Why is the PoC experience of mental health different?

Stigma Within PoC Communities

In a lot of PoC cultures, mental health is still not a concept understood or respected by more conservative cultures. Hence mental illnesses like depression is dismissed as weakness or even laziness, and anxiety disorders are disregarded as overreacting.

Ultimately these dismissals of mental health can be summed up as a general inability to listen and respect other members of their communities. What can exacerbate this issue is in a lot of cultures, there’s a general obsession with the concept of ‘saving face’ [maintaining one's social standing, reputation, and honour]. Because mental issues is seen as shameful and since these communities are so obsessed with preserving an outward appearance, the need to hide mental health issues becomes more urgent and desperate. As a result, a vicious cycle forms and their mental health suffers even more.

Gaslighting

Gaslighting is a form of emotional abuse that’s seen in abusive relationships; it’s the act of manipulating a person by forcing them to question their thoughts, memories, and the events occurring around them.

It occurs when our struggles with mental heath are dismissed as ‘weakness’ or ‘overreacting’ by our family, when our parents minimise their abusive behaviours towards us and attempt to tell us we are wrong or it didn’t happen. It’s important to recognise gaslighting when it occurs and to trust your own memory and feelings and don’t let anyone invalidate how you feel or what you remember.

W H Y I S T H E P O C E X P E R I E N C E O F M E N T A L H E A L T H D I F F E R E N T ?

Cultural Identity Crisis

PoC in Western societies often struggle with the experience of feeling like they do not fully belong in either their family’s culture nor in the Western white society they live in. They instead exist in a void flitting between both cultures but never truly settling in one culture, which is a lonely existence; to never truly belong and feel at home.

Inevitably, this can have an adverse impact on one’s mental health especially without a strong support network able to relate and empathise with this experience.

Intergenerational Trauma

Historical trauma resulting from colonialism and genocide are handed down from generation to generation, adversely affecting the identities and experiences of PoC. This has eroded cultures, dispossessed them of their lands and forced them to migrate to places that demand they relinquish their identities to survive.

These experiences place excessive stress on PoC, forcing them into a constant state of fight or flight. Because of this, many grow up with emotionally detached parents who demand perfection in a world that vilifies PoC for being anything less. This fuels abusive behaviour within communities of colour. Paired with institutional racism and the persistent search for identity, PoC are inherently vulnerable to mental health issues.