How Did Our Stories Become Hard to Hear?

by Nour Mousa, Palestinian Syrian and Global Development Studies student at University of Western Ontario

Have you ever felt that all you need is to be in silence with yourself? In my journey to escape from Syria to Lebanon and then to Canada, I thought that all I wanted was a peaceful place to detox my soul from all the loss and terror I experienced and witnessed. I felt that all I need is to transform myself from survival mode to living every moment to its fullest and catch every little opportunity on the road in a peaceful place. This bright picture was not because I am a huge optimist. Like many people who escaped the terror of our home, we needed to build high hopes about the next destination. We need to reach there so desperately.  

I was one of the lucky ones, to reach that next destination, Canada. The place that was too peaceful for me. I finally had the chance to be in silence with myself, only to find that the noise was coming from my mind. I found myself trapped with my memories, more horrifying than the wildest nightmares. It is so calm here. Nobody will annoy you or give you a hug. I let the moments pass by me without noticing, and the road seemed deserted with no opportunities. At this moment, I decided to ask for help, and I started to look for a therapist. 

I was hesitant. It takes a lot of courage to ask for someone to help you order the chaos in your soul. The first step to open a wound for a stranger and trust them to give you a safe place where the pain will be bearable is challenging. Pain can alienate people, and trauma can make them feel incredibly isolated, the feeling that their story is too hard to tell, that it is hard for them to be heard. 

I went to a therapist at the end of my first summer in Canada. I was trapped in loneliness and survival guilt, struggling to achieve success in my education. When I went to therapy for the first time, they asked if they needed to learn about anything before the session. I wrote, “forced disappearance and political detainees in Syria.” During the session, I told her the story of my family, the war, forced disappearance, loss, and displacement. When I left her clinic, I saw tears trying to escape her eyes. As much as I appreciate her sympathy and sensitivity, I felt that my story is too heavy to be told even in the therapist clinic. This brief experience created an additional barrier for me to accept my pain, and I found that the best way to survive here is to hide it well.

Hiding the pain is not a good idea either. It is not a healthy thing to do—this is what the mental health awareness campaigns on social media tell us. We should express ourselves. But if I want to express myself, the elephant in my head will escape and join us in every room. Therefore, I got back to survival mode. I want to make fractions of happy moments to keep going.  It was the only mechanism for me to keep going. I still believe therapy, expressing feelings, and healing are important. But I cannot be alone on this, it is a hard process, and I need to find someone who understands the complexity of my story. 

I still feel that we who escaped the terror of our homes deserve to be helped. Somehow the pressure to find help is landing heavily on the shoulders of those who need the help. One piece of advice that I heard in the orientation session before I came to Canada was, “In Canada, do not expect to get help if you do not ask for it.” At the time, I thought of it as something logical, people will not guess that someone needs help. Later I realized that this statement reflects the dominance of individualism in Canada. Seeking casual or professional mental health help is not a simple task for refugees who are called newcomers, especially since they did not have a chance to build a social support circle of family and friends. 

The feeling that I am an isolated stranger made it hard for me to ask for help again. My story became harder and harder to explain in this peaceful place. This place seems too peaceful for us after years of facing terror as a norm in our everyday life. It is a lot to unpack from the generational trauma to the traumas that we experienced by ourselves not too long ago, to the misery of our home. No matter how far we go, it will always follow us. Not because we are too nostalgic, but because we still have people and places we love that we left behind. That we couldn’t save. 

At least of the ones I tried, the mental health services tend to focus on the individual response at the expense of the cultural, socioeconomic, and political factors driving people to lose control over their lives. This mentality is cruel to people who are already drowning in vulnerability. Even when many of us are trying to seek help, we are not able to find the right help for us. Some of my friends were offered medication after the first session, while others left with recommendations of books about anxiety and mindfulness and guided meditation applications. Also, some were referred to find an Arab or Muslim community based on the therapist’s assumption, before exploring the person’s relationship with their community or spiritual life. Most available, free, or affordable mental health services tends to oversimplify both our collective struggle and our individual significance. They don’t have a deep understanding. They don’t engage the affected people or identify new tools and methods befitting their needs to heal. 

We want to be part of this new place. But we cannot detach ourselves from who we are and the experiences that led us here. We are not fans of the “let it go” and “happiness is your choice” mentality. The reason is simple: we still need justice for ourselves and those we could not save. Our pain and loss have become far too normalized. There are too many people here who will hit us with “those in the Middle East have been fighting since the dawn of time.” 

Canadians always try to represent their nation as a multicultural one. The colonizers’ dominant culture, however, is reflected in mental health services and therapy. The notion of BIPOC speaking up about decolonizing mental health and treatment is growing, and refugees need to find their space to speak up and reflect on their experiences without being judged.