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I might be wrong but I think I read somewhere, probably twitter, that you wrote Dear Me in 3 months. Eh, how? Please share all your focusing secrets with me who has been trying to finish writing a book in two years, and counting…
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Hahahaha I hadn’t planned for it to continue but I have had a lot of requests for Nana 3. So let me convince my creative genius to get on board.
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I finished it in 3 months because it was my only coping mechanism. I had something to do while I tried to fix my life. Also I needed my loved ones to have an explanation if I had taken my life after.
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Auma Rita is a lawyer, writer and mental health advocate from Uganda. Just yesterday, she released her first book, ‘Dear Me’ which chronicles her dark mental health journey. We’ll be engaging her here on how she overcame the worst of it and what she hopes to achieve with Netya Spaces, a Mental Health Support Group she started to help others facing similar challenges like her.
The kaboozi session will start at 2 pm (EAT) on Monday 23rd December but feel free to leave a question before then which she can respond to when the session starts.
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Oh hey, that’s great! Looking forward to it.
I would love to know if there was a particular trigger that got Rita onto the mental health advocacy journey, or if it was a realisation over time.
I am also trying to understand how she manages to balance her own health with the act of supporting others, without getting drained.-
The final trigger was letting go of someone who kept insisting I lied and manipulated people but I was certain with my “truth” and version of events. I knew then there was something wrong beyond what I could comprehend. Plus the suicidal ideations had increased and I had no outlet.
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With time I have been able to know when I am about to shut down or relapse. I have a relapse chart where I monitor how I am or if I am coping.
I also have accountability partners who have been able to monitor and sometimes tell when I am about to reach a relapse stage. They basically avail themselves if I need them.
I am learning how to manage social anxiety because that’s what the book and Netya Spaces is pushing me towards. People yet I am very introverted.
Helping people also gives me purpose. Especially with my anger. It’s directed at making sure no one goes through a dark void without help or succumbs to suicide while on their journey.
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Hi Rita. Glad you are doing this kaboozi session. Even ‘gladder’ you are doing the work to shed the stigma around mental health. In one of your blogs you say,
…the stigma attached to mental health is so great that people who suffer from it are ashamed to say they are not well or others don’t even know they are sick and just cannot do life anymore…
Since publicly coming out about your struggles with mental health, have you been treated differently by friends and family?
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Related, did you also have a time when you didn’t know that you were sick and, if yes, how did you find out and what was that like, putting a name to this thing that had been making your life miserable?
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Well I did not know I was sick for twelve years because I did not have information about the illness. If I did know I am a bit certain I would have gotten help earlier because I wouldn’t have wanted to be in such a dark void for such a long time with symptoms that could have been managed.
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Well the acceptance stage did not just affect me but had a ripple effect to my friends and family. It was hard for all of them to understand yet I felt like I needed them to get on board as fast as they could so that they could support me. Some insensitive things were said but I got to a point where I knew I had to forgive them for they didn’t know what that were doing. It took me 12 years to kind of grasp what was going on so I needed to be patient with them too.
I would say I am now in a space where they understand. So I am positively being treated differently .
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“I always knew she was mad”
“Lol I can’t believe she is using this as an excuse for her past actions”
“ You are just being defensive.”
Basically anything that is said that makes my symptoms who I am as a person.
Well if other things are said they are not to my face.
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Seeing as you also be lawyering, what are you thoughts on the government policies around mental health and what could be done to make them more relevant to patients?
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Oh yes!
Suicide is referred to as a crime in the penal code and treated as such in Uganda. Our law gives it such a negative connotation even in the way they describe people not in their right state of mind.
They are referred to as idiots, imbeciles e.t.c
When I look at the insurance law policies mental health is greatly not considered and they will not take accountability for situations where one attempts to commit suicide or even provide medical options for the same.
No body wakes up and takes their life for fun. Suicide is the last stage to mental illness which is the disease greatly affecting our generation. -
The employment laws are equally oppressive because most people do not consider it as a disease so employees do not have the benefit to sick leave because of let’s say a manic depressive episode.
Most times they are just tagged as lazy and thus loose their jobs or are totally thrown out of the system because they give up. All odds are against them.
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You’ve been blogging regularly about mental health. What triggered that thought of I now need to write a book?
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And the title, I like it very much. Did you have it by the time you started writing the book or did it come to you later in the process?
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The title came to me during the writing process. I knew what I wanted to create in terms of the content especially the bit of writing to myself but I really had no title for a while.
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God told me to write a book about my life journey.
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Here is a very naive one, is there a bright side at all to mental illness? Do you ever think to yourself, it sucks that I have to deal with this on a regular basic but on the lip side, here are some valuable life lessons it has taught me or it maybe gives me this advantage over others?
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Yes I fact that’s why Netya Spaces was started. To show people like me that we can flip the coin and focus on the positives as we believe in a healed version of us.
Personally because I “over think” I am able to come up with out of the box solutions to a crisis.
I am great at researching because my mind tends to want to not let things go until it’s convinced.
I am a creative writer because I have moments where my feelings are too much. I normally transfer them to paper as an outlet.
I love learning because my brain cannot be bored. It hates that but loves new information. Just this year I think I have done 2 masterminds and a course despite the mental health issues, the accident and adulting.
Most people like me are actually genius but we try to oppress that side of them by putting them in a box Because they do not fit our narrative.
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What does the future look like for you? Are you still determined to achieve all the dreams you’d set out for yourself before mental health issues became speed bumps, if they haven’t always been present, or have you had to adjust expectations?
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Yes, Hopefully a whole franchise of them.
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I have had to adjust my expectations and want to achieve more.
Learn and unlearn more,
Create more; books, movies, vlogs.
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Sarah Jakes Roberts
Elizabeth Gilbert
Paulo Choelho
Currently C.W Lewis May influence a lot of my writing this year.
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This bamuloze/ agude edalu/ white people problems stigma, do you think we shall ever overcome those as a society especially considering how really witchcraft bes over here?
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It’s hard to attain perfection in any society but progress is always a step in the right direction.
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This was absolutely comforting to read. Thank you
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