Guest blog: The stories we tell

This year I had the privilege of completing an internship at FrameWorks UK, supporting the team in their research activities. One thing I’ve learned is that when the current framing of a social issue is not generating positive impact, we needn’t retreat, we need to research. Through evidence-based research we can identify framing that can lead to a significant shift in mindsets and policy.

FrameWorks UK have been working with Impact on Urban Health to shine a light on the wider drivers of children’s mental health including poverty and racism. These are my reflections on that project.

We need research to help us figure out the best way to shine a light on the drivers of children’s mental health, particularly racism, and this cannot be separated from the involvement of first-hand experience to shape and articulate that story. When we invest in these stories well, we honour the children who have lived them. We invest in the ones who come after us—and in the possibility that they could truly live in a better world.

When I was 6 or 7, I felt like most of the 6- or 7-year-olds around me. I got my left and right confused. I loved playing Bulldog on the school playground (until it got banned). I needed a night light at bedtime. I still believed in the tooth fairy, and I could still be bribed with sweets for good behaviour.

When I was 6 or 7, I went over to play at one of my friend’s houses for the first time. In my memory her bedroom walls were dark blue. But I think I added that confabulation over time. ‘The girls are upstairs’, one of the mothers must have said.

Just before my foot crossed the threshold, my friend stopped me with one sentence.

‘You can’t come in, no Black people allowed in my room’.

I remember my body feeling like it was about to rupture. I shook. Maybe I froze. All I remember is somewhere in my young mind were the words ‘This is what being afraid feels like’.

Outside of my family, experiences of racism were not explained or addressed—especially as a child. Life went on as normal, or so I thought until I started to notice things about my mind:

When I was 16, I avoided certain restaurants in the city I was born in because I would get this rush of anxiety that I wouldn’t be welcome. When I was 18, I hesitated to accept my place at a top-ranking university because both curricula and the accounts of discrimination minority students endured whispered the same message, ‘you do not belong here’ (The Guardian, 2018; Rushton, 2024). When I was 20, I questioned if I could enter certain job sectors, or rewrite old canons with new narratives or join certain sports clubs—because I believed the lie that I could not ‘come in’, that there was no place for me.

These fears weren’t imaginary neither were they singular; racism is structural and institutional, it affects every level of society, from education to healthcare to leisure (Mental Health Foundation, 2023). Neither were my fears exaggerated; the day-to-day toll racism has on a young mind can be fear-inducing at the least and fatal in the worst circumstances (Stop Hate UK, 2022). Finally, these fears did not stem from one negative interaction with an ill-informed girl. Zoom out from that bedroom in East London, and you’ll find children across the UK experiencing similar moments. My story is representative of broader trends. It is just one that sits alongside millions of others, all part of a continuum of racism that spans generations.

Clinical psychologist, Sana Ahsan, noted that young people are surrounded by messages of racism at every level of society which ‘communicate a central lie – that one is less worthy of life, less deserving of love, safety, care and access to resources’ (Ahsan, 2025). The effects these messages have on children’s mental health are vast, deep, and lasting. By failing to address the negative impact of racism on child mental health, society has missed out on generations of brilliant, healthy minds.

There is a space for—and a need for—communications to highlight how racism impacts child mental health and what can be done to prevent stories of suffering proliferating in children and affecting every part of their lives. And it needs to start now.

No one can deny that racism has been increasingly talked about in the last 5 years. But what good is the discussion if those affected by it are not given a voice? And what good is the amplification of a voice if it is only one, and if it is not supported with research? The spotlighting of stories coupled with research so robust that those with power—in power—cannot help but listen fuels change. As FrameWorks UK’s Director of Evidence Tamsyn Hyatt stated, individual stories placed in context can show scale and propel systemic factors like racism to the forefront.

How we talk about the factors that affect children’s mental health shapes how they are understood and addressed. That’s why effective research-driven communications are paramount—not only to explain how racism affects children, but to explain what institutions across the UK can do about it. When we invest in stories, we honour those who have lived them. Memories of isolation and being overlooked needn’t erode young souls in silence. Instead, they can be brought to light. When we invest in stories, we invest in the ones who come after us—in the possibility that they could truly live in a better world. Who wouldn’t want that?

References

Ahsan, S. (2025) I’m a clinical psychologist. I know just how badly racism is damaging children’s mental health, Big Issue. Available at: https://www.bigissue.com/opinion/racism-uk-mental-health-children-sanah-ahsan/ (Accessed: 11 April 2025).

Mental Health Foundation (2023) Racism and mental health, www.mentalhealth.org.uk. Available at: https://www.mentalhealth.org.uk/explore-mental-health/blogs/racism-and-mental-health.

Mind (2024) Facts and figures about racism and mental health, www.mind.org.uk. Available at: https://www.mind.org.uk/about-us/our-strategy/becoming-a-truly-anti-racist-organisation/facts-and-figures-about-racism-and-mental-health/.

Rushton, A. (2024) Exeter ranked least ethnically diverse amongst Russell Group universities, Exeposé Online. Available at: https://exepose.com/2024/10/24/exeter-ranked-least-ethnically-diverse-amongst-russell-group-universities/.

Stop Hate UK (2022) How Racism Affects Health and Wellbeing, Stop Hate UK. Available at: https://www.stophateuk.org/2022/10/17/how-racism-affects-health-and-wellbeing/.

The Guardian (2018) ‘Wealthy, white students still do best at university. We must close the gap’, 9 April. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/higher-education-network/2018/apr/09/wealthy-white-students-still-do-best-at-university-we-must-close-the-gap.