Every week in Western Australia, a young person takes their life in a suicide.
Anne Richards knows all too well the struggle a young adult can go through before it all becomes too much.
Her son Mark took his life five years ago at the age of 27.
“Looking back, things were so much tougher for Mark than any of us realised,” Ms Richards said.
Mark was a bright, well-liked kid and a talented sportsman.
“I noticed signs that Mark was struggling in his later teens, I recall him saying to me when he was about 17 or 18 ‘Mum, I just don’t feel normal. I just want to be normal like the others and I don’t really feel like I fit in’,” she said.
Ms Richards said he suffered insomnia as a teenager, had self-esteem problems and the occasional issue with friends.
“There were a lot of things that when I look back on and add them all together painted a picture of a young guy suffering depression, probably,” she said.
Mark was not diagnosed with clinical depression until he was in his 20s.
Ms Richards said at the time, the family did not know where to turn.
“There was nowhere to go really, if you can’t afford psychiatric help and psychologists, which I’m sure the average person can’t, there was really nowhere,” she said.
According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, more than one West Australian under the age of 25, has taken their lives each week for the past four years.
Ms Richards now speaks out about Youth Focus, an independent not-for-profit organisation that offers a range of mental health services to West Australians aged between 12 and 25 and their families, with the main aim of putting a stop to suicide.
They offer free counselling to 2,000 West Australians each year.
Youth Focus’s chief executive Jenny Allen said there was more demand than ever for their services.
“We are holding 450 young people on our books at the moment, that’s an awful lot of young people who are struggling, the most we’ve ever experienced,” she said.
Social media creates greater pressures
Ms Richards said most families are not qualified to deal with serious issues affecting their teenagers.
“Having never experienced it myself and having nobody I knew experienced, it was never really talked about 15 years ago, suicide was taboo,” she said.
“It’s one of my motivations to speak out is that mums and dads, if your kids are struggling with this, and you’re not feeling right about all, there is somewhere to go, go and get help now, don’t leave it and certainly don’t have your own prejudices that may hold you back, embarrassment or anything, the issue is bigger than that.”
Jenny Allen said there were more pressures on young people than ever.
“I think the pressures are just so different from what I recall or even my 30-year-old daughter experienced and with the intensity of social media, I think it’s really tough,” she said.
“Someone told me the other day their daughter wouldn’t go to school because she didn’t have enough likes on her Facebook page.
“Social media is very much peer-driven and it creates a lot of bullying and difficulty with ‘am I popular, am I doing ok, do my friends like me?’.
“They’re going into year eight, they’re going from the top of the patch to the bottom, year nine seems to be a difficult year for many, they have to choose what they want to do for the rest of their lives.”
The organisation gets into schools, particularly year nine classes to educate them in what they mean by the term ‘mental health first aid’.
“It tells you what is depression, what is anxiety, what do you see in someone who might be having a panic attack, what is it about self harm, does that mean someone just wants attention,” Ms Allen said.
“Then there’s community things we can do to make people feel that there isn’t a stigma attached, that it is OK to have depression, it’s no different to diabetes or a heart condition and in most cases, you do recover from it if you get the appropriate help early enough.”
Ms Allen said early intervention helps.
“Most of our young people do recover, they go on to have very full lives, but they just hit a bump in the road and they need help sometimes,” she said.
“It’s those that don’t go and get the help, and there’s a lot that don’t engage and just struggle on, then you’ve got severity and it takes longer to get someone well.”
The charity is raising funds for its first-ever Christmas appeal.