Letters: Living with depression discussion

WHILE I agree that suicide needs to be more talked about, or rather what leads to people feeling like suicide is the only option, I am not an advocate that it should be made headlines.

Why? As someone who battled for a decade with depression, I can remember only too well what that darkness felt like.

And I know what effect Saturday's Chronicle front page would have had on me, which would have been leaving me feeling even more helpless.

While I might have only been one person, reading something like that could have been the one message that tipped me over. For those living with depression, it's a very fine line some days …

Where is the front page story of those of us who have survived and thrived after depression?

How about a front-page story on a high-profile person who has made it through the other side of depression and this may just plant a seed of hope and keep someone who is struggling moving forward.

I suggest that media are very careful with this subject and take some direction from those who have struggled with their mental health to this degree.

CARLA LANGMEAD
Whanganui

Editor's note: Our story on Saturday about the death of Dr Chris Cresswell was clearly a very sensitive topic. However, we believe discussion of depression needs to be brought out into the open, and there is expert opinion supporting this. The way we report these matters is closely controlled and includes the publishing of helpline numbers, which we did on our front page. We are certainly open to talking to and reporting on those who have overcome depression.

Smart alarms

Technology offers a different approach to the risk of fires from unattended cooking. The basic requirements are for a wired-in smoke alarm, and for the cooking appliance to be electrically operated..

When the smoke alarm is triggered, it can also be made switch off the cooking appliance. Once the heat source is removed, the risk of fire disappears. Any qualified electrician can install this – especially if you offer them scones for morning tea!

P CUNNIFFE
Otamatea

Face-to-face talk

There's something not right. How come we get to be named the World's Most Intelligent Small Community (Chronicle, September 11)? With all this smartness, I think many families are forgetting to communicate face-to-face with their kids.

I work with young children, and it's worrying to see many of them arriving at kindergarten with poor speech and little concept of conversation. I know that new entrant school teachers are finding the same.

One of the most precious gifts that families can give their children is time and real face-to-face conversations, sharing everything that is relevant at that time and place and sharing stories and song. Research about the way that babies first learn their "mother tongue" is exactly that! They have found that at about six months of age whilst being cradled and fed their eyes gaze directly at the mother's mouth, absorbing the shape of her mouth and tongue with the sounds that she makes.

That face-to-face language is perhaps the earliest vital part of speech development but it doesn't stop there. Children need ongoing happy meaningful communications and stories. Put the digital stuff on hold while children are about, please. That time is precious!

SUSAN SHAND
Castlecliff

Flight to Nauru

Recently, our PM took a Boeing 757 to Nauru at a cost of — well, who knows? The petrol alone was $80,000.

The PM took this flight separate from the NZ delegation so she could have an extra day to breastfeed. "Damned if I did and damned if I didn't" she said. Wrong.

Per his portfolio, our foreign minister should have gone with the NZ delegation. But no go. He might have represented the best interests of the nation rather than the misguided refugee policies pursued by this PM.

Has breastfeeding taken on such sacred cow status that we, the media and National cannot criticise the PM for this? How many breastfeeding mums could have fed their whole families for a year with the money wasted by the PM on this single junket? More than a half-dozen, I'm sure.

The Coalition Government should spare us their bloviating about the less fortunate. They would have blasted a National PM for similar spending for personal reasons, and rightfully so. Which makes me wonder if we even have an Opposition. National's silence on this has been deafening.

Let's also be reminded that in Ardern's expressed political views, she is simply breastfeeding her choice to not end a pregnancy. Isn't that what we hear from her when the subject of abortion comes up?

Maybe in motherhood Ardern will come to grips with the scientific fact that it's not just the woman's body involved in ending a pregnancy. There is a baby involved. She has made the taxpayers pay dearly for this reminder.

TEDDY MARKS
Whanganui

Send your letters to: The Editor, Whanganui Chronicle, 100 Guyton St, PO Box 433, Wanganui 4500; or email editor@wanganuichronicle.co.nz