Kirsten's stories

Kirsten's story - What family and friends can do

So, I'm Kirsten. I originally I'm born in Denmark and grew up in Denmark and came out to Australia about eight years ago. And I have two beautiful little children that's six and four years old, single mum.

So my mental health journey's probably started about when I was nine. I'm 32 now, so it's been quite some years. I think some people they prevent speaking about what they're struggling with because of they're afraid of being judged by the community and people around them. I think for me growing up in Denmark, where it's probably not as much stigma as there is in Australia, if you ask me from my personal experience, is that I'm probably a little bit more open and a little bit more talkative to people and telling people where I'm at.

One thing I like about Australian culture is the "Hey, how you going?" But sometimes I also feel like that takes away from actually connecting because we're asking that to everybody and we're kind of just expecting a "Yeah, good." Or something. So if people actually would say, "Actually I'm struggling." People don't really know what to say. They're like, "Wait, this is not what you're meant to say or answer." I think when you have mental health, you are very good yourself at bashing yourself and say, "I should be able to cope with this. I should be able to do this." So if we can get rid of some of all that stigma and get rid of people judging and saying, "Well, you should be able to do this." Or "Why can't you clean the house, keep the house clean." Or all these kind of things that we might struggle with. There would be more support and we might even get to a point where people with mental health don't judge themselves so bad, and therefore we can maybe get a bit better quicker because we're not feeling so judged. Because it is like we're judged ourselves, then we feel judged by others, and others are judging us, we just get even worse. Instead of getting up we just kind of go down.

Having support from friends and family when you're dealing with depression, it's really important because I've had some that are just kind of been like, "Just get over it." And don't understand why I'm maybe struggling to get everyday life things done, like in a cleaning and stuff like that done, and just kind of just get over it. It's just in your head type thing. And that kind of just makes things even harder because then you, at least for me, I punished myself for struggling so much and then it gets even harder and more overwhelming to do.

When I was in Denmark is a good example. When I actually, when I got into the psych ward for that 10 days, I was afraid of the stigma that I would receive from friends because I was only like 20 or 21. It wasn't like I was... I was young, so I was afraid of the stigma. But I had one friend in particular, I think we did a once a week or twice a week, I would either go to her or she would come to me and we would cook dinner together. I had another friend or two that we would once or twice a week, we'd go for a walk in the forest together. We'd just schedule it in, it would be a set day, I think.

So I actually experienced a lot of support from a lot of people and just like, "What can we do? Where can we come alongside you and help you?" So that's really helpful and supportive rather than kind of just snap out of it and go for a walk on your own. Of course, I could have gone for a walk on my own, but I didn't. Having that someone that was depending on me and was going to meet me there, made me get out of the door, where if I didn't have that, I would have just stayed at home in bed probably.

I think it's very important for people to have a good understanding and education around mental health. If you break your arm or your leg, people understand that you're out of action or you can't fully function, but when it's mental health, a lot of people don't really understand it and they're like, "Oh, just get over it. Just snap out of it. It's just in your head." Yeah. So, that doesn't help someone that's struggling to be told those things.

Kirsten's story - Workplaces need to be understanding

I'm Kirsten. Originally, I'm born in Denmark and grew up in Denmark and came out to Australia about eight years ago. And I have two beautiful little children, that's six and four years old; single mom. So my mental health journey probably started about when I was nine. I'm 32 now, so it's been quite some years. I think like some people they prevent speaking about what they're struggling with because they're afraid of being judged by a community and people around them. I've also probably in a job I've had, my boss has been understanding of different things going on with the separation from my ex, in the more practical side of things, but there's not really been an understanding of the mental health side and I've felt like really a lot of pressure from him to get different things done for work when I just was struggling with everything at home at the same time. Yeah.

I think it's very important for people to have a good understanding and education around mental health. If you break your arm or your leg, people understand that you are out of action or you can't fully function, but when it's mental health, a lot of people don't really understand it and they are like, "Oh, just get over it. Just snap out of it. It's just in your head." Yeah. That doesn't help someone that's struggling to be told those things. I've also recently been to a job interview where I was honest about having become a single mom, having the kids to work around, and also that I do struggle a bit currently with depression, and I found it very positive because they seemed to positive towards me. And they were like, "Preferably we're looking for a full-time person at the moment, but with your circumstances, we would look at accommodating for that.

Obviously, I haven't heard if I'm getting the job but just getting that positive feedback helps someone with mental health that maybe is nervous going into that job interview or something. Just getting like that you're not feeling like just because you're having those issues you are not going to be looked at at all. Yeah.