Unlike most people, I became privy to mental illnesses from pretty much the moment I was born. My sister is autistic, you see. I would accompany my mom to get my didi from school – named Psycholab, in the most tone-deaf way possible – with my pretend backpack full of pretend schoolbooks as a toddler. I desperately wanted to start school, preferably with didi. But even then, I knew that a different kind of school was meant for me. Children like me, the ‘normal’ kids couldn’t go to school to study with kids with developmental disabilities. The kids who were called ‘special’ or ‘handicapped’ and by some ‘retarded’ – depending on who you asked.
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The peace at my home depended on what new medication didi would be put on, and what little reaction of ours would tick her off. We were always walking on eggshells and still somehow managing to lead regular lives in the eyes of the world.
Till I was 18, I believed we had to lead dual lives. It was embarrassing to talk to the world about the regular screaming matches at home. The pressure was a bit too much on me, then just a kid, going through the growing pains of puberty and pretending like all was just as it should be at home.
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I developed anger issues and depression, but I didn’t know I needed help. I didn’t know these were also legit mental health issues. Neither did my parents, whose lives were disrupted in a lot of ways because of this secret condition our family suffered from but couldn’t talk about.
I am older now, I’m wiser now. My parents were also younger then, thrown into a situation they never bargained for, surrounded by people who didn’t have the right advice, overwhelmed with the fate that they had been dealt. I realise now that my mental health was not a priority to them then. My tears, my anguish were just additional burdens they were too overwrought to know how to deal with. They tried their best though and that I know now. They tried their best to give me a happy, normal childhood, even though they had no one holding their hands, helping them navigate their unhappiness.
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But I did suffer, not in silence, but without realising that I was indeed suffering. Slightest inconveniences would drive me off the edge. Sometimes there would either be violent outbursts or I would fall apart in puddles of my own agonising tears. I mourned most of my heartaches in solitude, away from even the eyes of my parents. I knew if something happened to me my parents would not only be devastated, but I would become just another tragedy in their lives.
But I have forgiven… I’ve had to forgive them as well as myself. For not talking about it, for being unable to recognise patterns, for being unable to prevent things that would eventually become worse before I could do something to stumble back to being myself again.
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It’s been ten years and it seems like there is so much conversation about mental health awareness. But Indian parents, even the ones who don’t have a child like my didi, or especially them perhaps, are still turning a blind eye and deaf ears to their kids’ mental health issues and traumas. I know this because I’m privy to the suffering of hundreds of teenagers, who write to me on my social media channels. A safe space where I discuss mental health as much as I can, to the best of my capacity. I want them to know that they are not alone. But sometimes, I still find myself grappling for the right words.
When a young boy from Punjab wrote to me about wanting to run away from home because his parents ignore his suicidal tendencies, what is the right way to react? When he tells me his parents brush off his anxiety-driven bouts of nausea as an inexplicable stomach bug, how do I explain that his parents are not entirely at fault here?
How do I explain that to the young girl who writes to me about her toxic and abusive home, that her parents also need patience and guidance, not resolute hatred? How do I tell her that maybe there is no way to change how her parents think? That she might have to give up on them despite how much she wants to love them out of some misplaced sense of duty?
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I now know why I felt things so intensely, why I would overthink and go crazy worrying about things that weren’t even in my control. I now know that my depression, and later, anxiety issues manifested in a way that made me physically sick; not because I ate something bad, but because I was feeling something bad and clutching on to it, so painfully. I now know how much I’ve learnt and unlearnt to get where I am, but my parents never had the same tools I got on the way.
Even though, I always assumed they should’ve known more simply because they were the ‘grown-ups’, like most children do till they grow up and realise that the universe doesn’t magically hand us all the answers to all our problems, once we become adults.
It’s been a decade since I failed to confide in my parents about my depression, about my mental health. It’s been a decade since my parents failed to see how I suffered with my depression, with my mental health, how I took comfort in food, films, friends – basically anything that would help me escape my reality. I tried a few times, feebly. Too feebly for them to notice.
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But I am doing much better now. I fiercely take care of my mental health. I see doctors who give me pills to keep my sad hormones in check. I do things that keep my happiness quotient high, but not too high because then the crash would be bad. I take precautions to keep myself in check, so that my body doesn’t hold onto stress. I still fail on some days.
I get back up again and try to have conversations about how I am doing, with friends, with my mother…I am taking baby steps with my mother. She knows I see someone who helps me stay stress-free. Once upon a time, to my mother, seeing a psychiatrist was meant for kids like my didi. Now all she cares about is me being happy and healthy. If I could go back and help my 18-year-old self, I would. But I am helping myself now. And that’s good enough… for now.
Feature image & all artwork are property of Sonaksha Iyengar and have been featured with her permission.
