'Passing Phase?': Why It's Difficult to Talk about Mental Health with Parents
News 18“I don’t know how my parents will react”. “Should I really burden them with my worries?” Children, teenagers and young adults often find it hard to cope with mental health issues. When parents call mental health issues a “passing phase”, children often tend to dilute the urgency of the situation and evoke equally dismissive responses like, “I am doing fine”. There’s also a general feeling of being distant where family is concerned, and feelings of being emotionally unsupported,” says the 22-year-old student, who has suffered from mental health complications in the past. Without proper skill or understanding to deal with such issues, many often end up falling back on words like ‘abnormal’, ‘odd-behaviour’, ‘sick’ and other incorrect definitions and diagnosis of mental health issues.