"Just found out my mum has cancer. I'm taking O levels this year... (my mum) wants me to focus on my exams but I really don't feel like doing anything," read a post that went viral on a popular online forum, Reddit, just days before this year's World Mental Health Day on Monday.

Though I am 23 this year, the heartfelt lament hit home as my mother, too, was diagnosed with cancer when I was in my third year of medical school in 2020, a critical one transitioning from sterile textbooks into the world of "real medicine" in the hospitals.