James*, my eldest, was always a gregarious child: he loved being with people, and bringing everyone together. We weren’t surprised, then, that when he went to university 200 miles from our London home, he immediately immersed himself into the social scene, formed a great friendship group and seemed to be settling in really well.
But while he had always got good marks at school, his grades at university quickly began to slip. I put it down to the fact that his History degree meant he had to do a lot of independent learning, outside of classroom hours, and he wasn’t used to the self-discipline required beyond the structure of school.
That, and the heavy drinking (and maybe even recreational drugs) I guessed were now part of his new social scene. But I presumed it would get better as he settled into his new life.
Over time, though, he seemed to become more withdrawn. When he got his marks back for some important exams in his second year, they were far worse than he expected, and during our weekly phone calls, he clearly seemed devastated.
During the summer months, he moved back home to live with us. It was only after a month that he told us what had really been getting him down so badly during term time – that a university friend he had grown close to over his first year had taken his own life a few months earlier.
This was the second time someone in his circle had died by suicide – one of his schoolmates had died around four years prior – and I was immediately concerned about the impact on his mental health of another tragic blow.
You know your child, and it was incredibly upsetting to learn what he had been going through by himself, and that there had been a reason for the obvious shift within him all along.
As the summer holidays went on, he revealed too that his low mark had been down to a miscommunication over his circumstances with his tutor. He had told the tutor what had happened to his friend, expecting to be supported, and asked for extended deadlines.
But what he thought was permission to submit papers late wasn’t, as it turned out. Missing out on those marks, which contributed towards his final degree classification, made him feel dreadful about himself.
It was so hard knowing what he had been shouldering without telling us. I asked him whether he wanted to talk to anyone in my field (I’m a therapist), but he was still battling with a desire for independence, and didn’t necessarily want to be helped by his mum and dad. It’s really difficult, particularly with your eldest child, not to want to go and fix everything for them.
At the same time, I was really proud of him for the help he had sought – going to the mental health counselling service at his university and recognising that he needed someone to listen.
His university made help easy to access, he said, but of course that relies on the young person being prepared to open up. Much as it was hard to accept he had got help from someone that wasn’t me, you have to let your kids go, haven’t you?
Spending so much time at home with family over the university break, where he could go for walks for hours with our dogs, helped enormously. He also saw our GP and began taking anti-anxiety medication, which worked well, too.
By the end of the summer, he realised that, given how fragile he was feeling, he needed to be in a calmer environment rather than back at university, where he didn’t trust himself not to use what had happened as a reason to drink heavily and distract himself from his studies.
He had already organised his student flatshare back in his university town, but decided to stay at home for a few more months until he felt ready to face things on his own again. I didn’t want him to miss out but it was very much his decision.
When he did go back a few months later, he finished up his degree with OK marks, before deciding to do a Master’s in business management. I think he wanted to redeem himself after feeling so low about not performing better academically, and really needed to find himself again after spending so long in a dark place.
The course did exactly that. It was completely up his street, and he got his distinction. I believe the decision to really focus on what he wanted to do helped to push him back to his old self.
I know that once September comes and today’s new undergraduates leave home for student life, parents will worry about how to support them if the worst happens and they end up struggling as James did. Around 57 per cent of university students self-report mental health issues, and as a parent, it’s such a fine line when it comes to giving support, but not interfering.
Counselling, medication and the time at home had all improved James’s mental health, and I tried to focus on giving him space to truly see, hear and witness him. Much as he tried to withdraw, I wanted him to know that I was always there.
At the same time I had to accept that, as his mum, I was perhaps not the source of help he wanted. I’d encourage other parents to be OK with the fact that you can help from a distance, and part of that helping is to signpost where else they may be able to get some help from (in our case, the GP), and just to let them know that they’re loved.
I’ll always worry about James because he’s a deep thinker. Would he have turned out to be this type of boy anyway, and gone through these mental health challenges, had he not suffered those personal tragedies? I’m not sure.
But the sense of purpose he has now through work, and the fantastic girlfriend he is now with, show that even the darkest times don’t have to last forever.
*Names and details have been changed
As told to Charlotte Lytton