It used to be rare for a parent to disclose their child was on anxiety medication

This year’s parent-teacher meetings have been different for many reasons; they have been online for a start, but that has been the easiest change to accept and adapt to. Never before have parents put me under less pressure around their child’s academic performance.

Until this year it was extremely rare for a parent to disclose that their child, my student, has been prescribed medication for anxiety, depression or some other mental condition. And I have never before had parents tell me that they themselves are struggling mentally. I feel truly privileged to be trusted with those insights. I also feel a responsibility to raise awareness about what is emerging as a day-to-day reality.

Talk of the mental health crisis being the real pandemic is something I both welcome and recoil from. The individuals behind all of these statistics co-exist alongside us in society every day. We teach them in our classrooms. We greet them at parent-teacher meetings. We are them. Many teachers would argue that it is hard to find ways to do more for student mental health when their own feels so fragile. During the working week, many teachers feel that they exist in survival mode.

As with the Covid pandemic, we must also be in this one together

I need to remove myself from the conversations where the body language involves shrugging of shoulders and where the inevitable close will reveal defeatism. In these conversations you’ll hear “ah sure, what can you do?”, or general chastisement of Government Ministers and decisions.

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When it comes to mental health any form of the blame game mentality is to miss the point entirely. Each of us has a primary responsibility for our own mental health and a secondary responsibility for the mental health of those we encounter. We could go biblical and quote Matthew's gospel, "So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you", or philosophical by looking to Plato, "Happiness springs from doing good and helping others".

The conversations on mental health that I welcome are ones in which the focus is on doing better, raising awareness, having a positive impact in one’s own immediate context. They involve giving and providing for others in order that those who have less may have more. There is a focus on narrowing the gap between the haves and the have-nots. Conversations like this are creative, energising. They are solution-focused and inspiring. By and large the participants are those who work and mingle in the private sector.

That those of us in the public sector are perceived as less industrious and primed to take rather than give angers me. When I think of all of the friends and colleagues I know who do nothing to merit any of that criticism, I feel a deep sense of sorrow and a strong desire to retaliate and defend. But then I remember how often I want to be the one throwing stones right into my own glasshouse; so often I cringe at how we are represented in the media precisely because of how accurate and embarrassing the portrayal is.

The single greatest service that teachers, as public servants, could deliver right now is committed recognition of, and action on, the dire need for greater mental health support in this country. We are better positioned than any other professionals to ensure that young people spend their days in a place that ensures their psychological safety and mental wellbeing.

As a country we need to recognise that it is time to up our game and look at mental health through a preventative lens. We cannot afford to take it for granted that we are well. With mental health services under considerable pressure and waiting lists long, it stands to reason that doing all we can to avoid needing those services makes sense.

How we all conduct ourselves in conversations on mental health will determine whether such courage pays off and results in individuals feeling supported or not

Ireland’s investment in mental health is historically low. In 2020, 5.2 per cent of overall health funding was allocated to mental health; in 2019 it had been 6.3 per cent. Despite Covid’s inevitable impact on mental health, other areas were deemed more acute and mental health funding was cut. As a nation we were in no position to make that reduction, given that we have always fallen well behind the World Health Organisation’s recommendation that 14 per cent of the overall health budget goes to mental health.

An individual’s mental health battle can feature in other sectors too. Section 12 of the Mental Health Act 2001 gives a member of the Garda the power to take a person into custody if the member “has reasonable grounds for believing that the person is suffering from a mental disorder and that because of the mental disorder there is a serious likelihood of the person causing immediate and serious harm to himself or herself or to other persons”.

A recent report covering a 12-month period from July 2018 to June 2019, “Delivering Custody Services”, reveals that during that time more than 2,000 people were in custody under this legislation, and 3 per cent were under 18 years of age. While that 3 per cent may not represent a huge number of children, more than 2,700 young people were awaiting care at child and adolescent mental health services as 2021 drew to a close. By any standards that is a very high figure.

Little wonder, then, that the families behind those statistics now see it as inevitable that they share their stories openly, including at school. How we all conduct ourselves in conversations on mental health will determine whether such courage pays off and results in individuals feeling supported or not. Tolstoy captures the community aspect of our humanity particularly well with: “If you feel pain, you’re human. If you feel other people’s pain, you’re a human being”.

As with the Covid pandemic, we must also be in this one together.