Psychologist: People link mental illness with evil spirits

COUNSELLING psychologist Sule Joseph says people tend to associate mental-health issues with evil spirits. Speaking on the Minority Report on Tuesday, which coincided with World Mental Health Day, Joseph said, “There is an issue we face both in Trinidad and Tobago, which is that a lot of mental health issues, we usually attribute to spirits.

“So we talk about people being possessed and evil spirits – those are the things that we ascribe to mental health issues.”

Joseph said while there may be some situations that extend beyond mental health, “That is not my background.

“But what I say to people is that faith without work cannot work. You can’t have faith and not put in the work. Why not do therapy and whatever spiritual prayer you want to do as well? Why remove the therapy and only want to do the prayer?

There is nothing wrong with doing both. I welcome it. But you need the prayer and the work. The therapy is the work. We can’t remove that, just pray and say it is an evil spirit and leave it alone.”

Joseph lamented there is still too much stigma associated with mental illness.

“For a long time we have looked at mental illness as a 'crazy people' thing. That isn’t how we should view it. But we don’t take it seriously and that is the challenge.”

For example, he said a sudden death or tabanca (unrequited love) can make an otherwise normal person mentally unstable and depressed.

“Tabanca is a mental issue in relationships.”