by
Isabelle McCormick

11 July 2022

“We are all human,” it’s a phrase I have heard my whole life, a thousand times, I know you have too. To me, it’s always been something people say to comfort us in our struggles, but it’s a bit of a platitude.

I had always found it insincere. Something people say to be nice. The words to me never reflected actual care about my depression or loneliness, things I have had to personally manage my whole life. And still, without it ever resonating, the phrase would appear again and again.

Here at Migrants of the Mediterranean (MotM), where I’ve served as an intern for the past two years, we use similar phrases when we talk to you, our subscribers and community, so at first I was hesitant. How could I take this sentiment seriously after a lifetime of doubt? But as I got closer to the members of MotM and deeper into our work, things started to shift.

I have worked on various projects over the years. Some are posts you’ve seen on social media, and many more things behind the scenes. The most significant project to me was for our Story Archive data. One by one, I transferred content from each individual story to a spreadsheet. It includes everything from names and ages to all the stops people have made throughout their journeys – it’s all of the information you’ve read in the stories before, but in lines and columns.

Maybe a little bit dry, but by reading each journey and paying attention to every detail, I got close to the stories and built a personal connection to a few of the people. Especially Abraham. His words hit home even more when I heard him on the “Mental Health Crisis” episode of the Open Encounters podcast.

I hung on to every word he said.

He opened up so bravely about his struggles with mental health. He talked about the days that he did not even want to be alive anymore. That this never-ending thought of not wanting to be here turned into multiple suicide attempts. As hard as that was for him to admit, he gave me courage and inspiration when he did. His words resonated with me more than I thought anything could.

Mental health has been a struggle for as long as I can remember. I’ve dealt with depression and crippling anxiety, and on any given day it could feel like the weight of the world is on my chest.

The feeling is so intense that no medicine or therapy could take away the heaviness. I feel it daily. I thought nobody could grasp what my trauma felt like, so what a disrespect to hear emotional pleas that rang so insincere. “We’re all in this together?” “We’re all the same?” If my struggles were supposed to be somehow relieved by universal platitudes like those, it sure didn’t happen for me. On my darkest days, I never thought anybody could understand the feeling of not wanting to be here but being too scared to leave.

I sit here today with a different view, and am able to tell you that because of the connections I have made with these stories, my once negative view of that kind of language has turned.

Abraham was not afraid to be truthful about the effects of his traumas, and it was because he was given the space to do so.

It is not often that people from forgotten communities get a space to be completely free. Migrants of the Mediterranean gave him, and every other person in the migrant community we advocate for here, that chance. And when Abraham used his voice, it in turn gave me a voice in my own struggles.

His courage to be truthful about the battle he faces with his mental health allowed me to not only be honest with the people around me but with myself. Knowing that somebody else, even if they are thousands of miles away, can understand what I feel like makes me feel less lonely. Even if we do not know first-hand the emotional trauma someone in the migrant community goes through, I know that we are giving them the opportunity to say whatever they feel in a comfortable, safe space.

Ousman from The Gambia had already crossed the Sahara Desert and traveled thousands of miles on his own at the age of 16 when he arrived in Lampedusa in 2017. And while his age separates him from many of our other profiles’ Journey Stories, one thing is consistent: his unapologetic voice to inform the world.

That is what can bring us together, hearing each other’s voice – to find understanding and help one another get through life. We can’t do it alone – we’re all human and really are in this together. It turns out, those phrases I’ve always perceived as platitudes could actually be true.

Ousman’s and Abraham’s stories were a catalyst for my personal growth as much as they were informative. Being here at Migrants of the Mediterranean gave me the ability to find this power of human connection. Experiencing that kind of openness and allowing me, and every reader, to hear the struggles that these remarkable people have gone through gives us the courage and strength to use our voices in turn. For that, my gratitude to the people in this community is endless, and I hope it is for you too.