Renowned actress, TV host, fashion designer and fitness icon, Mandira Bedi has rarely shied away from speaking her mind, and more so when it came to breaking stereotypes and questioning age-old societal norms. Despite her highly successful career in showbiz spanning decades, Mandira did not have the easiest personal life. However, the diva has faced the storms head-on, asking for help when she needed it, rather than hiding her vulnerability out of fear of being judged. In her recent interaction, Mandira opened up about her mental health journey, a topic that’s still surrounded by stigma in India.
Mandira Bedi opens up on her journey in therapy
In an honest chat with Zoom, Mandira Bedi talked about the first time she sought therapy and how her own family reacted to it. The DDLJ actress began therapy years ago when few people even knew what a therapist did.
However, when Mandira told her mother about the therapy, her response was anything but supportive, given the generational and cultural misunderstanding of therapy as a sign of weakness or illness. The actress shared:
“I went to a therapist, way before anyone else has. It was a time when nobody had numbers of therapists on their phone. And I remember telling my mom I went for an appointment with a therapist, and she was like, ‘Why, what’s wrong with you?’ That’s the thing with mental health in India, if people hear that you are going to a psychiatrist or for therapy, they think that you are broken and they need to be fixed, or something’s wrong with them, they use the word ‘pagal’.”
Mandira Bedi talks about the taboo surrounding mental health in India
Although awareness around mental health has grown, a large section of society still hesitates to seek help, fearing the stigma of being labelled ‘pagal’, a derogatory term long associated with mental illness due to deep-rooted societal conditioning. Mandira stressed that seeking therapy doesn’t mean someone is ‘broken,’ but instead about checking in on one’s emotional health, just like we care for our physical health. In her words:
“The fact is, we all have moments where we are not feeling good, moments of anxiety, sadness, negativity… If something persists and stays for a time, then you need to have that awareness that something is not feeling right. You’ve got to do a mental check… to see how you are feeling, or an emotional check, and if something feels amiss … Then you have to have that awareness and something needs to be addressed and to address it you need to take some action.”
Mandira Bedi on her son attending therapy and normalising mental health at home
In the same conversation, Mandira shared that her young son has developed emotional awareness and confidently tells her whenever he feels the need to speak with their family therapist, who visits their home to help him process his feelings. Coming from a public figure, this revelation serves as an important reminder to emphasise mental health support. She shared:
“And now, when my son feels unhappy about something and he tells me very simply, ‘Mom, I think I’d like to speak to’ — we have a therapist who we call to the house, and she comes over and she hangs out with him in his room and they talk. He said, ‘I think it’s time to call her now.’”
From her mother’s outdated reaction to encouraging her son’s mental well-being, Mandira is setting a positive example to embrace mental health conversations without shame or fear. What are your thoughts on this?
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