We Should Talk About This

"It is not the bruises on the body that hurt. It is the wounds of the heart and the scars on the mind." — Aisha Mirza

 

Mental health is important. Mental health is complex. Mental health is stigmatized and very often ignored. Truth is, people around us suffer all the time, usually alone and in silence. 

 
This silence is deafening though. Carrying a heavy burden alone is devastating for those who suffer. A burden that cannot be bottled up or easily communicated. 

 

What if we created a safe space for people to speak up? What if we cared for each other at least a bit more? What if we were open about mental health? 

 

The series We Should Talk About This seeks to give individuals a voice and explore the intricacies of mental health. The conversation has to start somewhere. The time is now, and not anytime later. 

 

The power of vulnerability and acceptance is capable of breaking down every wall. Sometimes it just takes one question or one embrace to make people feel heard and loved.

 

These are the stories of brave AUBG students whose vulnerability and honesty deserves respect and appreciation. In order to preserve their right to stay anonymous, each student will be referred to by random pseudonyms.

 

Jay, a junior at AUBG, seemed rather nervous to start the interview. Understandably so. 

 

“Where to start?” he asked with hesitation, and, after a couple of seconds of mutual silence and shared sympathy, he opened up.

 

“I am definitely suffering from mental illness (depression),” he said, sharing that, unfortunately, AUBG has not been able to give him much support. As a freshman, he took the initiative and went to the university counselor. He left the room so disappointed that he did not go back for another two years.

 

“It was so dreadful. It was so bad, she is just there to get paid, it is simply frustrating,” he said. 

 

He felt disregarded: “I go to her with serious issues, and she just applies it to having a bad day. Did I not just tell her that I was struggling?” 

 

He decided to find somebody else to ask for help, outside AUBG, outside Bulgaria, and even his home country. “I had to find a therapist in Croatia,” he said.

 

Later in the conversation, Jay pulled out a box with pills and asked: “Can I make a live demonstration?” He shook the box a couple of times and then took one pill. “Last batch of antidepressants was so bad for me that I did not feel anything. I was a shallow person,” he said. 

 

Pills are definitely not a quick fix for mental health issues, and as Jay elaborated, they can do as much harm to a person, as provide help. This explains why his journey with antidepressants has been in a way troublesome.

 

Recently, he was prescribed a new set of pills which will take up to three months to show any effect. Jay hopes that this time they will be more helpful and can alleviate his struggles. 

 

“It is a combination of recent events and childhood trauma,” Jay shared. “My school life was so bad, that I felt suicidal for a year or two,” he added.

 

Things did not get easier for him at AUBG. He felt increasingly worse and the only person who managed to help him out was a friend who worked at a gym reception. Apart from being a friend, she was also his personal trainer. 

 

After her graduation last year,  Jay has been suffering more: “I am completely isolated, I have pretty much nobody here. I am silent, alone with my laptop and studying.” 

 

“You just do not know what to do. The counselor does not help. Any mental health event is during the most intensive class periods, and it takes a massive tragic event for anyone to start caring,” he said.

 

He felt angry and disappointed: “What does it take for people to actually take mental health seriously?”

 

He views the AUBG community’s response to mental health topics as a vicious cycle: “People just tend to move on. Tragedy happens, some people start caring for mental health and then they forget,” he referred to the cycle. 

 

“People do struggle with mental health, and they are mostly silent, they cannot cry out for help, they cannot yell, they will remain in silence,” he added.

 

Two weeks after the interview, Jay took a step and visited the new counselor despite his past disappointment and many doubts. The good news is that he shared how the new AUBG counselor was able to offer him actual help. They sat down and talked through Jay’s situation and set a plan for future meetings.

 

The reality is, it took him three years to go back to the university counselor. He shared how he had to convince himself against the hesitation to reach out for help one more time. 

 

The series We Should Talk About This was planned to start last semester. It was supposed to start with a conversation with the AUBG counselor, but needless to say, the counselor was not too enthusiastic to cooperate and contribute. 

 

Once we figure out how to bridge the gaps between different members of the AUBG community, we will certainly have a better and safer space.

 

 

 

 

The university should be a safe space for students - a space where they are encouraged to open up and be vulnerable. 

 

Lila, a senior at AUBG, has not had a positive experience with the previous AUBG counselor either: “I told her I was depressed, and she replied that I was probably just homesick. I felt worse after talking to her.” Her meeting lasted for twenty minutes and none of the counselor’s words made Lila’s situation any better.

 

“Instead, I went to a psychiatrist in Sofia, who prescribed me antidepressants, which I have been on for more than a year,” she shared. 

 

By no means is it a simple way out, though: “Sometimes I do not even understand what’s happening, but overall pills are helping with my depression.”

 

This semester, she went to the new AUBG counselor and left pleasantly surprised. “I think we are approaching a better world with the new psychologist. They should make it known that there are services people can go to in case they need help.”

 

As a Resident Assistant (RA), Lila feels a lot of responsibility: “I want the students to know that we are here for them.” RAs get training, have simulations, and while it is true that they are not professionals, Lila expressed: “Sometimes you just need to talk. They don’t have to be your friends. I was in a really bad state last year and my colleagues showed up at my door with snacks and flowers.” 

 

Lila thinks the community has changed a lot: “There were far more international students before, and it was just easier to blend in.”

 

People can be nice, and people can be judgemental, but still, there must be someone whom you can turn to. “It is like two sides of a coin, you can find both here,” she said.

 

When we talk about the complex nature of mental health, we must acknowledge how most of the time it is not obvious how much a person is dealing with. Behind entertaining jokes, cheerful laughs, and a seemingly perfect demeanor, quite often there is a person who is carrying a heavy weight of struggles.

 

This is the case for Elia.

 

“I have been depressed since I remember. My case of depression is the one that no one knows about,” she said. She has not found it easy to share her case with people around her, because the reactions she gets are similar to: “You don’t look the type,” as she expressed.

 

What is the typical makeup of the person with mental health issues, though? Is there even such a thing?

 

“I often smile. I must be ‘normal,’ she said.

 

She was 17 when she was first hospitalized due to depression. She spent three weeks in the hospital, and still, she felt like she was not taken seriously. Instead of receiving proper help, she found herself helping other children there because most of them were younger and going through similar things.

 

 

“I had already gone through the same things - eating to compensate for my feelings. And I suddenly became a help in hand,” she said. Despite being happy to help others out, she felt like her needs were compromised: “That was not the point though. I needed help too. I deserved that help.”

 

Apart from that, Elia also realized that it was difficult for her mother to spend much time in the hospital with her. Her mother wanted to leave as soon as possible. This brought even more distress to her.

  

“I was fighting a lot of guilt. At least when I was out (of the hospital), I was still struggling but I did not feel guilty anymore,” she added.

 

Fast forward to when she joined AUBG. This certainly marked a difficult period of her life. Her condition escalated even more in the US, where she had to deal with panic disorder.

 

Her time at AUBG has been interrupted many times. From going back to the hospital, to taking a leave of absence, Elia was torn between a paradox: on one hand, she had to take that time to work on her mental health, but on the other, she felt like she was missing out on a lot of experiences at the university.

 

Whenever she came back, she had to do her best to catch up and attend all the lectures, but soon she realized how alienated she felt. “It felt like the whole community was crushing me. Probably it was just me, but I did not feel welcomed, everybody felt distant and as if they had already forgotten about me,” she shared.

 

Elia shared that she is feeling much better this semester, but there is something still lingering. “I still feel empty. I outgrew this place because right now I am facing even bigger issues that have been affecting my life and will continue to do so,” she said.

  

Elia expressed her gratitude for people who sympathize and are willing to listen. After the tragic event at AUBG, one of the professors reached out to her when she missed a class and offered to meet.

 

“I did go to her to talk. I sat there and cried my eyes out,” she shared.

 

The sense of guilt seems like the most overpowering feeling for Elia. The tragic event made her ponder many things. 

 

“Why did I have a chance to survive last year, and he did not? I felt guilty. It takes so much to ask for help, and I wish somebody was there for him,” she added.

 

Elia brought up the important topic of stigma. For many people, mental health is a taboo topic. It does not even cross their minds that someone can be going through hell. “This means they have not been through anything difficult, if they don’t understand. Sometimes I even feel happy for them, because they are so lucky,” she added.

 

Whether or not you are fighting the demons in your head, sympathy is the biggest gift you can and should exchange.

 

Annie’s case is another touching story and brings up many different aspects of mental health. 

 

Annie spent her first year in her home country because of Covid. Right before joining AUBG, she started dating a guy, who at first seemed like a very nice and pleasant person. Yet, things took a radical turn in the relationship, and it soon turned abusive. “By that, I mean not just mental abuse but physical abuse too,” she shared.

 

Considering how the cases of domestic abuse are treated in her country, Annie was very hesitant to speak up about her struggles. “I was too scared to even tell my friends or family.”

 

What is more, her partner was a teacher. With the eight-year -gap, Annie was well aware of the uneven power dynamic which complicated things even more.

 

She tried her best to keep up with her studies at AUBG and even joined two clubs. Yet behind the curtains, Annie was drowning in tears. “I was so devastated that I tried to commit suicide. I had to do something because it was so hard for me to handle the situation,” she shared.

 

Her partner would go from being abusive to convincing her that he loved and cared for her. She felt perplexed and lost: “It’s never always bad, that’s why it was confusing.”

 

Annie tried going to different therapists. One of them told her that she was in a codependent relationship, while the other asked her to not go back: “Because I was not doing a ‘proper’ job. I just couldn’t because it was so mentally exhausting for me.”

 

For her sophomore year, Annie managed to come to AUBG, which made the situation slightly more bearable as her partner was now far away and could not physically touch her. She tried to cut ties with him multiple times, but never successfully: “I blocked him on social media accounts, but he would start messaging me on Gmail or a bank app.”

 

“Please forgive me. I will kill myself. I cannot be without you,” were his words to her. 

 

In her junior year, Annie met her current boyfriend. She found comfort with him and managed to open up and share her pain. “Having a person who listened to me and did not blame me was new,” she said. 

 

Whenever Annie tried to share her struggles with people around her, she would be blamed or called dramatic. So, this was a fresh start for her.

 

Annie still has nightmares and panic attacks. In addition to her personal problems, the political situation in her home country was very troubled, which intensified her anxiety. 

 

“I did not have anybody here (at AUBG). I ‘lost’ so much time in my freshman year. It makes me angry,” she added.

 

She noted that over time she has made a lot of progress. “I can talk about it now without bursting into tears,” she said, “I reached the realization that if I do not help myself, then no one really will.

 

Annie brought up an interesting metaphor: “Imagine that you are a flower. In order for it to fully grow, it needs sunlight. And if it has been deprived of sunlight for too long, it may still be alive but it needs a lot of support, like a wooden stick attached to it. You should also give it some water. That’s how we are.”

 

“It's probably impossible to get rid of all the trauma, but you can learn how to manage it and accept the bad moments too,” Annie added. 

 

She emphasized the issue of stigma: “Crying and being unwell is a normal way of processing grief, expressing emotions. It should be understood.”

 

The conversation then switched to AUBG and gossip culture at AUBG. “It is frustrating. People don’t know what’s actually happening and still…”

 

And still… They gossip, make assumptions, say thoughtless jokes, and go out of their way to label somebody. 

 

We should talk about this, and we should keep doing so. Mental health must not be stigmatized, if anything, it must be the loudest and most frequent conversation topic for us.

 

To be continued…

 

Editors: Toma Krumov and Niya Manditsch