Caistor Food Bank

Kind of a depressing 48 hours for those of us who do some work around the edges of mental health in the military. We’ve had a dinosaur retired fast jet pilot spouting 1950s ideas about people with mental health injuries being “weak”. Over on @MilitaryBanter we’ve had some good evidence that the Armed Forces still aren’t doing enough to educate their people around reporting sick with mental health matters. Let’s address each in turn. “Strong/weak” aren’t words that belong anywhere near mental health. Each person has their own limits and it’s not for anyone else to judge them when they reach those limits and need help. Mental health injuries aren’t rational or logical. Almost by definition, when someone reaches a point where they consider taking their own life, rationality is out of the window. Mental health concerns across the board will come far too often with irrational decision-making. The only rational decision most people can make is to ask for help, and so the conversation around that needs to be encouraging and positive. Judgmental language like “weak” needs be kept as far away from the conversation as possible. Which brings me on to asking for help whilst in uniform. All too often you hear the old false lines: “It’ll ruin your career”, etc. We need to reframe mental health as an injury, just like any other. So you might miss out on a course or a posting because you have a mental health injury? So would you if you broke your leg or tore your ACL. And just as with the broken bone or ligament tear, with a mental health injury you go to the doctor and get the medical help you need. And when your injury is healed, you crack on with your career. Injuries happen and injuries can be treated. And yes, sometimes people get medically discharged both with broken legs (I know at least one - broken femur from a parachute jump) and mental health injuries (me, for example). But that’s a long process and a service person will only be discharged *because they’re not suitable to serve any more*. It’s the best option for the service person and the service. But the key point - it’s rare, and it’s a very long way from being the automatic result of reporting sick. You wouldn’t expect a medical discharge if you sprained your ankle, so you must not expect a medical discharge for needing help for a mental injury. It’s a duty on the chain of command to understand this and make sure their people are properly briefed. This weekend shows us there is still so much work to do. We keep on.