Gambiaj.com – (BANJUL, The Gambia) – I’ve been really disturbed by the increasing number of suicides lately, in particular the way Gambians react to them. When people are not judging those who attempt to commit suicide and their families, it is treated as a crime by the law.

Stop for a moment and think about that. It’s like saying if you die from cancer, that’s fine, but if you recover, you’ll get jailed.

Because suicide is due to mental illness, not someone being “reww” or “bandi” or not believing in God. Absolutely no one—not even animals—wants to die. But once it takes over your brain, all you can think of is escape. Like being on fire and seeing a river nearby, and even though you can’t swim and know you’ll drown, you just want your flesh to stop burning and the pain to end.

That’s what it feels like, and it’s a horrible, unbearable feeling. How do I know? I’ve shared on here about my bipolar and how it has led me down very dark paths, many that would have ended in very bad places. But I was in the US at the time. Instead of jailing me, I was provided with the services, drugs, and therapy I needed to finish college and achieve all I’ve achieved in my life.

In Gambia I wouldn’t have gotten care—I would have gone to jail or been dumped at Tanka Tanka after being tranquilized. So someone is driven by their mental illness to try to take their own life, and instead of celebrating their failure and getting them help, you throw them into Mile 2? Make that make sense. How abhorrent are we as a people?

The worst thing is we didn’t come up with this anti-suicide law—the toubab did, and we inherited it from them. As with many other cases, they have evolved and learned to treat their mentally ill better. Meanwhile, we’re stuck calling them “doff” and laughing at them until they finally snap.

The US took care of me and healed me to a point where I can actually contribute to Gambia and live a full life. But in my own home and motherland, instead of getting help, I would be at Mile 2 wasting away?

We Gambians who live with mental illness are not bad people, not really, not “goamadi” or any of the things that let people otherize us. We’re exactly like you: struggling and fallible humans just trying to survive and prosper. Mental illness is like any other illness—this is something we shouldn’t even have to say.

I thought I’d speak up because the way I see Gambians talk about these topics is leading to great harm, not just in terms of stigmatization but in terms of giving permission to Gambians who suffer to seek help without judgment.

We are better than this as a people. Our lawmakers need to act and remove this ridiculous law so more Gambians will feel comfortable getting help when they reach that point.