When someone has mental health issues, no one would deny that it’s hard for those around them. Even so, there is good mental health support and there is not so good mental health support, and over my years of ministry, I’ve seen both. 

I think the country witnessed some “not so good” mental health support this last week in the ongoing story of former swimming champion Grant Hackett. Three-time Olympic gold medalist Hackett and his family have all acknowledged his mental health issues, which makes his family’s recent actions so disappointing.

Hackett’s father calling the police on his son because he became “agitated and verbally abusive” is a story that challenges my sensitivities. I would have thought that calling the police on your own son, who is not well, would only be the absolute last resort, especially when you know your son is famous and will have to live with the infamy of this event for the rest of his life. I hope for both their sakes it really was the last resort. Police wisely laid no charges.

Then there’s the case of Hackett’s older brother who told the media he “had” to punch his brother in the face, then justifies it by telling everyone all the good works he’s done for ungrateful Grant over recent times. So much for Jesus’ advice that when you do good be so quiet about it that you don’t even let your left hand know what your right hand is doing. As a very bruised Hackett said on his Instagram “My brother comments to the media ... but does anyone know he beat the **** out of me”.

Finally Mrs Hackett gets on TV and pleads for him to come home. Pfft. He had already texted her twice and she had his mobile number and planes, trains and automobiles, so why did she “appeal” to the Courier Mail at a clearly painful time for her son? And why would Hackett want to rush home anyway? For another fatherly arrest? Maybe another brotherly punch in the face? 

Nurses and mental health patients have told me cases like the above are not uncommon.

When a visually-impaired person is around we help hold the signs closer to their eyes, not further away, and when the lame are around we open doors for them, not trip them over. So why do some people try and make the lives of those with mental health issues even harder? Because the disability isn’t visible? Embarrassment? Their own insecurities? Pathetic power?  

Good mental health care is letting the sufferer know that everything is going to be alright because everything is alright because you have their back. The biggest cross for mental health sufferers is their belief that they are alone. But you are not alone. 

Queen Victoria, Beethoven, Audrey Hepburn, Benjamin Disraeli, Cary Grant, Charles Darwin, Dorothy Day, Charles Dickens, Ernest Hemmingway, George Michael, Harrison Ford, Howard Hughes, Jim Carey, Kylie Minogue, Leo Tolstoy, Leonard Cohen, Mel Gibson, Pablo Picasso, Robbie Williams, Sigmund Freud, Anthony Hopkins, Sting, Ted Turner, Tennesse Williams, Uma Thurman, Winston Churchill, “Buddy” Franklin and countless others have suffered with mental health issues. You are not alone.