Yep it's that time again, I've not been keeping up with the news much to be fair, I find all the Covid stuff pretty depressing and confusing. But yesterday I heard a guy raise a pretty interesting point and thought we would discuss it today, because I realised the point he was making was very true indeed. At least for our area.
So what did this guy actually say? Well, lets give you some context first, so they were discussing mental health and lockdown, and he said that he found lockdown really hard because he couldn't go to the gym or the pub, and that he tried working out at home but it wasn't the same, he didn't have the same motivation that he has at the gym and so he just didn't do it and his mental health suffered for it. And that he is worried, if we end up in lockdown again and they shut down all the pubs and Gym's his mental health with suffer. Which is fair enough and probably true, I mean I am not the sort of person who works out or get much out of going to the pub, but I know these things are important to some people.
But that's not the really interesting part about what he said, no that came when he said "I have only heard of a few people who have had Covid, this year, but I have heard of loads of people who have committed suicide."
I'll just give you a minute to process that, because it takes a minute to really think about that. And that's what I did and I realised that actually what he said, was very true. Me and Sammy actually sat and worked it out, now bare in mind we are in Cornwall and we did really well here, and didn't get very many covid cases at all. In fact Sammy and I worked out that there was only one confirmed case of covid that we actually heard about locally. This wasn't someone we actually knew, but that we heard about locally.
But we heard of 6 suicide attempts, many of which were heartbreakingly successful and some failed. All again locally.
Now don't get me wrong I am not saying that we shouldn't have been in lockdown because I believe that we should, and that the government did the best they could in a very difficult situation. And that the mistake that was made was properly releasing the restrictions to quickly. But what choice did they really have. People were struggling mentally and financially, businesses were having to shut down. it was a mess.
But I do feel that some exceptions should have been made, you know like for family's or friends to be able to visit loved ones who are on their own and have no companionship. Because can you imagine doing lockdown completely alone. It must have been awful. I mean it was hard enough when you had other people to talk to an interact with at home. Of course the problem comes when people take the piss and twist the rules to suit themselves and I think that's what makes it all so difficult.
It is, no matter how you look at it a really difficult situation, because you can't possibly cover all possibilities or meet everyone's needs in a situation like this.
What do you think? Have you heard of more suicides than covid cases since this all began? How do you feel about that? Do you think things have been handled badly? or do you think it is just an impossibly situations, in which it is impossible to know what is the right or wrong thing to do?
Now this does connect to the news too, I'm not just going off of some random guys words, because there was a bit in the news today about a woman who was found dead by her 5 year old son after lockdown 'broke' her. The Metro's words not mine.
So this lady was called Katie Simm's and she was 32 years old. And her son was Archie.
Now, Katie already had a phobia of going outside, and this naturally heightened during lockdown. Now her brother says that Katie had been struggling since her other brother Barry, took his own life back in 2015.
Barry suffered from PTSD after serving in the Army.
Now prior to this Katie had apparently been very outgoing and sociable but after Barry's death she started to shut herself away and developed a phobia of going outside.
During lockdown, she was also unable to visit her parents. Due to health issues, on both sides I believe. But don't hold me to that.
Now her other brother David says, that the family feel as if they have let her down. Which is heartbreaking, because realistically they were bound by the same restrictions. And having been suicidal in the past, way back when I was like 17, I know its not something that you really feel you can tell people about. It's a complicated thing, something that a lot of people feel they have to keep to themselves.
Something that wrongly, we feel ashamed about.
So what can we do about it?
Well personally I think we have to stop the stigma around mental health. And that is starting to happen. People are becoming more aware and also realising that it can happen to anyone.
I think where we are perhaps not getting this message across clearly enough is men, because a lot of the suicides I have heard of this year have been mostly men.
This whole men don't cry bullshit that has been being passed around like gospel for years, by well men, has to stop. Men can and should bloody cry, we all need a good bloody cry sometimes.
Men really need to start being advocates for other men. Because until they do, I don''t think we are going to see the number of male suicides fall.
What do you think?
Well I am going to leave this here for now, But I'd love to hear your thoughts and comments. Friendly discussion only please. And don't worry about your spelling, grammar or if you've got all your facts right, we don't do that shit here, no ones perfect after all.
Love and hugs
Joss xxx
No comments:
Post a Comment