Children's mental health: do we care nearly enough?

As 25,000 children are hospitalised every year for self-harming, MPs are finally asking the big question

annalisa.png

THE subject of child mental health is very close to my heart. I was a depressed teenager. I had emotions I could neither name nor deal with, but which came out in strange behaviour such as controlled eating and uncontrollable spending.

There were no obvious causes: I had loving parents, I wasn’t bullied, I had lots of kind friends. But the adults in my life were hard-working people who didn’t really “do” emotions and I was left trying to work out “just what do you have to be depressed about” all by myself.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up
Explore More
Annalisa Barbieri, sketch writer for The Week, is a UK-based writer and broadcaster. A former fishing correspondent of The Independent she is now a columnist for The Guardian and contributes to The Economist's Intelligent Life and National Geographic Traveller. She is patron of Rights of Women.