Depression is not a Racist; The Nguvu Story

Depression is just one of many mental disorders like anxiety disorder, bipolar disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder, and psychotic disorders, which are the most common types of mental disorders, and they are not racists — they don’t discriminate, they are not reserved for some particular skin colour or type, body size, wealth class (rich or poor), and definitely not reserved for less accomplished people, because you can be successful and be living with mental disorder. In fact, you can be grinding at work, hitting targets, churning jokes and be living with a mental disorder.

These disorders have a huge impact on the world, with over 300 million people globally suffering from depression and over 260 million people globally living with anxiety disorder, costing the global economy $1 trillion each year in lost productivity, according to a 2017 WHO mental health report. This report is even 3 years old, a pre-COVID19 era. Now, with the current and rather unfortunate pandemic, we can unanimously agree that it has affected the mental health of a lot more people exponentially, with spike in anxiety levels of many who fear contracting the virus, suicides, domestic and sexual violence, amongst other sad incidences. It’s indeed a tough time for almost everyone, even the frontline workers saving people who contracted the virus. I mean, have you ever stopped for a second to imagine how these healthcare workers’ lives are and what state their mental health is, after seeing people die daily? I can’t even imagine.

So, let me ask you this: how will you feel if you get a text from your friend that reads:

“I’m freaking out!!! Like I’m trying everything I can to be calm but I can’t!”

Or maybe you get this from another saying:

“I am tired of life and I’ve begun to cut myself and eventually want to kill myself.”

These are real highlights of my personal experiences with close friends’ struggles with mental health disorder and I hate to wonder what may have happened if they didn’t get a response to their messages or even an answer to their calls.

Sad fact: close to 800,000 people die due to suicide every year, which is one person every 40 seconds; suicide being the second leading cause of death among 15–29 year olds globally, according to a 2016 WHO Suicide Data.

This reality of what people are facing or have faced is what spurred me to start Nguvu Health.

Nguvu Health is an on-demand teletherapy platform for Africans/Blacks both at home and in diaspora.

It is true that the concept of therapy is still a bit strange to some people but in actuality, many people need a professional; someone trained to identify traces and symptoms of mental disorders. For instance, I am not a clinical psychologist, so I can’t really decipher if someone is suffering a mental disorder and even if I were to be so certain which one it is, I won’t know what else to do from there. So, I thought, why not create a safe space, where people can talk unprovoked with licensed therapists who will handhold them through their mental health journey?

Our aim is to make therapy easy and affordable from anywhere in the world, at any time. We employ the use of technology to make this work by offering text therapy and video therapy, to strengthen people mentally and emotionally. We believe that everyone deserves good mental health, which is at the core of our existence as humans. We want to be able to provide 50 million Africans/Blacks mental healthcare through our platform.

For our text therapy, text, audio, and video files can be exchanged with your matched therapist. One feature worth loving a lot is the anonymity feature where upon signing up to join our platform, you primarily remain anonymous to your therapist just in case you don’t want him or her to know who you are— we believe this will encourage people to talk without guilt or restrictions. However, you can toggle back your identity visibility when you feel safe enough to do so but all at your own discretion. As for our video therapy feature, you get to schedule a live video call session based on the availability of your therapist. Unlike the text therapy where there’s an anonymity feature, it’s not a feature that exists here for obvious reasons — video call. Lol.

We have also come up with a pricing plan that is affordable compared to the traditional therapy pricing which often deters people from even seeking therapy in the first place. Asides, creating easy access to quality therapy, making it affordable is also one of the drivers for building this solution.

As for our therapists, our standard is to ensure that ONLY licensed therapists sign up with us. Asides being experienced, our therapists are professionally calm, creative and cool enough to speak with. You can, thus, be rest assured that Nguvu Health therapists take very seriously your privacy as their code of conduct mandates them to keep conversations discrete. They are also bound by a non-disclosure agreement with us and our clients to further ensure that anything that transpires between them stays private.

Your mental health is just as important as your physical health and the best investment you can make for yourself is subscribing to Nguvu Health to get the help you need. We are launching our Android app soon, so you can keep in touch with us on our social media handles to know when we launch. Also, our social media accounts are filled with helpful contents that will give your mental health a boost.

We Care.