This Tuesday, the municipality of Medina Wandifa (Bounkiling department) held its World Mental Health Day. Through an informative awareness forum, experts and social actors raised the alarm about the devastating impact of family stress on vulnerable children and young girls.

Family stress: an invisible enemy

According to Aminata Guèye, a consulting psychologist, a child's psychological balance depends directly on the serenity of their environment, particularly their family environment.

Unfortunately, in Medina Wandifa, the risk factors are real. There is social insecurity, poorly managed adolescent crises, and an unstable family environment, often catalysts for this malaise, which frequently leads to conflicts within families or school dropout.

Consequences: a child exposed to constant stress sees their communication skills deteriorate, their social relationships worsen, and, more seriously, their academic performance plummet.

Ms. Guèye advocates the creation of a secure family environment as the first line of defense against mental disorders.

Bintou Cissé, a facilitator at Enda Jeunesse Action, provided a local perspective on the situation in the Bounkiling department. The observation is unequivocal: in Médina Wandifa, the situation is considered alarming.

"Stress, when it persists, becomes pathological and dangerous," she warned.

For Enda Jeunesse Action, the objective of this forum is to protect vulnerable young girls and guarantee their future by improving the family environment.

Francisca Diouf reminded everyone that mental health is not just a medical issue, but a major social challenge.

For her, the responsibility lies primarily with mothers. "Stress destroys the family and, by extension, the entire social fabric," she insisted.

His intervention resonated as a call for solidarity and collective awareness to restore dialogue within homes.