Nothing really happens as planned in my life anyway. It tends to put me in [such] situations and my options are either shutting them [my children] up by saying, -we-ll talk about it later-, but never getting down to it, lie about it, or just be honest," says Bengaluru-based journalist and writer Sandhya Menon. The 40-year-old mother-to-two—an 11-year-old son and a 12-year-old daughter—tweeted in the first week of September that her son, spotted on her phone, while it was lying around, that she was to speak on a mental health panel. As her daughter also looked at the picture and the note next to it, she asked Menon, "You tried to kill yourself?"

"I decided to go with being direct. Of course, I was conflicted. -Are they too young to have this conversation with?- I thought. In the end I decided to follow their questions and let them lead the conversation," says Menon.