Com­mu­ni­ty is im­por­tant to hu­man ex­is­tence and es­sen­tial for those strug­gling with men­tal dis­or­ders. The more con­nec­tions one has, the greater the feel­ing of be­ing sup­port­ed and the pos­si­bil­i­ty for re­cov­ery. That sense of be­long­ing aids re­silience.

A vis­i­ble or present com­mu­ni­ty, em­pa­thet­ic and sup­port­ive, re­moves some of the mis­trust peo­ple man­ag­ing men­tal ill­ness­es hold and, re­search shows, prompts peo­ple to seek help and sup­port.

In a coun­try where com­mu­ni­ty men­tal health is not well es­tab­lished, sup­port from in­di­vid­u­als, fam­i­lies, re­li­gious or spir­i­tu­al groups, vil­lages, peo­ple with com­mon in­ter­ests, and the like is our best hope. High em­pa­thy and aware­ness in these cir­cles cre­ate a nur­tur­ing and in­clu­sive en­vi­ron­ment, pre­vent­ing iso­la­tion.

Com­mu­ni­ty has evolved dif­fer­ent­ly for me over decades of man­ag­ing my well-be­ing. I have sur­vived well, but the dis­ap­point­ments are many in the com­mu­ni­ties’ in­abil­i­ty and un­will­ing­ness to act in com­mu­ni­ty.

My su­per­pow­ers evolved through those dif­fi­cul­ties. I de­clare them now as be­ing born a woman, be­ing my un­apolo­getic, gen­uine self, my abil­i­ty to be con­tent in every sit­u­a­tion, and my strength to con­tend as one.

The lat­ter came from the many ways com­mu­ni­ty has not been pro­tec­tive. At first, the dis­tress caused two decades of cry­ing. Then the tears dried up. I har­nessed self-de­ter­mi­na­tion and em­braced my deep­est essence.

In 2007, I com­plet­ed a col­lec­tion of about 50 grief po­ems. No one told me that craft­ing dis­ap­point­ment with hu­man­i­ty in­to po­et­ry could fine-tune my thoughts and feel­ings to a ther­a­peu­tic vic­to­ry.

The cathar­sis was en­riched as I be­gan paint­ing at age 50. At that time, I al­so com­plet­ed a hor­ti­cul­ture pro­gramme and cu­rat­ed an en­vi­able gar­den in the yard my fa­ther left me.

These are the ways I re­placed the idea of a sup­port­ive com­mu­ni­ty in my life af­ter years of re­al­is­ing that ab­solute­ly no one was com­ing to “save” me. Out there, I have found few gen­uine in­vest­ments or in­ter­ests in my men­tal well-be­ing.

There are peo­ple and or­gan­i­sa­tions that would nev­er again in­vite my par­tic­i­pa­tion in men­tal health pro­gram­ming. Why? Be­cause in the past, when their pro­gramme mat­tered so much to them, and my pres­ence was a call­ing card, I did not show up. (Could not show up, re­al­ly.)

Know this: when peo­ple want you to talk about men­tal health strug­gles, you are not al­lowed to strug­gle on that day. How dare you have an anx­i­ety or pan­ic at­tack on the day of the event?

Quick­ly, I re­alised my sto­ry was the sell­ing point. Not me or my well-be­ing. Or­gan­is­ers’ im­age and pro­grammes were what mat­tered. How much em­bar­rass­ment I have faced in mes­sages of “dis­ap­point­ment” and back­room con­ver­sa­tions about my “lack of pro­fes­sion­al­ism”!

Nev­er had one of those or­gan­is­ers ask post-event if I had im­proved or if I need­ed sup­port. Nev­er have I ever re­ceived a next-day well-be­ing fol­low-up phone call. Soon I learnt to say no. I de­cid­ed to lim­it my ex­po­sure in those sit­u­a­tions.

Com­mit­ted to val­ues of ser­vice and vol­un­teerism in giv­ing back, most of my work is at no cost to or­gan­i­sa­tions. I go wher­ev­er men­tal health pro­gram­ming needs build­ing up. Even so, the dis­re­gard for my men­tal well-be­ing while build­ing well-be­ing com­mu­ni­ties per­sists.

Most re­cent­ly, af­ter a year work­ing with a char­i­ta­ble or­gan­i­sa­tion, there seems to be con­cerns about my lack of in-per­son pres­ence. I re­ceived mes­sages about “un­der­stand­ing” my “un­avail­abil­i­ty” and ap­pre­ci­a­tion that “my life is liv­ing”. My con­ster­na­tion? There was not one con­ver­sa­tion ini­ti­at­ed that asked about my “lif­ing life” or “avail­abil­i­ty” for months, while I suf­fered many tri­als.

I have al­so sought com­mu­ni­ty around my be­liefs be­cause spir­i­tu­al prac­tices bring peo­ple to­geth­er. But the peo­ple in our re­li­gious com­mu­ni­ty are bro­ken too and are from the same prej­u­diced T&T pop­u­la­tion.

My dis­ap­point­ment with the church com­mu­ni­ty is summed up in this that I read: “The worst pain is get­ting hurt by a per­son you ex­plained your pain to.”

In 2025, I had a break­down – some­thing I had not ex­pe­ri­enced for years – and the first to go was the “sis­ter” I had forged a re­la­tion­ship with for years. The fol­ly? The is­sue was not with her. The melt­down was in a con­ver­sa­tion with some­one else, and her best Chris­t­ian re­sponse was to re­al-life “un­friend” me.

My re­sponse? Hav­ing ad­dressed the is­sue us­ing Bib­li­cal stan­dards, re­al­is­ing my break­down caused a depth of re­vul­sion enough to un­wel­come me in her sa­cred space, she be­came and was de­clared (to her) an un­safe in­di­vid­ual to my well-be­ing, so trau­ma­tised I was!

I re­treat­ed. Al­ready hav­ing emo­tion­al­ly left rel­a­tives be­hind this past year, I ac­cept­ed again that I am my best sup­port. I dwell in peace and safe­ty in the com­mu­ni­ty of things that keep me. Writ­ing, paint­ing, gar­den­ing, peer coun­selling (go­ing where I am need­ed), prayer, my com­pan­ion pet Lar­ry Bird, Bible ex­po­si­tions, and cook­ing.

In my paint­ings, I cre­ate peo­ple who are ab­sent and write sto­ries about them. I imag­ine my com­mu­ni­ty as present and pro­tec­tive, and I ex­pe­ri­ence less dis­ap­point­ment by lim­it­ing my ex­pec­ta­tions. And liv­ing here has taught me not to over­es­ti­mate my con­tri­bu­tions or im­por­tance, and that keeps me.