Education is vital in tackling the problem, particularly as young men such as ourselves are sometimes unwilling to even acknowledge the quality of our mental health, let alone talk to someone. To an all-boys school like Dulwich, this is an incredibly important concern to highlight. Moreover, I truly believe we can go above and beyond simply looking at the problem. Dulwich College is blessed with great medical facilities but sometimes it is not the words of a doctor or counsellor that can help the most, but rather your friends looking out for you and making sure you are all right. With the foundation of the Equality Society, a forum has been created to discuss issues such as these in an open and tolerant environment. Choosing Papyrus (the national UK charity dedicated to the prevention of young suicide) as the charity of the Michaelmas term helped to raise money and further awareness around the issue. The College was also able to bring in several highly charismatic and inspiring speakers including Tim Ramsey, who spoke about his depression in dealing with his sexuality, and in a Liberal Studies session, one father spoke of how his son took his own life. Both were deeply moving and were also very important experiences for young men, especially as the culture of an all-boys school can verge on becoming too macho. Dulwich goes further than this and challenges us to look beyond an often-concealing macho image. With Wellbeing and the continual development of spaces where we can talk about and share experiences of mental-health issues, these can, in turn, become ways of achieving mental health. No young man or woman deserves to lose their life from depression or any other mental-health related issue. I believe that by continuing to tackle this issue together as a community and by raising awareness and support for all, this challenging battle, which too many men and women are fighting and losing, can be resolved.
A voice for a silent problem
Rohan Mistry (Year 13) considers the challenges facing boys and how we can move from mental issues to mental health
I ’m scared. Mental health is very personal to me: five members of my extended family have been afflicted with mental- health problems. If you met my cousin today – a friendly, funny, outgoing guy – you would have no idea that he tried to take his life several times during a two-year long battle against depression. This is the painfully silent problem of depression – an individual can go about their day-to-day life appearing to interact with people normally, yet internally suffering. I don’t mean to be all doom and gloom but it is important that we know what we are dealing with – and this means facing some shocking statistics. In 2014, a total of 6,122 suicides of people aged ten and above were registered in the UK. Of these, 78 per cent were male and 22 per cent were female. Suicide is the most common cause of death for men aged 20-49 in England and Wales. One in 15 people has made a suicide attempt at some point in their life. It is not hard to see why mental health is an issue, yet it will continue to remain a problem unless confronted directly.
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