On Sunday afternoon I met up with a good friend of mine and after they
headed off I went to a local pub to drown my sorrows and work out what
the hell to do with my so-called life. I picked a pub where its ok to
drink alone. Its the sort of pub where poor people go and most stay away
for its dingy atmosphere.
There was only one other guy in there chatting to the barman. He asked
me to play pool but I declined, preferring instead to work things out
for myself. But the guy was insisting I play pool so I had a game.
Hadn't played in years and I'm usually pretty bad but after a few beers
I can look like I know how to play. I think he just wanted to a play
pool and wasn't doing it out of some sophisticated understanding of
mental ill health and its presentation.
We ended up chatting and somehow the conversation got all about me. It
happens a lot. I chatted with this stranger and the barman about the
complex trigger and the things I had to work out. They had differing
opinions but were up for a banter about what was going on in my life. I
was pretty surprised about that but I know good bar folk. Anything
interesting is good banter. The barman was one of those sage's in the
rough. He'd seen much of life and many people through his job. He was
going through an experience akin to mine. We chatting till closing time
about my life, their lives and whatever other topic the conversation
flowed to as easily as the beer flowed out the tap.
The informal mental healthcare system has lots of benefits. There's no
waiting list to chat to a barman. There's the confidentiality of not
being known in that pub and the comradery of playing a game of pool that
does more in one session for client-therapist relations than a full
course of CBT could ever deliver. None of the guys I was chatting to had
degrees nor any mental health training whatsoever except from the best
educational establishment: the university of life or the school of hard
knocks as its also known.
The wisdom, perhaps even the prescriptive instruction, offered to the
barman is something I've considered for the last few days: tell her you
love her. Its so simple and its so true to my core beliefs. My cowardice
holds me back and the social impacts of opening up about impossible love
are holding me back from saying anything. He got through to me in one
pub session better than most professional therapists did in a few.
I'm lucky that I can do that: walk into a pub on my own, get chatting to
a random stranger or barman, open up to them in a way that's interesting
enough to be pub banter but allows me to explore what other people would
do in my circumstances and benefit from the wisdom of people who have
seen more of life than I have. I end up having to leave out a lot of
detail but I share that with people who know me and are willing to be
bored by my opening up. My mask is hard enough that few can see what's
underneath and I can avoid their sympathy or the stigma of mental
illness and help-seeking in certain subcultures, because the barman
would have thought less of me had I said I was "depressed" or I needed
to talk about my problems.
Its this idea of an informal mental health system and as society
improves it becomes stronger. Few understand the informal system as a
form of mental healthcare but its an excellent one that many people use
every day without realising. Its failures is why a formal mental
healthcare system exists.
True progress in real mental healthcare will see the kindness of
strangers grow but perhaps that's just another stupid dream from a
hopeless romantic.
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