National Suicide Prevention month: Call to stop stigma

Every year on national suicide prevention month in September, mental health advocates, survivors, friends and family, and mental health organizations across the country and around the world share their experiences and work towards eradicating it. Suicides are preventable. Much can be done to prevent suicide at the individual, community and national levels

Speaking to Lilian Muli on Citizen Friday Night, Charity Muturi co-petitioner in efforts to decriminalize suicide in Kenya, narrated her experience when she was age 14. She recounts her fear, her shame and guilt. 

“At 14, I started having suicidal thoughts. I didn't know why, but I knew it was religiously wrong, so I did not talk about it.”

 In 2015, she recounted being diagnosed with bipolar mood disorder. She knew where the law stood on the matter and it took her three years into treatment to finally open up to her doctor.

“I had learned that talking about suicide is a crime. That's what I had been told. But later I learned it is actually the attempting of suicide,” Mutruri recounts. 

Cultural norms, woven into the very fabric of Kenyan society, cast a harsh stigma on mental health issues and suicide. 

During the conversation, Muturi reflected on the societal silence: 

"Many of them are not able to talk about this because it is a crime, but it is also religiously and culturally wrong." 

The weight of culture restrains conversations, leaving countless individuals isolated in their struggle.

Religious leaders take on the responsibility of guiding followers and shaping perspectives. However, mental health remains a taboo topic. 

"We need to stop beating people who are already on their knees. They need help."

Amidst this intricate web of legal, cultural, and religious norms, people are pushing for change, demanding a shift in perception and understanding.  Human rights movements are calling for laws to be reevaluated. 

Muturi called on religious leaders to address mental health from the pulpit, adding conversations around suicide should be decriminalized. 

“To religious leaders, traditional leaders, let us begin to prepare safe spaces for us to be able to speak.”