Mentally Aware Nigeria Initiative is proud to bring you Knot Undone: An Anthology of Mental Illness in Nigeria. Featuring seventeen stories that portray what it's like to live with a mental illness in Nigeria from the eyes of those that have lived out this grueling reality. In a country where mental health stigma is a culture, where do people that cope with these illnesses hide? In Shame or in denial? And right in front of our very eyes? This will be the first collection out of the series.
Statistics from the World Health Organization state that 1 in every 4 persons is living with a mental illness. This equates to 1 billion and 700 million persons in a world population of about 7 billion. Disturbingly, 75% of this population live in low-and-middle-income countries (as in Nigeria), where stigma is rife. This stigma is down to ignorance and a constant denial of the reality of mental illnesses which has led to discrimination of the mentally ill and lack of the will to seek for help.
Stigma has a telling effect on how much one can do to seek help for their mental health problems and much of this stigma is down to ignorance resulting in a lack of understanding and empathy. That is why we decided to start this anthology series, that will collect real life portrayals of how people with mental health issues cope in this part of the world and that shines light on its reality in our environment. People will be made to experience this reality from the stories in these series.
Storytelling has long been a well acknowledged and unique educational model, and with these stories, we expect that thousands of persons, Nigerians and Non-Nigerians alike, will get clearer ideas of how mental illness is perceived in these regions, as well as how much better we can do with regards to reducing discrimination and its effects on those coping with mental illness.
This project has provided additional documentation in a PDF file (projdoc.pdf).
