#pinkelephant

Mental Health Week 2018

I have begun to find it increasingly difficult to keep my personal views about mental health, private.

Boundaries exist ethically to ensure that we as workers can remain fully present and attentive to the needs of the client in front of us. I still see this as important and I maintain.

However as individuals in a workplace we do not present 100% of the time objectively with our clients, we have our own time in the office too. We also have to be ourselves with our colleagues. If we can't be honest and open with our colleagues when things may be challenging, then this stoic independence can also then affect our effectiveness in the workplace, and with our clients if we are not fully in our best frame of mind for work.

I have not blurred the boundaries when working with clients. It is with colleagues internal and external that I have found the harder aspect to integrate. Part of mental illness is the hidden shame and stigma that prevents us from speaking out about it. Often this can then be perceived as a sudden quite dramatic change in behaviour or attitude that is simply the build up of trying to manage alone for so long.

I have, and have seen others reach a point of heightened intensity that then results in a short time off to sometimes longer. It is the most effective solution some would say. To be able to remove ourselves from the situation amplifying our stress. Why is it we need to move so our expressive emotions don't have to be witnessed by others.

Yet, this presents because we've reached a point where we can not deny or fake our 'feel good happy mood' that we wear as a mask and a face about the office. When we can't fake it anymore,  thats when externally, people would say 'a person is ill, or that person is depressed or not coping'. It is not that we are ill then, it would've started much earlier. It is just that our bodies will not hold the emotions at bay that we can ignore them anymore and there goes the ability to fake a mask.

All of these things over the past three years I have come to terms with. There were times that I couldn't keep a lid on my mood, or tears or voice anymore. On those days it would be hard to get out of bed,  to change, get to my car and then get out of the car. Still had the opportunity to stall or hesitate before getting to the work door and then my office. Each of those steps in the morning became harder to do and huge to accomplish. They don't affect me so much now.

What is hard to come to terms with is that before, I used to try and pretend that I didn't have any dramas going on. I was fine... I'm just not smiling today. I reached a point that faking my mood for the office was no longer an option. And then there is just the real you under that mask. In my case I got to a point that I couldn't force myself to pretend I cared, or that I wanted to be there. I was so hopelessly despondent, burnt out and needing to stop. I got all of that. I stopped. I took a break. I went close to utterly broke and then from that space I had to slowly work my way back to being a functioning adult in the workplace again.

Coming back to work after a year off for depression has had it challenges. I'm grateful that my work supported me with time to address my health. The interesting thing is though, when most people take 12 months off in their 30's they are usually on maternity leave. I came back and realised that most people thought I'd gone and had a kid.  It doesn't always flow into conversation, to say you needed time off for dealing with issues, though I would manage to say 'I've just been on leave.' However it is still that shame and stigma that made it hard for me to be honest..

In the first year (October 2015 - 2016) I tried to hide my illness from people both professionally and privately. Then in the second year, I removed myself through this time off and still couldn't always talk about what I was going through. In this third year towards re-integration, I now find myself back at work, where people don't know why I've been away, and it is something that I have wished I could have shared at the time and maybe have been able to get support from people.

Because I've come to realise that the only way to heal and accept having a mental illness is that you have to normalise it. Make it common. Open up a little and put away that stoic face.


Sure, maintain boundaries and objectivity with clients. But allow room for colleagues to become open. Colleagues should not treat their colleagues as clients. Attempting to maintain objectivity here fragments the individual, into the work they do, from the person they are. We all know that people are more effective and happy when they can embrace all of who they are. We can't hide our past, who we are, particularly when our illness or our quirks  can't always stay hidden. There will be off days.  

This is most important realisation I've had, I now need to integrate this new me, the me that is no longer hiding from having had depression, into my current everyday workplace. I've started to do this. I find it hard though when colleagues don't acknowledge this change in me. That it is ignored when shared. Or simply skirted around. I'd rather name that pink elephant in the room and get it out in the open. I'm done hiding.

In this industry, I think we could do a lot more to support our fellow colleagues.  You can't be authentic if you are responsive to clients and not responsive to colleagues. That shows lack of integrity. It is two faced. It is damaging to professional relationships. An opportunity to show empathy towards a persons vulnerability is lost and it further reinforces stigma.

If someone shares a personal mental health story or journey with you, whatever the circumstance of where you are, in the community, with friends, or your workplace, take the opportunity to thank them for sharing.  Attempt to learn from them how it's been, what's helped and accept that part of them. They are still a person that you've know for a while and you will probably cross paths again. It's not like they've morphed into a #pinkelephant that you can't talk to anymore.