Between the lines: What South African stories reveal about men's mental health

Mail & Guardian

a day ago

In one session with my therapist, he said mental health challenges are not a gender issue nor should they be limited to a month or day. With that said, commemorative days or months do a great job in giving society pause to reflect on a specific issue.
Apart from putting a spotlight on men's health in general, the month of June makes us think about men and boys' mental health and wellness. Research shows men are less likely to ask for help regarding their mental health than women.
Due to factors such as stigma, masculinity norms and lack of knowledge, men tend to suppress emotions leading to disruptive outcomes like violence and suicide.
For instance, the World Health Organisation 2021 report on suicide worldwide noted that South African men are least four times more likely to take their own lives than women.
The organisation defines good mental health as an individual's ability to cope with normal life stresses; learn and work productively; use their talents and contribute to their community.
Many friends and loved ones feel helpless when it comes to how to support troubled men and boys who are silently drowning in the darkness of their minds and souls.
Through fictional characters and non-fictional literature, we can get different perspectives on how our fathers, brothers, sons and other men in society manage mental health issues. Here are some books by South African authors which shed light on this topic.
Men and Mental Health: Shattering the silence by Marion Scher
Award-winning journalist and author Marion Scher has been writing about mental health for the past 30 years. Through straightforward interviews, For this book, she spoke to South African sporting legends, top entertainers and heads of corporations, including Swys de Bruin, Chad le Clos, Eugene Khosa, David Kramer and Robbi Kempson.
Along with valuable contributions from psychiatrists and psychologists, Scher relays the painful stories of men struggling with mental illness, defines various disorders and points us towards solutions that can provide relief and support.
The book is divided into five easy-to-read sections: the strong silent type, depression, anxiety disorders, serious mood and thought disorders and managing men's mental health.
In one chapter, ex-Springbok men's team and Lions rugby coach De Bruin highlights the importance of mental health practitioners for sportsmen.
'When I was coaching Lions, we were very fortunate to have a psychologist on board and he helped me a great deal. But this isn't common in rugby and there's a big need for this type of intervention, particularly with top-level players. They need to understand that stress, anxiety and depression are an illness. It doesn't mean you're crazy,' he says.
Like all five of the books on this list, Men and Mental Health emphasises that, to beat the wave of mental illness affecting men, men themselves need to start talking and asking for help towards healing.
The Child by Alistair McKay
Alistair McKay's work mainly explores queerness, mental health, social justice and climate change. In his second novel, The Child, he looks at the complexities of a gay couple returning home to Cape Town after the narrator has a mental breakdown.
The couple aim to start a family by adopting a child — someone to love — as the world around them falls apart. Maybe even a chance to atone for the sins of this country.
But, as the adoption gets underway, the narrator is forced to confront the childhood spectres he has spent a lifetime avoiding.
While his marriage and sense of self begin to unravel, his life becomes increasingly enmeshed with that of their bubbly and outspoken domestic worker, Sibs, and her quiet young daughter, Buhle. And the more he tries to fix things, the worse they get.
Somewhat auto-fictional, the novel reads like a memoir, offering deep insights into the protagonist's feelings, anxieties and thoughts.
The Child is masterfully written with emotive and thought-provoking dialogue between the characters.
It looks at the effects of unresolved childhood trauma in our adulthood, parenting and work life. It reminds us that healing is not only needed for individuals but also for a country.
Patient 12A by Lesedi Molefi
In his mid-20s, Lesedi Molefi battled with complex post-traumatic stress disorder and depression. Years later, he's writing about his experience with mental health issues. Thus, his book captures his 23 days stay at Akeso Psychiatric Clinic, in Johannesburg as Patient 12A.
Essentially a memoir that reads like fiction, Patient 12A is evocative of Phumlani Pikoli's The Fatuous State of Severity. The 2016 self-published collection of short stories also captures Pikoli's depressive episode at a psychiatric clinic. Patient 12A is the emotional ride of a young man searching for belonging and dealing with childhood trauma, vulnerability and self-acceptance.
In one session at the clinic, a doctor says to Molefi, 'Well, our past has a way of teaching us about who we are and why. It's important … You can remember for a good reason, too. For your future. To help you find clarity, you know? To help you bring some light to what you've been suppressing. You're carrying a heavy load by holding yourself in, Mr Molefi. Let go. You'll feel lighter afterwards.'
Patient 12A is a black man's quest to filter out the noise in his head to find the truth, however uncomfortable.
It's a powerful book showing how childhood experiences can have a profound effect on the adults we become and a commentary on how mental illness remains a difficult conversation in black families.
The Second Verse by Onke Mazibuko
Psychologist, author and educator Onke Mazibuko writes with utmost sincerity on the weighty issue of young boys battling with mental illness. The Second Verse shines light on the mental health battles many teenage boys are going through.
Set in East London, aka Slummies, circa 1998, through Bokang Damane's eyes we learn about how family pressures, depression and suicidal thoughts weigh on many adolescent boys. In South Africa 9% of all teen deaths are caused by suicide, according to 2022 statistics from the South African Depression and Anxiety Group.
The fastest growing age is young people under 35, specifically female suicides which peak between 15 to 19 years. The group further indicated that, although more females attempt suicide, more males succeed. This is due to the more violent methods males select. Women and girls are more likely to overdose on medication or ingest chemicals, whereas men and boys often find access to firearms or hang themselves.
For instance, Bokang, in this novel has a Suicide Manifesto. In this notebook, he outlines plans to, and methods of, committing suicide like jumping off a bridge or even swallowing a large quantity of marbles.
Through the older male characters readers get to see how gambling and alcoholism are consequences of undealt-with anger, grief, childhood traumas and the inability of men to process such emotions.
The Second Verse looks at family, parenthood, manhood and the mental health of teens. This debut novel is a challenge to adults to show more compassion, empathy and understanding to our young boys — and girls.
Junx by Tshidiso Moletsane
The death of author Tshidiso Moletsane last year hit the literary world hard. I was personally saddened as I had met this 2022 Sunday Times Literary Awards winner at a book festival I was moderating in a few years ago. With Junx — his only published book — he left the world a raw and compelling gift.
Moletsane's explosive novel takes readers from Soweto to the central Johannesburg party scene. Through an unnamed character, and his imaginary friend Ari, Junx serves shots of sex, drugs and anxiety while tearing into life, death, race and politics.
The book essentially looks at a young man's struggle with depression and anxiety, possibly caused by unresolved childhood trauma, abandonment and the loss of a nuclear family structure. To find relief, the protagonist engages in substance abuse as a coping mechanism.
'I can feel my hand tremble but I try to keep it steady. I hope she doesn't notice. Mental illness and substance abuse are best friends.'
Like Mazibuko's The Second Verse, Junx explores suicidal thoughts among teenage boys.
'Have I told you that I have been suicidal for years but I just don't have apples to snuff myself? … I've killed myself a million times in a million different ways. Some nights I even go to sleep and hope I don't wake up.
'My melancholy has become part of my character. It has grown so irrevocably part of me that I want it back when it's gone. There is almost a comfort in it. I am a classic sufferer. I don't fix my problems, instead, I get used to them and I add them to my seemingly never-ending tales of failure and woe.'
Published in 2021, Junx is a marathon of madness. Its structure, offering no breaks or chapters, emphasises the rolling steam train of depression and anxiety in a man's mind.