Helping others

Te āwhina i ētahi atu

What can you do to help?

There are some simple steps you can take to look after your mates, regardless of what challenges they may be facing. 

These steps are sometimes called ‘Mental Health First Aid’, and can be remembered using the simple acronym: REACT

• Recognise symptoms of mental health difficulties

  If you know your mates well, you’ll spot any change in their usual behaviour, which is often the first sign of a mental health problem.  Other symptoms of mental health difficulties can include physical reactions like nausea, sweating or shaking; thinking reactions like poor concentration or negativity; behavioural changes like disrupted sleep, excessive drinking/smoking or increased aggression; and emotional reactions like sadness, anger or anxiety.

• Engage the person

  After you’ve recognised something that could be a symptom, engage with your mate. Talk to them – for example, you might say “I’ve noticed X, Y and Z, are you okay?” Have this conversation in a private environment if possible, just be yourself and listen to them.

• Actively listen

  Once you have engaged, you need to actively listen. Active listening involves both hearing and accurately understanding what the speaker has said.

  Your job during this step is to listen to your mate, reflect what you are hearing and clarify any differences - “so it sounds like you’re feeling angry because of XYZ, am I right?”.

  Allow your mate time to vent if need be, and don’t be afraid to allow some silence in your conversation – sometimes people need silence to think. 

  This is not the time to argue with them, tell them you know how they feel, or try to solve their problems. Simply listen, reflect and clarify.

• Check suicide risk and risk of harm to others

  If, after engaging and actively listening, you are at all concerned that your mate is at risk of suicide, self-harm or harm to other people, you need to ask them about it directly.  For example, ask your mate “Have you been thinking about suicide?”. See Helping a Suicidal Mate for more on this.

• Take action

  If they are considering suicide or self-harm, they must be taken to a doctor for assessment.

  If they are considering harming others, the police need to be involved. In both cases you need to remove any threats (e.g., firearms) when and where it’s safe to do so. You should never agree to keep secrets or leave them alone if they are in crisis.

  If your mate is not suicidal or homicidal, and you are no longer concerned about their mental health, you might choose to simply monitor them.  However, if you think they would benefit from support, help them take the next step to see some professional advice and care.

Tips on supporting a mate

• Prepare yourself

  Before looking out for someone else, it’s important to look after yourself. Make sure you’re in a good headspace and understand that they may either not want to talk or end up expressing some strong emotions.

• Find a quiet space to talk

  When starting a conversation about their mental health it can help to find a safe space where you won’t be interrupted or overhead by others and have enough time to talk properly.

• Ask them how they are doing

  It's as simple as that. If you're not sure how to start the conversation or what to say next, try these conversation prompts 

• Listen to them

  Take in what they say with an open mind and without judgement. Ask open-ended questions and show that you’ve understood by repeating back what you’ve heard. They may need time to think, so sit patiently with them without interrupting or rushing the conversation.

• Offer your support

  Acknowledge their struggle and how tough things are for them right now. There isn't one 'best' thing to say, so be yourself and offer words of comfort and encouragement. Check out R U OK? or download this conversation guide for more ideas. 

• Ask what would help

  You can offer to help them find support, or even ask if they are comfortable with you going with them. They may feel more comfortable with you checking in on them without you becoming too involved. Use your judgement, and if you think they are at risk, contact a support service.

• Ask about family/whānau supports

  People won’t always have talked with their family/whānau. These can be an important resource to draw on. Ask if there is someone in their family/whānau who they trust that they might be able to talk to—this might be a koro/kuia/grandparent, a parent or uncle or aunt, a sibling or cousin. Getting their involvement can unlock other support resources for your mate that you may not know about.

• Do something you enjoy together

  An important part of supporting a mate is being there for them by doing things you normally enjoy together. Just doing normal things together can make a big difference to how they are feeling.

• Keep in contact

  Make a note to yourself to check in with your mate at a regular intervals. Ask them how they're doing and keep them involved by inviting them to join in, even if they don't always reply. Know that your support means a lot to them and is making a difference to how they feel. 

You are not alone

• Read Pearl's story on supporting her partner through depression

  He'd changed. It was gradual at first.  He was angrier, quick to lose his temper and flying off the handle at everything.  He said it was everyone else's fault. He became more and more withdrawn, he never laughed or smiled, and at home he mostly sat in "his" chair with a scotch in his hand staring into the floor or at the TV. He stayed on at work a lot more and slept in weekends.

  Our kids were the soft target of his temper and increasingly spent time in their rooms when he as home. We were all walking on eggshells not to upset him. People were noticing the change at work too, asking if he was OK. He didn't think he had a problem. He told me he didn't know if he wanted to be with me and the kids anymore. I began to doubt whether I wanted to be with him too. After a couple of months of this he moved out. I felt relieved, I think the kids were too, but worried for him. Things on the work front got worse, and finally he got help. The doctor diagnosed him with depression, put him on stress leave and referred him to a clinical psych. He went on medication, he didn't like doing that at first but it made a big difference. He realised it wasn't us anymore and he came home. He gradually got better, I remember the first time we laughed together again, it had been a long time for both of us.  

  Our relationship has changed, but we are ok.   He's off medication now and mostly back to his old self again. What caused it I don't know - there was some family history but there were work pressures and some stuff from deployments that he'd bounced right through at the time.  Our loved ones are tough, asking for help isn't easy for them. He had to hit a crisis before he got help and even then he didn't really know he had the problem, partly that was the depression. It's hard was hard on him and everyone around him. But he got help and he is OK now.

• Read Jon's sister's story about losing her brother to suicide

  Before Jon died we’d planning an ‘epic roadtrip’ for months and I was so excited. We were going to drive all the way up the North Island right to the very top and be crazy all the way there like we always were. Then one day my entire world came crashing down on top of me. Jonathan was gone forever.

  I remember that moment like it was yesterday. When the words came out of my sister’s mouth I looked at her wishing for her to tell me it wasn’t true and it was all a horrible mistake. When I realised he was really gone the tears started and rarely stopped for the next six months. We were never going on our roadtrip, I’d never hear his voice again, hug him, laugh with him or be able to tell him how much I loved him ever again and his son would never see his father again. I thought I would never be able to recover from losing my big brother, I loved him so much and couldn’t bear the thought of going through life without him. Jonathan and I became very close in the last few years of his life. We often tried to figure out how it happened and decided it was the day he spent all day trying to cheer me up when I was sick. Coincidentally this was only two days before he went away for basic. He was so busy getting ready for all of this but still had time for his little sister.

  Whenever he came back to Auckland for visits we were always going on little escapades together – late night takeaway runs, random drives, going to the beach, talking in Spanish in a sombrero – we always found something to do. In the end he became more than just my brother to me. He was my best friend and my protector. I always felt so safe like nothing bad would ever happen as long as he was around. In fact when he died, the person I needed most to pick me back up was him. I’m not going to lie… there have been many times that I have been angry at Jon for leaving, for giving up and wondering how he could ever leave us to go through life without him, especially his son who he loved most in this world. I thought that his love for us and our love for him would miraculously fix everything that was wrong.

  Many times I have felt guilty for not doing enough to help him or for being angry at him and spent countless hours replaying everything I said and did wishing I had done more to help him, wondering if I did enough. I agonised for months over a phone call we had just before he died where we had a bit of a frosty conversation. I couldn’t remember if it was our last conversation and whether I had told him I loved him like I did every time I ended a phone call with him. I couldn’t bear the thought of him thinking I didn’t care and that being his last memory of me. We knew Jon had been fighting his depression, but he didn’t like to talk about. The times he did talk to me, I had to practically force it out of him. He didn’t want to burden anyone with his ‘problems’ and he got so good at convincing people I thought that he was OK until it was too late.

  Slowly, I have learnt to accept and understand that Jon did love all of us, that he wanted to be there for his son as he grew up and that he didn’t want to die. He was fighting a crippling depression and eventually he got so far into that dark place in his mind he just couldn’t find his way out. One thing he said to me about his depression helped me to eventually understand that he knew we loved him but it just couldn’t take those feelings away. I will be forever grateful to him for giving me that. Depression is a terrible disease that we need to understand can’t just be turned off. It is unforgiving and relentless. I hope that one day depression isn’t something we hide away from and instead learn to understand and accept that it’s OK to ask for help. His death has helped me to realise that and I may not have been able to prevent his death but if I can do anything to stop someone else making that decision I will always do it. Remember you are never alone.

• Read a mother's words about losing her son to suicide

  No man is an island, entire of itself, every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. Famous words by John Donne. We may not always realise how much of an impact what we do has on others.

  In November 2013 I lost my son Signaller Jonathan Hosken, who was based at Burnham Military Camp, to suicide. This is about my journey since that horrific news came to me.

  To lose a loved one is always difficult and no matter why we lose loved ones we naturally have many questions that we ask to try and make sense of our loss. As Jonathan’s mum, I would like to say that losing a child – no matter their age – is unbelievable – it isn’t meant to happen at all, we are supposed to pass before our children. And losing our child because they choose to pass is so hard to get our heads around. We carry our babies for nine months while we dream of how they will lead fulfilled lives. Then we nurture them close to us as young children before sending them out into the big wide world fervently praying that they will make choices that lead to love and fulfilment. If they make choices like Jonathan made, it is gut wrenching. And rightly or wrongly we question what we could have done differently that might have saved him. Even though I know in my heart that Jonathan, and Jonathan alone, made the decision to end his life.

  This is part of a message I wrote to Jonathan two years after his passing. It holds as much relevance now as it did seven years ago:
  It has been two long years since the tragic day when we lost you. And though you may have thought we would soon forget you, every single day you have been remembered in one way or another.

  You may have thought those you left behind would be unchanged by losing you. But we have all changed because we lost you. Your passing has affected many people deeply.

  As time has gone by it has become easier to talk about you, the funny things you did, the experiences each of us had with you. The tears don’t come as often. But they do come because we will always grieve the loss of you, a beloved and integral part of who we are. Sometimes the tears come out of the blue. It may be a smell, a sound, a song – it could be anything. Sometimes we can relate it to you. Sometimes we cannot. This is part of each of our lives now. We miss you deeply and love you to the moon and back, Son.

  He waka eke noa – we are all in this waka of life together. What affects one person, affects the whole crew. We depend on each other. From the depths of my mother’s heart, I plead with you to seek the support of the rest of your crew whenever the urge comes to you, either for yourself or for your mate(s). Whatever you decide to do will have a major effect on the people around you, the people you love. It is unavoidable.

  Ngā mihi