Support service finds women suffering the most from emotional distress
An emotional and mental support chat service provided via Line app, @d-chat, revealed that over the past two years the top three issues faced by Thais are domestic problems, disloyalty and depression.
Chorpaka Wiriyanon, the project’s coordinator, said 3,437 people had joined the chat service and most of them were women seeking emotional and mental support.
Of them, 30.54 suffered problems at home, such as domestic violence, difficulties arising from unhealthy relationships, financial crises and breakups.
Meanwhile, 21.33 per cent dealt with heartbreak from unfaithful lovers, and 19.66 per cent suffered from mental health conditions like depression.
Other issues include sexual assault, sibling rivalry, as well as problems with friends, work and studies.
“More people are seeking help in these matters as the number of appointments is rising. Society has to come up with a way of effectively tackling these issues,” Chorpaka said, adding that @d-chat will later collaborate with public health agencies.
Line @d-chat is a free service created by Sathira Dhammasathan, a learning community for peace and harmony, which provides training for “peer counselling” to help relieve distress.