After making the long arduous climb out of depression, 16-year-old Di Sha Phillip wants to extend a hand to others trying to make the same difficult ascent.

The Brampton Centennial Secondary School student is a bright, articulate young woman determined to remove the public stigma that clings to those suffering from mental health disorders and creates a potential obstacle to recovery.

While battling depression, Phillip found stigma stained the way others saw her and even how she viewed herself. Neither perspective aided in getting help or recovering from the emotional fall that landed this teenager in a mental health unit at the local hospital.

Phillip has bravely stepped forward to put a face on mental illness and establish a grassroots organization she has dubbed Students Erasing the Stigma. Her hope is to start youth chapters within local schools to raise awareness about mental health issues and assist troubled students looking for help.

“I’m doing this because I got out of a really bad situation last year with depression and I’ve been involved in the mental health system and I realized there isn’t a lot of youth activism going on, like at a local level, to help people understand mental illness and mental disorders,” she said.

Phillip is a high academic achiever who, at a glance, might seem an unlikely candidate to experience serious mental crisis. However, experts agree mental illness has no regard for intellect, gender, age, race, ethnicity or socio-economic standing. It strikes without discrimination, can be paralyzing and sometimes be fatal.

Last year, Phillip was a Grade 10 student in Turner Fenton Secondary School’s highly regarded International Baccalaureate (IB) Program. The demanding pre-university course challenges the academic and life skills of high school students with the Peel District School Board. Program graduates can access universities all over the world.

As depression began to take a firm grasp, other students in the highly competitive IB program started to see her as emotionally weak. She found herself shunned by peers, bullied and the topic of gossip. She has since transferred out of the IB program to Brampton Centennial.

Some schoolmates last year referred to her as an “emo— a popular culture term and stereotype used to sometimes describe someone who can be emotional, introverted, depressed, prone to self-injury and suicidal.

“I didn’t necessarily fit that kind of image, but I was very unhappy,” she admitted. “I did say a lot of negative things about my life, how I didn’t like myself and I didn’t like the way I was and the person I’d become and I guess they kind of didn’t really understand what was going on with me and they kind of started to ostracize me in that way.”

High expectations, academic demands, stress and competition in the program, coupled with her poor self-perception, grandmother’s death and depression eventually led to a nervous breakdown.

“I understood my feelings, but it took me a while to realize what I was feeling was depression and it was a serious mental illness.”

She was admitted to the adolescent mental health unit at Peel Memorial Hospital where the clinical environment provided access to individual counselling with a psychiatrist and psychologist as well as group training sessions on depression. Participants discussed managing feelings, anxiety, anger and other emotions.

“It was a very relieving experience because I was around other kids who were going through similar situations and it helped me feel at ease and I wasn’t alone,” she said.

Many adolescents battling mental illness fear being labelled crazy by their friends and peers. Skewed ideas about possible treatment also make them apprehensive about seeking help.

Phillip closed herself off from a support network of friends and family. Her parents knew something was wrong but she simply retreated to the bedroom. “They figured it was me being a typical teenager,” she said.

Phillip’s parents, Onam and Chermine, are proud of their daughter’s efforts to get better and her plans to now help others.

“I feel having gone through it, it was a really difficult time for the family and she’s been motivated enough to help other people or encourage other people to come forward and get the help that they need is wonderful,” Chermine said.
In light of the death of Brampton teenager Nadia Kajouji, the family is counting their blessings. A boater found the first-year Carleton University student’s body in the Rideau River about five weeks after the 18-year-old walked out of her dorm room late one night in March.

She had sent an e-mail saying she was going skating. It was later discovered the outgoing, high academic achiever was troubled by a breakup, struggling in school, depressed and talked about suicide.

“It’s a big tragedy. I feel really bad about that. I keep thinking that could have been me if I didn’t get the help that I needed,” Phillip remarked. “It’s pretty scary, my parents were talking about that too.”

Phillip revealed being stigmatized and ostracized by others, who did not understand mental illness, served to drive her further from friends and family.
“It contributed to my low self-esteem and that made me sink deeper within myself,” she said.

A school-based organization run by youth for youth can provide a valuable avenue for students seeking help, Phillip believes. She plans to enlist peer mediators in schools. The group, which presently includes a close friend, is planning community initiatives to raise funds as well as support and network with mental health service organizations in Peel.

A Facebook group she created, under the same name, currently has more than 30 members.

Phillip is preparing a funding proposal to finance youth conferences.
She envisions an event that would gather students from local schools for educational workshops. They would return to their schools as ambassadors to raise awareness about mental health issues.

“With this organization I’m trying to send the message to kids that we shouldn’t be quick to judge others,” Phillip explained. “Instead try to be supportive and try to understand what the other person is going through and that helps them want to get help and probably understand more about what they’re going through.”

More information about the organization is available online at www.freewebs.com/studentserasingthestigma. She can also be contacted by e-mail at studentserasingthestigma@hotmail.com.

• An estimated 10-20 per cent of Canadian youth are affected by mental illness or disorder.
• The total number of 12 to 19-year-olds in Canada at risk for developing depression is 3.2 million.
• Suicide is second only to accidents as the leading cause of death in 15 to 24-year-old Canadians.

In some instances the afflicted, family or friends do not properly address serious emotional problems or mental illness because the signs of trouble are not recognized.
University of Toronto Associate Professor and Chief Psychiatrist at the Hincks-Dellcrest Centre for Children Dr. Marshall Korenblum suggests looking for some of these warning signs:
• Persistence — does depression last more than a couple of days?
• Severity — does the emotional episode interfere with sleep, appetite, concentration, etc?
• Functional impairment— does it prevent the child from doing necessary everyday things such as going to school?
• Interaction with others — does it affect relationships with peers, friends and family?

Most never seek help
Stigma, misconceptions and stereotypes surrounding mental illness can be a real barrier to young people in need of help, according to experts.
Help can make a difference for an estimated 80 per cent of people once depression is recognized, according to statistical data. An estimated eight to 10 per cent of adolescents may experience clinical depression at some point.
“Of those, only one in six will ever get the treatment that they need and a large reason for that is absolutely because of stigma,” said Dr. Marshall Korenblum. Korenblum is associate professor at the University of Toronto and Chief Psychiatrist at the Hincks-Dellcrest Centre for Children in Toronto.

Social acceptance can mean more to some young people than their own well-being. It is not uncommon for teenagers to resist confronting serious emotional problems to avoid the teasing, labeling and disapproval of peers.
“Often in adolescents, the worse thing to be thought of is weak and mental illness is often thought of as a weakness or a character flaw,” explained Korenblum, who has been a practicing psychiatrist for more than 25 years.

Stigma is, in large part, the result of a general ignorance about mental disorders, counselling and treatment. While there is plenty of health education occurring in schools, very little mental health literacy is a regular part of the school system for students or teachers, Korenblum noted.

“Most youth or young people don’t have a clear idea what mental disorders are about and still have notions that you’re crazy if you go see a counsellor or a psychiatrist or psychologist,” said Yasmin Loewe, clinical supervisor with Nexus Youth Services, a community organization working with Peel Children’s Centre to offer teenagers and young adults counselling services.

There are also many cultural barriers to confronting mental illness, Loewe added. In a culturally diverse community like Peel, she encounters many cultural taboos and stigmas around mental disorders.

“A lot of cultures don’t understand mental illness or don’t believe in such things as mental illness,” according to Loewe. “Other cultures have taboos about talking about personal problems (they believe) you should keep within the family or you should speak to religious persons about.”

Sufferers of mental disorders who have the courage to “come out” about dealing with their illness could have a very positive impact, Korenblum suggested. Their experiences could help raise awareness as well as shatter myths and stereotypes.

• Peel Children’s Centre — 905-795-3500, www.peelcc.org
• Canadian Mental Health Association— 905-451-2123, www.cmhapeel.ca
• Mood Disorders Association of Ontario— 416-486-8046, www.mooddisorders.on.ca
• Youth Net help web site—www.youthnet.cmha.peel.ca
• Kids Help Phone— 1-800-668-6868, kidshelpphone.ca

—Roger Belgrave, The Brampton Guardian, Friday June 20 2008