Challenges in Aboriginal Mental Health

The provided document discusses the challenges in Aboriginal mental health, focusing on the experiences of Indigenous Australians. It highlights the historical trauma, racism, and cultural barriers that contribute to their poor mental health outcomes. The assignment emphasizes the need for culturally sensitive and inclusive approaches to address these issues, ensuring that healthcare services are accessible and effective for this community.

Running head: HEALTH JOURNEY OF AN INDIGENOUS PERSON IN AUSTRALIA
HEALTH JOURNEY OF AN INDIGENOUS PERSON IN AUSTRALIA
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HEALTH JOURNEY OF AN INDIGENOUS PERSON IN AUSTRALIA
Introduction
Recently I came across a survey that said that the rate of hospitalization of indigenous
people in Australia is quite higher than the non-indigenous counterparts. Once again there are
more number of indigenous people who can suffer from cancer than the non-indigeneous
(Kilian & Williamson, 2018). All these made me ponder me about the poor state of health
concerning the indigenous people. I would not say that I had many indigenous friends.
However, there was this one girl with whom I felt that I have a connection. She was Sivanna
Amandyo, my wonderful indigenous friend who taught me about the values of friendship,
unity and respect for diversity. She was studying in St. Marina’s high school in grade XII,
and was highly fond of physics and biology. However, I had no idea that what was awaiting
at Grandma Martha’s house is graver than I ever imagined!
Sivanna’s suicide: An introspection of mental health
This time when I visited grandma Martha’s house in Queensland for Christmas I was
customarily staring out of the window hoping to catch a glimpse of Sivanna, the lively and
feisty indigenous girl. She and her family has been a neighbour of Grandma Martha’s for the
past three years and over the period, we bonded well due to our shared interests in animal
photography. I still remember how much fascinated she would become seeing a platypus
emerge out of water and budging towards the worms to satiate its lunch! As I was
reminiscing about our bonding, Grandma Martha came from behind and told me “Sivanna is
no more!” I was startled by this revelation and before I could volley further questions, she
told me that Sivanna has committed suicide in the beginning of March 2018. She was
undergoing severe depression and her mother, Mrs Amandyo, did not know about her
declining mental health.
Born in 25th December 1988 in Perth, Sivanna Amandyo was an average student in
school as she found it difficult to cope with the demanding schedule especially in a language
and ambience that was foreign to her. She could not understand the accent being spoken by
the teachers at school. In classroom, she hardly found friends with whom she could feel at
home. There was always emptiness, a void that was haunting her, leaving her gloomy and
pushing her to extreme isolation. During lunch break, she would sit quietly in one corner and
sob helplessly. Most of her classmates did not bother to enquire her about her well-being.
Some of the girls in her class would offer her to play with them but Sivanna always rejected.
Sivanna was close to grandma Martha and on one such occasion, on persistent
coaxing she blurted her heart out. She felt lonely, out of place and could not adjust to the
school environment. To deal with depression she took refuge to alcohol. Even drugs were
found underneath the bed. In the light of the suicide tragedy, it also came into the picture that
Sivanna’s mother also had symptoms of depression. Her mother, Mrs. Smith was a single
parent and she had to rear Sivanna all by her own. Sivanna’s father was a victim of substance
abuse and under the intoxicated state, he would often perpetrate violence on her mother.
Witnessing such gross violence unfolding in front of her eyes made Sivanna all the more
pessimistic.
Alienation at school, pangs of dealing with an abusive father, witnessing a troubled
marriage, separation from the homeland, lack of a genuine friend to bare her heart and the
everyday negotiations of an aboriginal woman had shrouded her life with the pall of
depression. Mrs Smith in her own struggle to earn the bread of the family, found it difficult to
find time to spend time with her daughter. She later came to know that her father’s alcoholic

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HEALTH JOURNEY OF AN INDIGENOUS PERSON IN AUSTRALIAnature is a way of respite from the everyday racism that he had to encounter upon in his
workplace. According to the Australian Bureau of statistics (2012) anxiety and depression
among the indigenous is directly proportional to racial discrimination
Sivanna was also subjected to body-shaming. This was another incident about which
she did not articulate much clearly except for penning down in her diary. Once she told
grandma that her only true best friend was her pink diary. It was known, that she had feelings
for Charles, the prototypical white Australian boy. Charles was good at sports and was
courteous with everyone around him. Many other women at her class liked him and so as
Sivanna. One day when Sivanna decided to pull up courage and hinted to him about her
feelings, she felt that she should not have ever been that vocal. Charles along with few of his
friends left no stones unturned to bully her. She was body-shamed, called an “Ape” for her
distinct features. She was questioned on her audacity to love an Australian boy! This made
her introspect about her identity. She continuously asked herself what it meant to be an
Australian. Is she not an Australian? What is her identity?
Mrs Amandyo has always told her that Australia is her home and should take pride in
her national identity. However, Mrs Amandyo always told her to retain her individuality.
There was no shame in embracing who she was and holding on to her roots. However, her
school experience especially the Charles incident left her feeling repulsed not about others
but herself. She felt a sense of disgust towards herself and her being. She felt that had she
been like any other white girl Charles would have accepted her.
Mrs Amandyo is yet to cope with Sivanna’s suicide! She held herself culpable for not
being able to provide enough time for her daughter. She feels that it is her negligence that
pushed Sivanna to choose suicide over survival. For Sivanna, this was an escape from the
grimness of being an indigenous girl in a dominant non-indigenous white colonial society. It
also made her contemplative about the series of mental health tragedy that she had to witness
in her community due to their dispossession from land, loss of identity, the persistent feeling
of an outsider and lack of means to deal with this mental health wreckage. Her eyes became
moist with tears as she pondered on her savings from the meagre income she made through
department store job, to finance Sivanna’s higher education. All these now have no value to
amother who has lost her eighteen-year old daughter to the whirlpool of structural murder,
which is not new to her community. The members of her community have come to accept
that as indigenous people, depression and mental health issues are part of being born an
indigenous.
Overview of the mental health condition of the indigenous
The mental health of the indigenous can be attributed to a melange of factors. It has
been found that loss of culture causes grief. This is because of the history of invasion that has
made them extremely traumatized. Indigenous people have a history of violent persecution by
the white colonial settlers. The white government was known for separating indigenous
children from their parents with the motive of resocializing them to accommodate in the
dominant white culture (Gair et al., 2015). This resocialization was followed by incorporating
this children as modern day slaves and domestic servants in white households. They were
referred to as the stolen generation and the Australian government in 2008 also launched a
National Sorry Day to apologize for the grave sins committed by their predecessors.
This deep mental health condition has implications on the overall health of the person
( Brown et al., 2016) Trauma has a severe effect on an individual and is reported to be passed
onto the next generation (Williamson et al., 2014). Indigenous people also suffer more than
their non-indigenous counterparts and therefore, they are continuously suffering from some
form of illness or the other. The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (2015) and The
Australian Bureau Statistics (2012) have twice the chance of undergoing psychological

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HEALTH JOURNEY OF AN INDIGENOUS PERSON IN AUSTRALIAdistress. Indigenous people were more likely to be reported to binge drinking which is 42 per
cent and substance abuse, which is 28 per cent (Kilian & Williamson, 2018).
Indigenous community in Australia experience a sense of disempowerment. In
addition, not belonging anywhere leaves a profound effect on the metal health of the
indigenous people. It is argued, that there is a correlation between racism and the feeling of
depression (Hinton et al., 2015). Racism and depression go parallel as envisaged by
Ferdinand, Kelaher and Paradies (2014). Individuals who have experienced racism have been
shown to have depressive symptoms. The trauma that soars up within generations can have
profound can be potentially damaging for the emotional, mental and spiritual illness of a
person (Brown, 2016). The 2014-15 National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander social
Survey found that 33 per cent aboriginal people in the age group of 15 years suffer from high
level of psychological problems. It is said that this was twice the level reported compared to
other Australians. It was also found that 60 per cent of the aboriginals are prey to mental
health conditions (Mannan, 2015). It was reported that 30 per cent felt a sense of
homelessness and third were victims of racial jokes, name-calling and ignorance during
accessing service. Statistics demonstrate aboriginal people are 26 times more likely to
develop dementia between the age of 45 and 59 years.
Abuse is an issue that demands immediate attention instead of pushing it in the far
corner. In terms of abuse, Australia has a long way to go in order to combat race-based
discrimination (Indigenous reconciliation in Australia: still a bridge too far?, 2018).
Conclusion
The biography of Sivanna Amandyo encapsulates the nexus between colonization,
racism, white supremacy, patriarchy and dysfunctional family impinging on the mental health
of a person. In a society, where the dominant mainstream culture is the epicentre, it is the
minority who are made to feel like an outsider. This feeling of being not belonging anywhere
leads to a person feeling anxious, incomplete and depressed. The project of assimilation does
not occur in a smooth flow but it comes with a heavy cost. It is found that the onus always
lies with the minority to modify, adjust and adapt to the majoritarian culture without realizing
this leads to severe mental damage for the individual. Discriminatory behaviour meted out to
the aboriginals also contributes to their bad mental health. Indigenous women are said to be
mote stressed compared to aboriginal men. During the course of clinical treatment,
addressing the psychological illness is not enough. Instead, there is a need to take into
account the prolonged period white colonization that has invaded Australia.

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HEALTH JOURNEY OF AN INDIGENOUS PERSON IN AUSTRALIA
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