A novelist opens up about mental illness
The theme of Mental Health Awareness Week 2021 is mā te korero, ka ora - take time to korero. Taking time to talk sounds so simple, but this basic human need for connection can be overlooked when it’s easier to hide away than show the vulnerable self. I know how this works. I remember trying to deal with mental illness during my darkest days and scolding myself for appearing so needy that I made the decision to stop talking to friends and family.
I write in my new novel Crazy Love, "Every one of us has vices to get through the tough times. We seek solutions and help. Personally, I’ve tried friends, Lotto, tears, blame, prayer, sulking, hiding in closets with my dog, running away, staying in bed, a little alcohol, a lot of alcohol, marijuana, fights and storming out. All of it works. None of it works."
Crazy Love is the story of a couple that fought to stay in business and together through many times of crisis. It wasn’t until three years after losing our business and home that my husband’s Bipolar 1 disorder showed us its fully flexed muscles and caused a mental collapse that had my husband planning an early retirement from life. Failure is an enormous emotion to deal with. Sometimes the resilience of getting up and carrying on just doesn’t work.
In these times, we need to know that we are not alone. In these times, especially, is when we need our community to be there. We need to be brave enough to talk, and to share. Not just to the professionals—most of which have six month waiting lists at present for new clients anyway—but to each other.
We need to talk, a friend messaged me last night. I finished your book a few days ago, and I’m still processing things, but when I have, I need to talk to you about it.
Another friend told me about a thread that started during the latest lockdown between wāhine writers looking out for each other with support, advice, and encouragement. "Being a writer is a privilege," she says. "By its very nature the journey is lonely, uncertain and stressful—a challenge for mental health." And she’s right. During the lockdowns of 2020 this writer-friend formed a messenger group with myself and two others. We call ourselves the Lockdown Bitches, and we often ask each other for advice. Sometimes a question can sit there for hours, even a day or two before everyone has responded, but knowing it is a safe place to express concerns and ask for help doesn’t need immediate answers. Just knowing they are there and listening is so reassuring.
This is how we love each other. By being there. By sharing.
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Books can often be a gift of love in these times too. I think of Hinemoa Elder’s book Aroha, published a year ago, and still frequently in the NZ bestseller list. A discovery of traditional Māori philosophy through 52 whakatauki, one for every week of the year, such as: "Ki te kotahi te kakaho ka whati, ki te kapuia, e kore e whati. When we stand alone we are vulnerable but together we are unbreakable."
There is also Collaborative and Indigenous Mental Health Therapy: Tataihono – stories of Maori healing and psychiatry by Wiremu NiaNia, Allioster Bush and David Epston. Its sold over 700 in the Women's Bookshop alone.
There's also Sorrow and Bliss, a novel by Meg Mason; Imposter, by Matt Chisholm; and This Is Not How It Ends, a memoir by well-known journalist Jehan Casinader
Allowing yourself to be vulnerable enough to put your story into a book takes courage, and I admit, when I initially wrote Crazy Love, I had no intention of confessing that it was based on my life—that was a last-minute decision. But when I think of Charlotte Grimshaw’s The Mirror Book, I realise what a gift it is to look inside someone else’s life and to be able to relate to some of the experiences. In doing this, we understand that we are not alone. And it’s important that our writers who have had books released during lockdowns know that they are not alone either.
Writers like Angelique Kasmara, whose stunning debut novel Isobar Precinct asks: "How do we go about healing people, so the place we want to be is right here, right now?"
Or Eileen Merriman’s Double Helix: "No one tells you how deep grief runs, marbling inside you, layer upon layer."
It's ironic that my novel Crazy Love ends with Auckland City in lockdown 2020, because on the night of the book launch, New Zealand went into level 4 lockdown. Just as the speeches started, the emergency mobile alert buzzed through our phones, adding to the surrealness of the evening, knowing that within a few hours our entire country would once again be shut away inside the safety of our homes, and my years of work would be stuck in bookstores for weeks to come. Yes, I understand that dark place of disappointment these writers have felt, and many others whose books were also stuck during this time. And I’m grateful for the online spaces where these books are kept alive, such as ReadingRoom and the Academy of New Zealand Literature.
Also very much worthy of mention is the open mike of Poetry Live every Tuesday evening at The Thirsty Dog, K’road, where many writers have started sharing their stories and still do. "I had no other place in the world to share my experiences," Miriam Barr says. "The poetry community offered me that space." Miriam is a poet and performer, as well as a clinical psychologist who often uses poetry in her therapy sessions, and recommends Toi Ora poetry classes on Ponsonby Road for those starting out.
Those who put our stories into words, whether of fiction, non-fiction, or something in between, can do so because of lived experience, and can therefore, give back. And I know that is the desire of all the writers mentioned here.
As my wonderful te reo tutor, Tūraukawa Bartlett, of Manavation has taught me this week: Kia ū ki te whanaungatanga. Give relationships priority.
A best-selling and critical success, Crazy Love by Rosetta Allan (Penguin Random House, $30) is available in bookstores nationwide.
