The Tapestry Project Nicole

An interview was conducted with Nicole from the Tapestry Project as she talks about the power of firstperson narrative in mental health

Do you find it challenging to collect these stories? Especially since there is a stigma in mental health from the older generation and the younger generation being unaware of it? We first started in 2014, it was so difficult collecting stories from people. Mainly because people do not want to be seen as weak or crazy, and there is some real cost in sharing one’s story. So for example, for sharing your personal details, your employers might find out and you are penalized for having this condition. And of course, family embers. The risk of offending them.

So the way I see it, stigma is 2 parts. The outside stigma where the outsiders will treat you differently but then there’s internalized stigma where it’s actually a lot of - people who have these tend to internalize the external pressure and the way that they can - it holds them back from telling their story. So that was the challenge. So initially, when we first started, I needed to ask a lot of my friends. And unfortunately, I had a lot of friends who were going through depression, or bipolar disorder. So I tried talking to them, and they were so generous to share their stories. But under a pseudonym and remove any personal identifiers.

But things are a bit better now. I think that the older generation are more hesitant but the youngers are, what we say more #woke. So people are more self-aware about this idea of emotional literacy, about self-care so they tend to be more bold about speaking up about their own journey

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How effective is storytelling in terms of empowering people as compared to informational kinds of campaigns? Do you think it’s fair to compare these two or does it appeal to different audiences? I think it appeals to different people. So how, in Singapore right, people tend to be more pragmatic and they tend to look more into clinical statistics, from authorities, institution.So they like to look at those things.

But I see a growing trend of people who appreciate first-person stories. They like to know that there’s a real person behind this issue. And I find that in the long-run, it might be a better approach to information-driven campaigns. So people are able to relate to this kind of information. It creates a sense of empathy, and that people are more open to getting help or - at least it helps people start their conversations. So I do think it’s effective. So if you look at online journals, storytelling is an evident space - it’s a good method. It’s a good method to convey information and convey personal problems.

Is it possible to educate people by storytelling? Yes, for sure. Because of storytelling and through our language, we are role-modeling in a sense that we should talk about mental health conversations. And I think when we use the words ‘I’ instead of ‘U’, people tend to be more open and think: ‘oh this person has been through this thing’ and they tried - you know, quite recently there was this person that searched on their experience in finding a therapist.

If you share it though story, so people will realize that - oh this woman goes to find a therapist. This first one didn’t work, but she kept trying and she found a therapist that finally fit and now she’s living a better life. Maybe I can do that for myself too. So it educates people on what to do in terms of finding the therapist that suits them but also empowers the readers to take actions for themselves and to have this knowledge that ‘okay I can get through this.’

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