Depression is killing young men

The first time a close friend ever said that he is depressed, we unanimously told him to shut up, man up and stop being a drama queen! See why the bar is hardly a place for therapy? With hindsight, I now see how hurtful our dismissal must have been.

In less than two years, I have come to understand what depression is. It is not to be dismissed curtly. When three university-educated students mention to you that they have contemplated suicide because life is tough, you must stop and wonder what exactly is going on.

Many people aged between 25 and 40 years are depressed and the situation is likely to get worse, since the economy is likely to perform badly in the next few years. An economist friend recently told me that my generation may officially be the wasted generation, since the economic policies of the last five years and the next five years are likely to affect us the most.

Many people have lost their jobs. Many are stuck in poor-paying jobs that can hardly take care of their bills, even after foregoing little creature comforts like a cold beer on a hot day or hot coffee on a cold day. Upward mobility is increasingly becoming impossible. The cost of living has never been higher. As the joke goes, nowadays you break up a thousand shillings note, buy a fifty shillings airtime and it is over!

Family pressure to marry

Despite these harsh economic realities, society pressures men to marry when they cannot even feed themselves. Feeding a wife, and soon a child or two, is not easy. Besides, women have always been aspirational and would want the best for the family. But we have run all public institutions from school to hospitals, meaning that that any service that a family needs must be sourced at private facilities. It is not sustainable at all, for many young men.

On a daily basis, I meet friends who live on loans and have shylocks on speed dial just to keep up. It is not that they are living beyond their means. I can't even judge them because I am just as vulnerable and if I was hit with even a minor disaster, those are the options I have.

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Financial and spousal pressure are now driving young men nuts and they are responding to it differently. Some take to alcohol and drugs. Some walk out of their relationships and children. Some withdraw from society and next you hear they have killed themselves, or moved to the village and given up on the city's rat race.

It never used to be like this. In the days gone, the social fabric that used to hold us together was tighter. Now they have integrated. Now, despite more channels of communications and opportunities for interaction with social media and phones, we are more disconnected and more disinterested in each other. Few friends and relatives who have made it have succumbed to crass materialism - ready to brag about their latest acquisition, but less ready to lend a hand to a struggling friend. As Africans, we never used to be like this. We always had each other's back, but the repugnant individualism of capitalism is slowly eating into society. But even so, we are a proud generation that hardly reaches out to people for help. If we are turned down once or twice, it becomes too much and we are likely to seclude ourselves.

So, where do we go from here?

I think churches, charitable organisations and NGOs must start focussing on depression as a fact of life in Kenya. Scholars must study the condition presently and how it affects the country. As a country, there are historical traumas that are haunting us as a country that must be exorcised. The last three elections have reminded us that we are balancing precipitously towards a disaster. And young men are at the centre of it - killings of a genocidal proportion are now an existential reality.

The government at a macro-stage must come up with policies that can make life easier for younger people. It must be creative in opening up opportunities for young people, if we are to save them.

At an individual level, if you are stuck, reach out for help. Whether it is your friend, a pastor or an elder, kindly talk to them. Seek help, human beings may be flawed, but they always have a capacity to help. Don't take things personally when things don't go your way. Turn to God, to your brothers and sisters.

Whatever it is, there is always a brighter day tomorrow.

- @nyanchwani