The Head of the Department and I were discussing today about a specific colleague who everyone knows and has labelled to be eccentric, to put it mildly. There have been so many instances in the past year or two, that in common language, we would call her mad. The rest of us in the department have accepted her madness.
Nothing great about this acceptance. Except, this acceptance is not helping anyone. A new issue crops us everyday. Students are complaining, crying and finding it difficult to work with her. As teachers, we have always found it difficult to work with her but the past couple of years have been worse.
And I am sure, although, she hasn’t expressed it to me, she must find all of us very difficult as well. In her language and interaction, it is clear that she is not happy with the department. She doesn’t engage with anyone. At time is rude, and at others, inappropriately emotional. In other words, our acceptance hasn’t helped her either.
What is this acceptance? She has been accepted with her idiosyncrasies and all of us have found ways to work around it. We haven’t had the courage or the bandwidth to initiate a conversation about her ways with her. She has been resistant. In the end, it remains status quo. She hasn’t reacted positively to being encouraged to seeking professional help.
‘Professional help’ was the term I used. Because saying she needs to see a psychiatrist seemed too harsh. What authority do I have to tell her so anyway? And so, with each of our arguments, we carry on with our own lives. Fretting and fuming over the difficulties that she creates for us and finding solace in each other’s company.
So much for mental health advocacy. In the end, we end up doing nothing. And she is not the only one. There is a student in our department who seems disoriented in her conversation and mannerisms. Another one has had mild seizures several times. Another teacher seems to be facing difficulty in conversations. All of these are cases that we observe, discuss, and then ignore. There is little by way of an institution that we can do to help.
My learning in Psychology tells me that in all four of these cases, they are themselves not in a position to seek help. Help will have to be imposed. For students, we do this because we find ourselves in a position of authority to call their parents. But with colleagues, we do not have the same authority. Then what do we do? We accept. We might as well accept defeat.