By Sola Ogundipe & Clare Ijeoma

Towards ensuring greater intervention in mental health issues in Nigeria, the Federal government has been charged to incorporate mental health into the nation’s school curriculum. The Director, Vivian-Fowler Memorial College for Girls, Lagos, Mrs. Leila Olufunke Fowler-Amba, who made the call in a chat with Vanguard, said such a move was important to help demystify mental health and break the culture of silence surrounding it.

Speaking ahead of the 1st Vanguard Mental Health Summit coming up in Lagos on August 26, 2021, at the EKO Hotel & Towers, in Lagos, Fowler-Amba, who called for robust conversation around mental health issues in the country, said most parents and society as a whole are in denial.

She remarked that in a culture where people don’t talk about their mental health problems, there are so many barriers, even as she lamented that many parents as well as society in general are in denial,  hence the need for matters to be brought to the forefront.

READ ALSO: Abayomi laments dearth of mental health support system in Nigeria

“In our school structure, we need to incorporate mental health into the curriculum. Mental health should be incorporated into the curriculum just like drug use should also be incorporated  at an early stage of learning so that children would understand that a mental health challenge is not the end of the journey, and they can receive help.

“We have to inject mental health into our curriculum, we need to make sure we are having more training for our parents. These are the kind of things we have to bring back, where parents have access and they discover that they are not alone because most people feel they’re alone.

“It needs to be a conversation that’s ongoing. We need to educate people about mental health and  educate parents about it, we need to start having the conversation around mental health issues.

“Although it’s an uncomfortable conversation in our culture  quite right, but we have to understand that mental health is a spectrum. We grew up believing that mental that is  extreme but we have to realise that mental health is a spectrum. 

“It ranges from just very little depression and can go as far as extreme depression. So I think it’s a conversation we need to have so that we can support the children.”

Fowler-Amba noted that culturally, talk about mental disorder is an uncomfortable topic in the home, but she called for  more conversation around mental health issues. We grew believing that mental that is  extreme. The picture of mental health that we had was that it is extreme.

“But we have to realise that mental health is a spectrum.  It ranges from just very little depression and can go as far as extreme depression. So I think it’s a conversation we need to have so that we can support the children.” 

Pushing the argument for the  conversation around mental health to be  an ongoing process, Fowler-Amba charged educators to be rise up to the challenge.

“I think there’s no school that won’t have encountered a problem with a form of mental health and that’s why I’m specifically saying that it’s a spectrum. You’re not going to see people take off their clothes, that’s extreme.

“One thing every educator needs to know is that mental health connects with learning. When a child is being rebellious or not doing well in school, that could be attributed to some form of mental health. 

“So everybody in every school will be in denial if you say you haven’t experienced that, so the key now is not to be in denial but what tools are you going to bring together to support the children so that at the end they can finish well?

“And one of the tools which every school needs to have is  an open door policy so that children can  talk. There needs to be connection  among students and teachers, you have to bring in mindfulness with the teachers because even teachers suffer  mental health breakdown, and mental health awareness is for parents as well.”

Noting that school prefects should be empowered to have a mental health week, Fowler-Amba said a counsellor and a school psychologist should also be available in schools.

She argued that the 21st Century calls not only for a school counsellor but also a school psychologist. 

“There’s a bit of denial, this current generation calls for those infrastructure, educational infrastructure being in place for the children to function because  there’s an interconnection between all those things.

“It’s a tripod. You know in education, any successful educational system has to have an educational tripod – the parents, the student and the school – there has to be collaboration between all parties so that there’s one voice being spoken.

“For instance,  like every other school, Vivian Fowler Memorial girls School,  has a counselor but we have gone the extra mile where we have a child psychologist  because you need an expert in  mental health.

“You need somebody who has been  schooled and who is certified, so we have a child psychologist who comes  three times a week and she meets with every student. She’s working on mastering their behaviour, confidence,  personalities and then anybody that needs a referral is recommended to our child psychologist. But our child psychologist works from a holistic point of view.

“Every child is important. We realise that one of the tools towards improving mental health is personality mastering which brings about self confidence which sheds away insecurities, which makes that person confident about being who they are.

READ ALSO: COVID-19: PENGASSAN petitions DPR, raises alarm over workers’ mental health

I think what we have learnt from Covid-19 pandemic is that the relationship between the school and student is extremely significant. Any institution that survived COVID-19 wouldn’t have  if it didn’t have some kind of mental health support system for their children.

 I totally agree that parents too should be on social media in order to monitor their wards. Parents have to understand what the whole process is.  Fathers needs to be more significant because we are bringing up children and there’s a term called toxic masculinity which means that there’s a lot of pressure on a man to be a man which means that in the process, parents are not understanding that this leads to mental breakdown because there’s a lot of pressure.”

On mental health and youthful exuberance, Fowler-Amba  argued that mental education does not end with the one-off, but has to be ongoing.

“Parents have to work towards being observant because children don’t talk sometimes to avoid being judged. So I think that the government as well has to provide. People don’t know where to go.

“For instance, if you look in westernised countries, if a child is feeling suicidal or depressed, there’s a number that can be called.

“I’m sure there a number in Lagos state but how accessible is it? I think that perhaps there has to be partnership between the private sector and the public sector because a child is not going to come to you and tell you he is suicidal. It doesn’t work like that.

“Mental health should be open. If  there are two things we are not talking about in our society, it is drug use and mental health. 

“The conversation about mental health is one  we don’t have so shy away from. I think there needs to be more of this conversation, just as there needs to be training.

“We need to make sure that teachers don’t see themselves as just teachers but also giving pastoral care because they spend more time with the children than even the parents, so it needs to be incorporated into our curriculum.

“What is scary is that, a few years ago, I was doing a research and found that in the whole of Nigeria, we had fewer than 200 psychiatrists, so how do they deal with 200 million people?

“We don’t even have the infrastructure to assist children if they’re feeling suicidal because there’s also the expense so I think part of retooling or rewriting our curriculum is that we need to look into few academics because if we don’t have people skilled, you don’t have emotional intelligence, you can’t even survive in the workplace. You can’t be employable.

“I would say that a mental health challenge is not the end of the world. We all suffer from mental health challenges, it’s a spectrum.

“I’m sure many people wake up one day and they don’t feel 100 percent and it’s important for us to understand that to these children, need a lot of mastering, patience, ears they can answer to and, I especially say to parents, you need time with your children.

“We need to support these  children, we have to understand that the way we were brought up is not the way they  will be brought up. Most especially, I think that we should get away from seeing mental health as a stigma. With treatment, with support, it’s something we can overcome.”

Vanguard News Nigeria