The book – which kicks off with Bridge’s assertion, “We’ve been living in a gross-out world of personal emotional self-indulgence and sentiment for decades now … decades which have seen the nation’s mental health worsening” – is a succession of equally magnificent declarations. Hence the “emotional obesity many are suffering from now”. Indeed the “empty calories contained in some feelings” have only helped our “sense of self-importance to grow fat”, she says. “And while antidepressants can be very effective, we need to be asking ourselves how we reached this point? Because whatever we’ve been doing clearly isn’t working.”Īt the Headmasters’ and Headmistresses’ Conference in 2019 Bridge told the 250 independent school heads in attendance what she believed to be the root cause of this mass unhappiness: “This focus on ‘me, myself and I’ is the problem… It’s taking people who are vulnerable to begin with and asking them to focus inwards.” And in Bridge’s ground-breaking book, Sweet Distress: How Our Love Affair With Feelings Has Fuelled the Current Mental Health Crisis, the behavioural expert explains why too much emphasis on emotion is as bad for our health as a surfeit of sweet treats. “But Covid cannot be held responsible for all of it,” cautions Bridge. There is no doubt that we are dealing with an unprecedented crisis – one that was definitely heightened by the pandemic. However, even Bridge was shocked by figures showing that more than a million prescriptions for antidepressants are now written for teenagers in England each year, with NHS data confirming that the number of drugs doled out to 13 to 19-year-olds has risen by a quarter between 20.Ĭhild mental health services are reported to be “at breaking point”, with referrals up by 52 per cent last year and some parents even admitting that they have been sleeping outside their children’s bedrooms in order to check they are not self-harming. “People were virtually orgasmic about their pan-banging, but how many of them then went on to volunteer or do something tangibly helpful?” It’s in part down to our gnat-like attention span, says Bridge, “but also the fact that a lot of the time we’re not interested in the actual subject, just the way we feel about it.”Īs an addiction specialist who has worked “with people’s brains” in schools, prisons and on Harley Street for decades and lectured on the subject of brain language and behaviour, the 71-year-old has watched our “fixation with feelings” balloon out of all proportion, eclipsing reason, and predicted how damaging it would be, especially for the young. Once we’ve had these ‘big’ emotions, we are no longer particularly interested, it seems.” She cites our celebration of the NHS as another example. “And you’ll notice that just like other political subjects that have prompted huge emotional outpourings on and off social media of late, things have now gone very quiet on that front. Terrifying, but “not surprising”, she adds with a sigh. But we were supposed to worry about the ‘anxiety’ young people were experiencing here? Frankly, I found that terrifying.” Meanwhile, what were they doing in Ukraine? Living in bomb shelters giving birth in cellars. “Yet there was this expectation that they were going to be enormously distressed – and about something that was not affecting them directly. ![]() “This was young people in the UK, you understand,” the teacher, therapist and author says slowly, narrowing her eyes and pausing for effect. “Nowadays there’s a huge demand for mishti doi even among the non-Bengali crowd,” he added.Shortly after Russia invaded Ukraine, Gillian Bridge caught the end of a BBC segment on “how young people can deal with their anxiety over Ukraine”. Shuprobhat Guin, owner, shared, “I went to Sydney last year for Bongotsav and there my workers made three types of doi - aam doi, sada doi and mishti doi - which were an instant hit not only with the probashi Bangalis but also with many foreigners.” The shop sells a minimum of 80 kg of mishti doi every day and never compromises on quality. No artificial colours or flavours are used in this process. This is then cooled and finally the ‘saja’ is added to allow the doi to set. ![]() The secret behind their consistent taste and quality is that they keep boiling the milk (adding the correct measure of sugar) till it reduces to half the weight and turns into a thick creamy liquid. But the undisputed winner and an all-time favourite of loyalists remains the mishti doi. ![]() This 180-year-old shop boasts of a special item for every Bengali occasion, be it monda mithai for Poila Boishakh, malpoa for Jamai Shashthi or chhanar payesh for Rath.
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