We need to talk openly about mental illness.

“Hey, stay away from that girl!” the mother warned secretly her child.

This declaration had been repeated so many times that my friend couldn’t even remember how many people had murmured to one another’s ear about her mental condition.

“The neighbors saw me as a crazier! Each time anyone asked my mom about me at school, she affectedly told untruths. I don’t know how my family’s acquaintances could do that to me. Have I ever offended them before? Did they know that it hurts?” An said.

My friend, An, suffered mental illness. When she was in grade 9, before her entrance exam to pass into high-school, An committed suicide. Later, she confided to me that she had broken up with her two-year-boyfriend and had been tired-out additionally because of studying at the same time. Fortunately, her mother accidentally knocked the door to ask her about school problems. After this event happened, her mother never let her lock any doors anymore. She even pulled out the door lock at once for the fear of other worse incidents.

Nevertheless An was an ambitious and active student. At no time did she give up on anything she went for. Invariably she was a great leader from primary school to secondary school. She aimed for thousand-dollar-scholarships of Ivy League to study abroad in the future. Soon after, An felt empty inside and her mood was high and low concurrently. All the two semesters in the last grade in high school, we hang out many times. And whenever An felt so high, she pulled me rushing to the supermarket to buy hundreds of items with exorbitant prices. We bought non-stop and only put at end until she was tired. And An was the one who was hilarious, thoughtful and reliable. She always remembered all of our birthdays to give us anything we wanted. But I refused anything she would love to give me. Conceivably An was trying so hard as far as she was burdened with many imaginary stuffs on her little shoulders. Looking at her gifts for others, I didn’t find my old real friend. It’s not her characteristics, they’re extreme symptoms! There was a day when she felt excellent but maybe in the next, it was sad and gloomy.

“It’s schizophrenia! I am schizo! ” An stood in dead silence when we talked over the phone call.

“You need to back down from anything which had bad effect on you at least this time.” I gave her advice.

It was the darkest time of her life. She admitted to some psychiatric hospitals in the effort to find suitable medication for her condition.

“Most of the time, I couldn’t sleep at all. It sapped all my energy and mood. Sooner I started to hear voices in my head. Those wicked ones told me that I was a fool, that I should die with a bullet in my brain or that I must cut my vein to end up everything. Then the personal physician informed me that I had another schizophrenic episode after many hours I was being strapped down in hospital. She encouraged me that those merely are hallucinations and not my controllable and genuine thoughts. But there’s hope that I have ability to reintegrate the community if I trust her to work on making me well. I can recover my true-self.”

On top of that, An unluckily lost confidence on her younger sister for her sickness.

“ My sister and I were such best friends. We shared our intimate secrets such as dreams, ex boy friends and gossips. The time she went to hospital for a surgery, I made my father take me there every day.”

She retold her story.

“And I thought. “Had she been me, she would have done the same thing. But the thing is… Aimee hasn’t come to the hospital not even once. And in the New Year eve since the first time I came back home from hospital, she even told Thu Antie that she was afraid of being me! Aimee whispered. “I don’t want to be like my sister. That’s why I’ve never come back home early every day when I got my part-time job.””

At the same time, I changed to another class to social group. (In Vietnam, high-school education system was divided into natural science and social science) We disconnected for a while since I didn’t manage time to talk to her, partially I also underwent my own suffering.

After a year and a half, we met over a coffee evening after we passed the university entrance exams. An had been taking medication regularly since the first hospitalization. It was her savior seeing that she was in balance again. Since then, we went out weekly with friends and this July, we are going to travel in 3-day-trip to Sapa for relaxation.

After typing every single word, the story left me inevitable questions. “What if you treat a mental patient in the same way that you treat an old man who suddenly has a heart attack on the street? Will you just be afraid to get too close? Will you just pass by without stopping to help? Somebody might consider it as “family matter” or “personal”. Will you think either a heart attack or a traffic emergency as a personal matter?

In my mind, I treat them sympathetically and regard intervention as CPR training for mental distress. Suffering mental illness is not shameful. Unfortunately it might happen with your family, your friends and your co-workers. Therefor we need to have an open mind to talk about it more and more. “Family matter” or not, the same instinct to avoid the topic of mental illness in fact also prevents many families whose lives have been impacted by it from talking about it, as if it were disgraceful and not genetically unavoidable. Maybe it’s a teenage daughter with an eating disorder or the suicide of a parent. The less we talk about mental illness, though, the more “other” it becomes. And the less we’re able or willing to offer those in the midst of it. Our fear increases.

Hanoi, Jun 24th 2016