Written By Maya

In the spirit of Black History Month, I found it fitting to delve a bit into the history of mental health among the ethnic minority group and its development to present day – because we can’t speak about Black History and where we’ve come from without addressing the mental hurdles as well. Therefore, in that same spirit, talk about some helpful tips to stay healthy and aware this month!

In the early 1800s, medical expert and director, John Gault made what he could have only hoped to be groundbreaking discovery in mental health by declaring that Black folks were simply immune to mental health issues (if only that were true) due to their lack of ability to engage in commerce. John believed that only those who experienced the trials and tribulations of civil affairs and trade could suffer mentally and therefore their enslavement was a barrier to this kind of illness.

Needless to say, that wasn’t true and so little to no help was ever provided to black people suffering from the mental illnesses that are more identifiable today. In fact, pro-slavery physicians went on to come up new diseases that explained atypical behaviour and symptoms amongst the Black community. One of the most interesting ones I read about was:

I’d assume running away from forced labour was in fact a true act of sanity, but Dr. Samuel Cartwright argued otherwise, and his publishing of this theory in “Diseases of the Negro” led to the beginning of various unsafe “medical” experimentation done on enslaved people.

As time progressed, it was getting obvious that mental illness can and is heavily impacting the Black community and so professionals began to single out the ‘problematic’ ones and take them for treatment – which essentially just meant locking them up in shabby institutions where they were mistreated. If you’ve ever heard, “black people don’t go to therapy” this is probably why. It became a situation where actually seeking help to deal with your mental health was far scarier than just choosing to live with the voices in your head, which is something no one should have to experience.

Thank God that that is not the case today. Despite the terrors of its very long past, black mental health has come quite a long way; not only is it more recognised but there are many more efforts made to try and understand mental troubles that black people today face. Currently, particularly here in the UK, black folks and other ethnic minorities can walk into support services, clinics, hospitals freely and seek help with little to no barriers in their way. This is because of a few heroes who paved the way for equal rights in the field of Mental Health like: