Reaching out can make a huge difference
Farjana spoke to us about her mental health experiences and how the University's Wellbeing Services helped her.
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Farjana Sultana is a final year PhD student in the Faculty of Life Sciences and Education. Her research aims to understand the risk factors and effects of sexual violence (SV) on adult female Rohingya refugees living in camps in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh. It also evaluates the efficacy of GBV response and prevention services in addressing SV survivors’ needs.
I embarked my PhD just two weeks before the lockdown in 2020. Initially I felt very lonely as it took months to connect with other PhD students. Also, unlike many others I experienced financial hardships, lost my father in COVID and was struggling to draw a fine line between work and family time. All these contributed to my experience of anxiety and depression which eventually impacted my productivity and day to day life. That time I was signposted to USW Wellbeing Service by my Director of Studies (DoS) Prof Kate Williams.
Post-fieldwork, I have faced mental health challenges again. Consistently reading around sexual violence, being in refugee camps and hearing about traumatic experiences from survivors or seeing its effects on them – made me overwhelmed, burnt out and negatively impacted my mental health. After returning from field research while I was transcribing survivors’ interviews at one point, I started having flashback and feeling helpless, hopeless, anxious, and depressed. Then, once again, I decided to seek mental health support and contacted wellbeing adviser who referred me to counselling service.
As I mentioned I was first signposted to USW Wellbeing Service by my DoS. However, both times initially, a wellbeing advisor contacted me and took a brief description of my problems and then based on the need referred me to a counsellor. The counselling sessions were/are (as I’m still taking counselling) very helpful in identifying my mental health problems with more clarity. Thus, it enabled me to explore the options or resources I need to recover positively and practically.
Issues related to mental health impact different people in a different way. So, if any student is struggling or anyone can see their friend struggling with mental health, from my own experience, I would definitely encourage them to access to the USW Wellbeing Services. Because reaching out to appropriate mental health support can make a huge difference to make us healthy, emotionally and physically. Also, we often forget to acknowledge that both mental and physical health mutually promote our productivity and effectiveness in daily life.