Tying up the black dog

Unfortunately when it does, the attack often goes unspoken, hushed up or even worse, ignored.

The reality is one in five Australians are affected by a mental health condition.

For people living in rural Australia, the added difficulty is that it remains a highly sensitive subject despite its widespread impacts.

Now in rural South West Queensland there’s a push to keep the black dog at bay.

Three Goondiwindi women, who’ve seen first-hand the crippling effects of mental health, are on a mission with their project, Tie Up the Black Dog (TUBD), to raise awareness across the community.

Mary Woods, Liz Wood and Mary Carrigan began TUBD in 2007, in response to a period of prolonged drought when they saw people in the Darling Downs district struggling to cope and manage the personal and financial pressures that accompanied hard times.

“We have learned that everyone knows someone – and we have had the most amazing response from our local community, which has given us encouragement to organise a number of events across our region,” Mary Woods said.

“We believe that what we are doing is achieving greater understanding in our community about those who have depression or another mental illness, or who know someone who suffers.”

The black dog reference has long been used to describe depression.

Former British prime minister Winston Churchill used the metaphor to identify the debilitating impact depression had on his life.

“People in rural areas often suffer alone. Depression is not well served by visits to the pub and it is not something that you can ‘just snap out of’,” Mary said.

Mary Woods has also felt the pull of the black dog’s chain, when her then 26-year-old son David succumbed to serious depression in 2006, while living and working at home on the family property.

Caring for and living with him through this time gave Mary an enormous insight into the devastating impact depression brought into his life and she began a quest to better understand the complexities of mental health.

Taking two friends along to a seminar night about depression attended by 400 people in Moree, NSW, and seeing the community’s desperate need for more information on mental health jolted these three friends into action.

Six years on they’ve come a long way in working within rural communities to create an understanding that mental illness is something people have, it is not who they are.

“Part of the impact of depression is the lack of understanding from peers and the community—often concerned, fit, vital people have no clue what the problem is or how to help,” Mary said.

“As sufferers withdraw, their friends let them go because they have no way of coping with the change they see before their eyes.

“Clinical depression can strike for absolutely no reason – sometimes there’s a trigger but sometimes not.

“It’s all about identifying and learning to use coping mechanisms as well as seeking medical advice,” Mary said.

That’s where TUBD offers a lifeline of support.

Since 2007, TUBD has hosted more than a dozen successful forums across Queensland in Roma, Goondiwindi, Miles, Mitchell, Dirranbandi, and been involved in events organised in Condamine, Longreach, Winton, Mt Isa, Julia Creek and Toowoomba.

Mary was awarded the Paul Harris Fellowship Award by Rotary for her work with TUBD, and was the 2012 Queensland Mental Health Week Awards individual winner.

She also recently spoke at the National Rural Women’s Conference in Canberra about TUBD and mental health in the bush.

Mary, Mary and Liz have developed a strong pulling power over industry representatives, drawing the likes of Wayne Bennett, health minister Lawrence Springborg, ABC Grandstand broadcaster Craig Hamilton, author Graeme Cowan, and a string of local clinicians, health professors, professional psychiatrists and psychologists and people with first-hand experiences, to their forums.

“Audiences hunger for these stories—they relate to the tellers and can understand where they come from, and can see that mental illness can strike anyone, and that everyone can recover,” Mary said.

“They also learn that mental illness needs constant vigilance, and this message cannot be more strongly relayed than from people who are in recovery.

“TUBD does is what is needed—it isn’t rocket science—but it’s certainly hitting the mark.

“It’s fulfilling a need in an area where there was nothing before. Bringing open discussion about mental illness out of the shadows and into the light shouldn’t be innovative-but sadly it has been.”

*See www.tieuptheblackdog.wordpress.com for more information. If you or someone you know is experiencing an emotional crisis, call Lifeline 131114.

TIE Up the Black Dog and Queensland Country Life have formed a partnership to develop and produce a mental health guide for rural and regional Queenslanders. In a special glovebox guide to mental health, the magazine, due for publication in October to coincide Mental Health Week, October 6-13, will put the spotlight on mental health in the bush and raise awareness of the illness that cripples so many farming families.

This feature will be a collaborative effort to raise awareness of mental health issues and be at the centre of every kitchen table, with the aim of starting the conversation on mental health, its symptoms, effects, where to access support, first-hand accounts of various mental health issues and just generally what to do when someone sees the black dog bite.