deal with depression are, in my experience, folks who can be quite charming and even seem to be always happy.

This would, to some minds, seem to point to an overall good mood. In private, though, it's a living hell.

My particular form of mental illness is defined by an over-all low mood. Most days I can function normally, but there are those days when getting out of bed seems like the hardest thing in the world to do.

On the worst days, I've had to check myself into a hospital because all I could think about was ways I'd like to die.

That part is hard to explain to people who have never been there. It's not so much a desire to no longer exist, but a wish that whatever this is that is clouding my judgement would just be gone.

The worst of it, though, is the loneliness. The feeling that even God has abandoned you to your sufferings and that relief is not coming.

I'm much better now than I was even five years ago, but trust me that those feelings rarely go away.

Even though I have a job I love, good friends, and a loving family, I am always having to worry about the day that the bark of the black dog will be too loud to endure.

That's the point of depression and all other forms of mental illness: it clouds the mind and impairs judgement, you are literally unable to think straight and sometimes reality looks like a hazy dream.

My mother once described it as seeing the world through a thick blanket.

You can't reason with it, you can't negotiate with it, and even if you understand that your thought process is not normal or healthy, it's easier to make out with a grizzly bear than to try to keep your mind from repeating that inner dialogue.

I don't expect this to make sense, because it barely makes sense to me and I have to live with it every day.

Throw in the fact that I, like many depressed people, keep a persona bon vivant, it becomes alienating when my mood reaches a low where I can't even stand my own company. We want so badly to have some companionship, but we're so afraid of our own minds that we'd shiver at exposing other people to our inner darkness.

That, above all else, is why I write. I don't like writing on this subject.

It takes just about every once of energy I have to write about depression. But, if one person can understand that they're not alone than I can hope that my mild discomfort can help them.

The world though, especially most Catholic media, is lousy at offering the help we need.

In the months since I started writing openly about depression and faith I've received the kind of cheap email messages that drive people crazy; things like, "have you tried avoiding gluten or taking Omega-6 oils," (because, holy crikey, I just needed Dr. Oz, M.Div all along) or "maybe you should pray more" (because depressed people don't pray, ever).

Depression is hard to understand, I get that, but we could be better at explaining it and helping the many who endure it find some form of healing or at least enough grace to go on. Depression does not sell conferences or books, but we need to see how many people it touches and do what we can. Lives are on the line.

Arise from the darkness!

I wanted to point out that depression touches many lives, whether we know it or not. Even my worst days I can fake being happy for a few hours before I collapse in exhaustion. If someone is depressed, you may never know it unless they feel comfortable enough to let their guard down. Then, it's up to you to do what you can to be a friend, mother, spouse, or whatever part you play in their lives.

Unlike many illnesses, it does not always show outwardly. The person in your life suffering mental anguish is probably barely aware of it himself. Dig, though, and it's there. Like all conditions of the Fall, we cannot let it fester in darkness but there needs to a light to shine the truth and to give hope to those who feel like all hope has abandoned them.

Depression doesn't give a damn about your status, vocation, race, or financial situation. Yet, neither does Christ. If we want the mentally afflicted to find the peace that surpasses all understanding, we need first to open the doors and to let it in, and that is what Christian charity ought to do.

If someone in your life is suffering mental anguish, I can tell you from experience what works and doesn't work. Don't try to cure them unless you are a doctor or a real wonder-worker, and for heaven's sake do not try to tell them, "But how can you be depressed!" Instead, let them know that they do have a friend, who is willing to carry a lot of their pains if necessary, and accept it if silence is their only response. Then, pray for help and that grace will be sufficient to get them through, but be aware that you probably are called to be an instrument of that grace. It means some work, but love demands it.

Also, if you are reading this and have been exhausted by your own black dog, know that it is not all there is. I've found some peace, but it doesn't mean my burden is gone. Seek help, go for a walk, do whatever you can to come back tomorrow with the determination that you shall live. Also, know that God did not take on our nature and defeat death just to leave you alone. It may sound cheap, I know, but sometimes that is the only assurance I have and it is no small thing.

To end, here's a little poem by one man that few knew struggled with depression, Mr. G.K. Chesterton:

THIS much, O heaven—if I should brood or rave,
Pity me not; but let the world be fed,
Yea, in my madness if I strike me dead,
Heed you the grass that grows upon my grave.

If I dare snarl between this sun and sod,
Whimper and clamour, give me grace to own,
In sun and rain and fruit in season shown,
The shining silence of the scorn of God.

Thank God the stars are set beyond my power,
If I must travail in a night of wrath,
Thank God my tears will never vex a moth,
Nor any curse of mine cut down a flower.

Men say the sun was darkened: yet I had
Thought it beat brightly, even on—Calvary:
And He that hung upon the Torturing Tree
Heard all the crickets singing, and was glad.

Michael J. Lichens is the Editor of Catholic Exchange and blog editor of St. Austin Review. When he's not revising and editing, he is often found studying and writing about GK Chesterton, Religion and Literature, or random points of local history. He holds an A.M. from the University of Chicago Divinity School and a BA from The Thomas More College of Liberal Arts. To hear some of his musings, find him on Twitter @mjordanlichens

Reprinted with permission from The Catholic Gentleman

In a brief article, L'Osservatore Romano called the comedian and actor an "unforgettable clown with a heart of gold".

Williams had recently been battling severe depression , according to his publicist. He was known to have bipolar disorder, depression and drug abuse problems.

"Born in Chicago July 21, 1951 and raised in Michigan, he graduated from the Juilliard School in New York," L'Osservatore Romano noted.

It pointed to how "Williams came to popularity in the late seventies interpreting the hyperactive alien Mork in the TV series Mork and Mindy".

The publication recalled Williams' numerous memorable roles - in both comedy and drama - including "Good Morning, Vietnam" (1987), "Dead Poets Society" (1989), "Hook" (1991) and "Mrs Doubtfire" (1993).

It also noted the Academy Award that he won in 1998 for Best Supporting Actor in "Good Will Hunting".

Mental health experts said that the fact that a universally loved figure like Robin Wllliams could commit suicide "speaks to the power of psychiatric illness".

Ken Duckworth, medical director of the US National Alliance on Mental Illness, said the tragedy "speaks to the need for better treatments and the need for society to be more welcoming to people who have these conditions".

Oblate priest Fr Ronald Rolheiser, OMI, who writes an annual article about suicide, stated in 1998 that suicide is the most misunderstood of deaths.

For most suicides, it is not true that it is voluntary, he wrote.

"A person dying of suicide dies, as does the victim of physical illness or accident, against his or her will," Fr Rolheiser wrote.

"People die from physical heart attacks, strokes, cancer, AIDS and accidents. Death by suicide is the same, except that we are dealing with an emotional heart attack, an emotional stroke . . . an emotional fatality."

The Catechism of the Catholic Church states that "grave psychological disturbances, anguish, or grave fear of hardship, suffering, or torture can diminish the responsibility of the one committing suicide (CCC#2282)".

Lifeline 0800 543 354

Youthline 0800 376 633

Suicide Crisis Helpline 0508 828 865

Sources

• Catholic News Agency
• Religion News Service
• Ronrolheiser.com
• Vatican website
• Image: Empire Online

"It is true that at that time, they could confuse epilepsy with demonic possession; but it is also true that there was the devil! And we do not have the right to simplify the matter, as if to say: ‘All of these [people] were not possessed; they were mentally ill'.

"No! The presence of the devil is on the first page of the Bible, and the Bible ends as well with the presence of the devil, with the victory of God over the devil."

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Psychiatric diagnoses have always been difficult and unreliable. This is one of the major reasons why illnesses seem to come and go. It was said that the best way to cure schizophrenics in America in the 1960s was to move them to England, where they would be considered merely ‘eccentric'. And it remains true that schizophrenia is still diagnosed less frequently in the UK than in the US. America has always dominated the psychiatric world.

Americans might not be too eager to accept that mental illness could be culturally determined, but in the UK we have tended to import their illness in much the same as we have embraced their taste in personal injury lawyers, sitcoms and diet. In the US, someone might be regarded as socially unskilled, unassertive and emotionally repressed; in Japan, the exact same behaviour might be considered simply demure or polite.

Psychiatrists have a tendency to colonise and pathologise behaviour patterns. New syndromes appear, the diagnostic manuals grow larger with each new edition. Naughty children now have attention deficit-hyperactivity disorder or adolescent defiant disorder. All sorts of behaviour previously thought of as selfish, immoral, even shameful, now gets nicely medicalised with a label that can be seen to excuse it. And soon there will be pharmaceutical companies with appropriate drugs to cure these new illnesses. Continue reading

Sources

• Aeon Magazine
• Image: You Tube

Eating disorders are characterised by unhealthy or extreme views of one's weight and/or shape, which leads the young person to engage in severe, restrictive and dangerous eating and/or exercise behaviours. These behaviours in turn impact on the child's life in a such a pervasive and significant way that it impacts on their ability to function in their daily lives.

Eating disorders are most common among females and while they can start at any age, teenagers between 13-18 years seem to be most at risk (TPTPR). An important question for parents is then, how do you identify and eating disorder and how to do you go about helping your child?

What are the types eating disorders?

There are several types of eating disorders, with the most recognised being Anorexia Nervosa and Bulimia Nervosa.

Anorexia Nervosa is characterised by significant weight loss with an accompanying intense fear of gaining weight or becoming ‘fat'. People with Anorexia Nervosa see their bodies in a distorted way, typically believing they are fat even when they are extremely underweight.

Bulimia Nervosa is characterised by seemingly uncontrollable episodes of eating to excess, followed by behaviours aimed to rid the body of the calories ingested, such as undertaking excessive exercise, taking laxatives and vomiting.

Even if your child does not quite fulfill the symptoms of Anorexia Nervosa or Bulimia Nervosa, two significant risk factors for developing a more serious eating disorder are:

● Disordered eating: For example, restrictive dieting, fasting, self-induced vomiting, avoiding food groups, use of diet pills. Australian and New Zealand research indicates that engaging in moderate dieting behaviour puts young people at a six-fold risk of developing an eating disorder. Disordered eating is in fact the most significant indicator that your child could be developing an eating disorder. Continue reading

Sources

• Sydney Morning Herald
• Image: The Telegraph

Sorry.

Perhaps it's ironic that, in seeking release from pain, his life ended in one of the most painful ways possible. Perhaps he's at peace at last.

I met Carl six years ago when I was managing a trust committed to the housing of mentally ill people, and he was seeking accommodation.

He had mental illness, and he wished he hadn't. Paid work was not on his possible list, but he tinkered with old computers and other electronics. Necessary medication was resisted and he was not keen on mental health workers having input into his life. Consumption of alcohol became an important solace and painkiller, and increasingly a gripping addiction. Continue reading

Sources

• Robin Guy in The New Zealand Herald
• Image: AKT

Robin Guy has recently retired after 50 years' involvement in the mental health sector.

Mr Hague said he had watched members of the church on Auckland's Queen Street target vulnerable people.

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