 Oh boy. Canada. What doesn't it derive from Agonyah Gavir? It's village. As Indigenous people, we are used to our stories getting a little twisted. So listen up as we set the record straight. I'm Agonyah Tio. Please join me as we hear from dozens of Indigenous people. Together we will decolonize our words and our minds on the Telling Our Twisted Histories podcast. You can find episodes on the CBC Listen app or wherever you get your podcasts. From The Conversation, this is Don't Call Me Resilient. I'm Vanita Srivastava. We all have self-stigma to mental health. If tomorrow we're emotionally challenged, we are going to wonder what is wrong with me. Why is this happening to me? It has been a tough year. We have all struggled and our collective mental health has taken a real hit. But according to a recent Stats Canada report, South Asians have taken an even bigger hit, reporting lower levels of mental health than any other Canadians during the pandemic. Today we're going to talk about some of the reasons why, including the pressure of needing to be a model minority. That's the idea that Asian immigrants keep their heads down. They don't rock the boat, they are successful, and they prosper. Well, those ideas are mostly myths. And those myths can cause all kinds of problems. Mostly it forces people to internalize their mental anguish, and they can end up leaving gaps in our mental health services. My guests today are intimately connected to the situation. Satlindra Bains is an associate professor and director of the South Asian Studies Institute at the University of the Fraser Valley. Her research focuses on access to mental health support in South Asian communities and the effects of migration and social isolation on mental health. And Manit Chahal is co-founder of Soach Mental Health, which encourages better access to mental health support in Canada's South Asian communities. Thank you both for joining me. Thank you. Thank you, Manita, for having us here today with you. Manit, as the co-founder of Soach Mental Health, your work with the South Asian community has really kept you close to the issues. And I'm wondering what kinds of trends that you've been seeing. I don't think it's any surprise that South Asians were as hard hit as they were. This has been happening a long time before the pandemic. And it's really sad when you think that because you don't know your environment, you haven't acclimated to the culture around you, that that's a disadvantage to your experience, your mental health narrative, essentially. You know, we look at mainstream systems, mainstream mental health services that are catered in a way for those that are educated, that are literate, that are English speaking. Predominantly from a white background is what you see. So South Asians were struggling with depression, with anxiety, without even knowing it's depression and anxiety. I think that makes it even more challenging when you're navigating something related to your mental health in the dark because you don't associate it to be a problem or for it to be even recognized as something that can be addressed or you can get help for. So there's a few things that you're bringing up there, right? One is this idea of culture and how important it is in terms of getting the kinds of help that you need to take into account that culture or someone's culture and the position that they're coming from is important when you're talking about their mental health. But you're also saying that this idea that the pandemic has exacerbated existing mental health issues. I think that's what you're saying, is that it's not the pandemic necessarily, it's just the pandemic that highlighted existing mental health issues. But I'm wondering specifically if things got worse during the pandemic. Yeah, things definitely got worse during the pandemic. And I think the reason why SOCH started is because a lot of people, majority of their life will probably go through falling through the cracks of the mental health system. They'll never get picked up. They won't even know they lived their entire life having a mental health concern. So some of those things that are exacerbated during COVID in relation to mental health are depression, anxiety, suicide, addictions. Addictions is a huge issue in our South Asian community, specifically speaking to the South Asian Punjabi community and drinking is the number one inquiry we actually get at SOCH. We're concerned loved ones are reaching out because a loved one is drinking and they don't know how to navigate and support them. Sathlyn, you've been researching South Asian communities for years. Why do you think some of these communities have been so hard hit during the pandemic, the South Asian communities that we're talking about? I feel that in BC there has been an explosion in terms of an understanding of the vulnerabilities of ethnic communities through COVID. And partly it's been because of the issue of racism. I understand culture as being a very critical point in terms of understanding mental health and wellness and making sure that practitioners take that into account. But to kind of say that it's because of culture is also a bit not warranted because sometimes it's not the culture that's at fault. It's actually the whole society that's at fault hasn't really understood their needs and I think the good thing from the pandemic has been that there has been a really bright light, Sean, on the vulnerability of ethnic communities and they're starting to be a greater understanding at the higher level of government to show a deeper understanding of the needs of these communities as taxpayers, as citizens, as children born here, not as put to the side kinds of groups but really integrate their designs so that everybody's needs get met, the needs don't get met, and then what you say is, well, these people don't know what they're doing. It's their problem. They live in extended family systems. They're spreading the disease without understanding what is going on behind it. Our community has matured and evolved from the 70s onwards. Even I would say our own, not hiding our mental health issues but coming forward with them. There has been a shift and I think that shift has helped. Let's talk about that shift for a minute. We all know that this is not a new issue. I mean, as you said, it's been going on since the 70s. In the 70s, one of the higher reported suicide rates in Canada was for South Asian women and many in the South Asian communities have struggled quietly with mental health for years. I guess what you're saying is actually it has changed since the 70s, which is very hopeful, but it is an ongoing issue. So what are some of the reasons that South Asian communities have struggled quietly? What are some of those issues at play there? In BC, we have some very unique issues. We have although 100 plus year history of South Asian Canadians living in this province, we still have a very large influx of newly arriving immigrants. The newer immigrants as they come in continue to bring traditional ways of dealing with situations. One of them is look within the family. Don't let other people know there's mental health issues in the family because the sense of this collective identity that we will all be tarnished with this brush. As you know in the South Asian community, the family is sacrosanct. It is the cornerstone of everything we do and people will sacrifice the individual for the family. Unfortunately, that does happen with mental health that we tend not to get the kinds of help we need for the individual thinking that the larger group, the collective family is the support the person needs. As Manit said, sometimes that support is right and sometimes it isn't. So partly it's been that we are not getting access to the services we need. One, the services aren't there. Two, if they were there, we're not accessing them. Three, there is still lots of stigma and the stigma continues. And even with COVID, there was stigma and Manita, I want to say that we no longer can see ourselves as a homogenous group. We can't say all South Asian Canadians deal with every community has cohorts of people that deal with things differently. So we also have to have the diversity of access options for all of us as well and I think that's not happening and to some degree we are seen as homogenous. The South Asian diaspora, what that means is so diverse. We come from so many different places. But you talked about two things there, the stigma, this idea of the ongoing stigma. You talked about this idea of this collective identity that somehow there's this notion that the collective is more important than the individual. That is a cultural echo that continues. Manit, what are some of the other things that you're seeing? Why do folks in the South Asian communities tend to struggle quietly this idea of not accessing the help? The stigma is huge. I think with stigma it's the guilt. Guilt and shame are huge. I think it's with anyone who struggles with mental health. But when you don't have that health promotion, that preventative lens, that mental health dialogue happening, it takes years to break down stigma. I'm sure all of us, anyone listening, we all have self stigma to mental health. If tomorrow we're emotionally challenged, we are going to wonder what is wrong with me? Why is this happening to me? So add on a layer of not knowing what mental health is. No one's ever having a conversation around you in the cultural way, the linguistic way for you to challenge that. You forever remain stuck there. And then comes that point, maybe one day you take a leap of faith and you go to the health care system and as a mental health professional it is so broken and so complicated, you wouldn't even know where to go, what to do. So what you see here in Brampton locally is things are unaddressed, they're shoved under the rug, you end up in ER likely because you don't know the system. What will happen is you end up having a panic attack, you only went to the hospital because you think it's a heart attack. If you knew it was a panic attack, you probably wouldn't go because you're like, it's mental health, I got to keep this hidden, I can't tell anyone. You feel it, you physically are feeling something is wrong with you now. It's like, okay, it's okay for me to go get health. But then a lot of those visits are left like that. You have a visit, you may have a follow up and you never follow up again, that's one example. The other example is you might go to a service provider, try to seek help and they don't recognize, appreciate, value your cultural experience, your family dynamics and you are forever kind of turned off from the entire experience and you don't want to go back. You mentioned family, Manit, then I know that you've spoken publicly about your dad's struggle with mental health. I'm wondering how that impacted you in terms of your work and where you ended up. So yeah, my dad struggled with depression, which started through grief. He lost his father, he lost his brother and I think grief consumed him and I think that is the driving factor for him to grow. I'm sure with family history, probably a lot of family history that he wasn't even aware of though because no one talks about mental health in the home. The immigrant experience, you know, just milestones, but I think grief is the biggest thing for my father and I think all of this as a professional and as a human being, when it really struck me was when I lost my dad at the end of 2018 because I think that experience was like, oh my god, you're in it and you go through it. It's like my entire perception if you were to have this conversation with me in 2017, I'd probably have a very different perspective than I do today because I was like, oh my god, grief can completely destroy you, destroy your mental health and some of us bounce back, some of us are broken and just carry on and others completely lose their way. I'm so sorry for your loss. Thank you. I know that you have done a lot of work in terms of the different generations and do different generations view and deal with mental health differently? Is that what you've noticed? Yes, absolutely. As I said, the family is the cornerstone of our communities and I give it real credit for one, holding things when things go wrong but also falling apart when things go wrong. So I want to say that generationally because we live in multi-generational homes, there's no empirical evidence of how many people live in multi-generational homes but we kind of know it might be half and half, let's say as a guess estimate that half the people live in multi-generational homes and half live by themselves in nuclear family systems. So I think living within multi-generational homes is both a support and it's also a bit of a negative because I hear professionals saying all the time in BC that South Asian Canadians don't need the kind of support from mental health services because they have family at home. They have families able to help them but I don't think they understand that not all families are equipped or have the knowledge to really do the work and they can do more damage than harm whereas maybe if they were a nuclear family and they didn't have the support they'd have to look somewhere else and others may step in and they may have to show through their assessment that the professionals do around the supports you need that they don't have anyone and perhaps they would get the services so I keep telling families to let people know that they're working, they're not home looking after mental health mentally unwell human and that they do need the support but I think it goes beyond the understanding it has to be a demand from us as South Asians to say to services that 25% of the population in Abbotsford is South Asian Canadian I want to see 25% of your services reflective of that I want to see 25% of your staff having that cross-cultural competency not just early knowledge of cultural competency but really advanced skills, well developed skills, hire people who've gone through universities and had those types of educations why in our social work program or nursing program do we not have the cross-cultural considering that the people that are graduating are going to work in these communities and we can't unfortunately always put the bonus on the family to come forward and look for services like it really, I would say to you as Manita has talked with the immigrant experience immigrants generally are very passive they come to Canada as a developed country and see the beauty, the milk and honey that they see, however they see that with rose colored glasses because it is not milk and honey, they see it that way initially and they kind of accept that they should take a second tier position to demands they shouldn't go into the school and tell the teacher I want this or go to a doctor and say I want this because they see the immigrant position as a secondary position they haven't been accepted as full Canadians with rights and responsibilities and it's a very difficult dance that they are doing because they're trying to uphold their cultural traditions which they don't want to let go yet they're frozen in time for a period of time and then at the same time they're trying to adapt and acculturize to Canadian society and you talked about the environmental acclimatization that people have to go through, I have to tell you that's a very complex process and we can't expect people to jump off a plane and get acclimatized to Canada and figure out how things work and make the demands that they need. As you know we are, all of us know we have to be our own advocates for healthcare unfortunately, right? But I have to tell you immigrants don't always have the capacity and the wherewithal to do that. So multi-generational homes provide the support to people who are perhaps mentally ill because there's someone in the home, someone to help etc etc but it is not the optimum support system. There has to be services attached to that. It sounds like you're saying not just do like I'm just going to use the we for a minute because I'm part of this community too but it sounds like you're saying not only do we not have the capacity but we we don't feel like we have the right. Yes. That's why the idea of I love the word social because social is much beyond just thought. It is a meaningful engagement in terms of our beliefs, our values what we think, how we think, why we think it is a much bigger word than its actual small meaning. So for somebody who doesn't know social, let's give a definition of social the word. I think that when they're doing an amazing job but like you know definition wise search means to think or thought and for us search is bigger than that right. It's a word that we've been using to really delve into the conversation about mental health, emotional wellness, your thinking, your emotions and it comes across really well when you're having the conversation between generations. I can have a conversation with my grandma, you know like elders in my family and say you know they're like what kind of work do you do? I'm like I work in mental health. I think about the mind. You don't think about your thoughts like you know your mind and all the things you think about and that's the stuff you know the challenging bits and the happy bits and how can we manage that and keep that at a balance. You know it's a short word but it has a very large meaning. It was just like a random brainstorm at a Starbucks with like you know it was me, Jasmine Harman another founding member of Soach and we wrote it down and then we started asking everyone at the coffee shop where like non-South Asian people can they pronounce this because like you want to pick a name that everyone can say. I also think Venita Soach has within it is imbued with the sense of future thought. Soach is much more deeper than the moment. The Soach is really about reflection and introspection. It's about a moment of thinking and it can take you forward. I'm really a proponent of progressive thinking of inching forward. Regression is just not my cup of tea and I'm sorry what's happening in Afghanistan today right? Like we're all just heartbroken because the progress is so hard fought and especially of people who are vulnerable, women, children, people who are in abusive situations, people who are suffering from mental health or other incapacities. Soach is imbued with this idea that you can overcome your shortcomings. That you can go forward and make something of it. We talk about going forward a little bit and you mentioned Afghanistan and we talked about generational differences a little bit but we haven't really touched on gender yet. The notions of Asian masculinity, the idea of patriarchy and gender based violence, these are all wrapped up together. What role does gender play in all of these things that we're talking about? I always feel gender is a fluid term and that it is forever being changed and challenged and manipulated but traditionally as you know, gender is seen as a binary and that there is this or that and we are nowhere in South Asian communities really ready to address all the differences between our genders. So as a result I think the binary of gender really defines who we are from when we are born to when we die. The rituals, the traditions, the thoughts, the ideas, the beliefs, the expectations, the roles, the responsibilities are kind of part and parcel of everything that we're socialized to do and to break those norms. Every time I see someone who's broken that norm I'm in awe of that human to say that they have this courage and this strength of conviction to go against the grain but in South Asian Canadian communities partly because we as all other communities on the planet are mostly patriarchal, we're in a bit of a trap and to open that trap is something not everyone is able to do. I'm also talking about just the idea of the patriarchy, you know this idea of how this overwhelming patriarchy impacts the mental health of these communities and those impacted by that. I see Manit you're nodding your head. Where we are stuck right now in the traditional sense in the patriarchy is that women really struggle with their mental health and that is because you have loss of power, loss of voice, loss of autonomy within your home. There's a lot of gender based roles that play into your mental health and your wellness. You see caregiver roles are put on women and women have household roles they are also working, they want their independence, they want equality outside but then they are expanding themselves and stretching themselves out thin with caregiving. So that plays a huge role on women and then we look at men in the traditional sense on how they've been socialized to deal with their mental health and their challenges right? We look at patterns of not talking about your emotions so which has been hosting a South Asian men's forum which we actually started with the beautiful work of Theraki which is a South Asian mental health initiative in the UK so the South Asian men's forum we created for South Asian men to come together have a safe space with those that have lived experience, those are professional to talk about things that are very challenging for men to talk about right? We don't give permission to men to talk about their emotions, you know be a man, don't cry, you know you can handle it. These pressures also don't allow for their mental health and the way they navigate to evolve so what do they do? They drink, they get angry, there's outbursts that are happening at home because that is the cycle they've seen before them and that is what's repeating and it's not breaking. So that still exists, it's very heavy it is being passed down to our generation, to our younger generation because that is a pattern they're seeing at home. I know that you both have seen the news you know the sort of reports about young South Asian men being impacted in a particular way and many of them turning to gangs and I'm wondering what's happening there? Yeah, it's unfortunate that BC has seen over the last I would say 30 years a real decline in wellness of young South Asian men, certain group of South Asian men now don't forget they're a minority, they're a small number, they do not define Asian Canadian men generally most of them are functioning very at very high levels, they're succeeding, they're doing well but there is a small group of men that are vulnerable and Manita shed some light on why they're vulnerable but I think one of the things that's happened is that as researchers as scholars, as practitioners we really haven't spent the time understanding men's burdens and understanding men's roles and while we spend a lot of time talking about the shifting role of women from being caregivers but also being bread earners we haven't really spent the time to understand the burden that men carry generally. If I look at the literature there's very little on South Asian men there's lots on South Asian women but very little on men and we are nowhere near understanding the challenges that young men face and we also have to understand the role of mothers and fathers and how they're raising those young men because they're also raising them with expectations of the past as if they're going to carry the burdens of family and bread winning and always being there for everyone and looking after that can be shared it's so much better if it's shared between sisters and brothers. I have to tell you that men don't understand their own privilege they actually wake up in the morning without examining it so there are challenges. If I could give you a magic powder or magic dust where would you start spreading that dust? What needs to happen to improve the situation? I'm going to start with you, Manit. I think you know in terms of Suthwinder like what she shared is that we're kind of second tier in terms of a lot of our community not thinking that they deserve it or it's their right because I think coming to Canada was like a ticket like it was you won the lottery magic dust would be that South Asian mental health culturally linguistically appropriate mental health services and supports it's everyone's right it's there it's not something that we're fighting for we have to advocate for we have to sit at the table and beg for funding for that stuff is just there that is like where I would start the other thing I would start with is at schools like schools should have mental health from the very beginning like why are we not talking about this and it should be mandatory for them to have you know mental health courses mental health training and mental health in the curriculum we need to start young mental health first stage be mandatory like I think that stuff should be out there did you say mental health first aid yeah mental health first aid so as there's first aid for CPR and saving lives there's mental health first aid for you know knowing your foundational mental health but obviously having that in different languages for different cultures like mental health training was not mandatory during my nursing you know education and I'm baffled at that the fact that you know you're supporting someone who might be at end of life or they're terminally ill or they had this you know horrific accident happened to them but you have no mental health training under your belt to support them during this transition in this horrible experience I can continue to probably go on but I think right now in terms of bigger picture you know I really feel like if you have that language from as soon as you're born and you come into the world and you're given the permission that you know you have a mind and we all have a mind and we have emotions and that is the human experience that's the beauty of it and please experience it to your fullest and if you're struggling reach out for health just reach out don't suffer in silence like that is the vision of the community that I look forward to seeing at some point in my life. Amazing thank you for that and Seth Winder I'm going to give you the same dust the same magic dust you're so generous I thank you for that I hope we can make some impact I guess I have two areas that I think really need attention one is we really need a very strong overhaul of the education system to address mental health and we need it at all levels as Manita said and the second piece is really for a policy makers if I had magic dust you know I would like to see at every policy table that they be culturally sensitive and appropriate services be designed for every single thing that we do Canada speaks about being a multicultural community but does it act it out does it in everything that we do do we address multiculturalism do we address the idea that so many cultures live under one roof in one country affected by these policies I'm sorry the policies are still very Eurocentric they are colonial driven they don't even address indigenous issues that loan migrant issues so the magic dust it might be wonderful it's just not it's I'm not saying it's impossible but it needs a whole shift in mindset a whole shift in idea making a whole shift in paradigms of how we function as Canadians and we all need to do that it can't be a prime minister in his his cabinet who does that although we put them there you know and when we once we put them there let's hold them accountable guys I felt that physically even though we're just virtual that was very powerful and very beautiful thank you both so much for the time that you've given today I really really appreciate it well thank you for creating this platform and thank you for allowing us to share our thoughts Manit lovely to meet you thank you Seth Winder and thank you Vanita honestly I think this conversation it helps I think for myself to kind of sit back and reflect on why I'm here why are we doing this and what work do we still need to do right like we deserve this we demand this and we need a better tomorrow especially when it comes to mental health for South Asians and Vanita I love that your podcast is called you know don't call me resilient because I think in that idea of resilience comes this idea of there there you know condescending patronizing ideas of you know you should be able to overcome this some things we can't overcome we need help to overcome those but this idea that immigrants will always be resilient they can take racism they can take assault they can take all kinds of discrimination stereotyping and they should just bounce back I think that's a really unfair characterization of what we can what we're able to accomplish I want to be resilient of course I do but not at the cost of somebody else's ability to then just shove me down and expect me to bounce back thank you so much thank you both so much I really appreciate it don't call me resilient don't call me resilient is a production of the conversation Canada it was made possible by a grant for journalism innovation from the social science and humanities research council of Canada the series is produced and hosted by me, Vanita Srivastava our producer is Susanna Ferreira our associate producer is Ibrahim Dyer and special thanks to our intern Vaishnavi Dandekar for her help on this episode Reza Daya is our incredibly patient sound producer and our fabulous consulting producer is Jennifer Morose Lisa Verano leads audience development for the conversation Canada and Scott White is our CEO and if you're wondering who wrote and performed the music we use on the pod that's the amazing Zaki Ibrahim the track is called Something in the Water thanks for listening everyone and hope you join us again until then, I'm Vanita and please, don't call me resilient