Looking After your Mental Health

We all know how to look after our physical health, even if we don’t always do it, and we know we need to seek advice if something goes wrong, but do we know how to look after our mental health? And how important it is that we do?

What would you do if you if you began to experience heart palpitations? Regular headaches? Breathlessness? An upset stomach? Excessive sweating? Frequent urination? Trembling or weakness in the legs? Muscle ache? Lack of sleep? Loss of appetite? Would you see your GP? These very physical symptoms could quite easily be an indication that you are struggling with anxiety or stress. Your mind is using your body to give you physical indications that you need to attend to your mental health needs.

We often worry about the physical state of our brains when we experience difficulties such as memory loss, detachment from reality, we hear voices, or we find we can’t concentrate but again, these can be symptoms of emotional difficulties that need identifying and alleviating. I had a client who was hearing voices that were quite clearly giving him the same messages he was consciously giving himself. When we talked through his difficulties around loss, fear, anger, and low self-confidence, the voices very quickly stopped. The brain no longer needed to alert him to what was happening within him because he was able to talk this through and alleviate the psychological distress he was living in.

Your GP may be able to offer you medication to create physical change in the body and brain to help you relax and manage your symptoms better but the underlying issues creating the symptoms also need to be resolved if you are to move forward in a healthier way.

Our bodies and brains are complex systems and when our brains send us physical messages to make us stand up and listen and give it the help it needs, we often try to distract ourselves, or medicate ourselves, or use other substances to relieve the discomfort rather than pay attention to the messages and do something to help our brain and in turn help ourselves feel better.

The more we avoid listening to these messages, the worse our symptoms can become. We need therapeutic support. We need to address the psychological issues we are experiencing and trying desperately to ignore or suppress.

There is a tremendous stigma attached to mental health problems but the truth of the matter is that, from time to time, we are ALL going to struggle with our mental health. When we grieve the loss of a loved one, we are dealing with a mental health struggle. When we become stressed at work, we are fighting with our mental health. When we are worried, scared, angry, distressed, overwhelmed, indecisive, tired, or even become physically unwell, we are at risk of losing control of our mental health and wellbeing. 

Our mental health is as much a part of us as our physical health. Mental health stems from the brain, and how irresponsible would it be to neglect this vital organ? The brain and the heart are the two pieces of kit our bodies need to fully function. You’d see a doctor if your heart was failing, so it makes sense to see a therapist if you feel your mind is in distress and preventing you from living a full life.

With suicide rates on the increase, it is more important than ever that we recognise just how important it is to accept that we need to look after our emotional wellbeing and seek help when we are struggling to cope.

In an ideal world, I would love to see us addressing our emotional and mental health needs long before we hit crisis point. Just as we would visit the dentist with a toothache rather than wait until the tooth rots, and just as we would see an optician if we notice our eyesight deteriorating rather than wait until our sight fails us completely, we need to have the foresight to recognise when our minds are in need of attention before we crash and burn.

How fabulous would it be if, as a new-born, we were signed up to both a GP and a mental health professional? Our physical and emotional needs allocated a dedicated professional we could make an appointment with whenever we needed it? How normal would mental health care feel if we were to grow up knowing there is a specific practitioner we can refer to when things get tough? I would hope that this will become the norm for future generations but until then, we can certainly seek this out for ourselves and ensure we get the help we deserve.

There are many things we can do to ensure we don’t hit crisis point if we choose to prioritise our mental health and keep it fed and watered. You’ll likely hear the term ‘self-care’ thrown around but what does it mean to care for your own mental health?

We can implement daily routines to promote a healthier mind including such things as practising mindfulness, listening to soothing or energising music, visualisation and relaxation, and generally anything at all that encourages a positive mindset. When we think positive things and we visualise a relaxing or fun place, when we remind ourselves of all our wonderful traits and all the things we are thankful for, our brain feels better and we mentally and physically relax. Physical relaxation will impact positively on the mind.

However, it is not enough to simply spend time thinking and feeling positively, we have to also allocate time to the things that aren’t going well, that make us feel down and sad and angry and stressed and anxious etc. Distraction techniques are a wonderful thing when we aren’t attempting to fully distract ourselves. Tricking the brain into believing we are okay and we are busy and happy and confident in ourselves will only work to an extent. We have to give our concerns and problems our time. Our brains need us to work through the difficulties and find a resolution. It learns from this, we will find it easier to deal with similar issues in the future because we’ve allocated them the time they deserve and have come up with solutions. 

If we balance out the time we spend contemplating our issues with conducting positive activities, our brains will be content in the knowledge that we are addressing its concerns whilst keeping it happy. We will be keeping ourselves well, and that’s all the brain wants for us. It functions to keep us alive, keep us safe, keep our biological processes ticking along nicely, but it needs you to work with it and help it along at times, particularly when we experience difficulties it doesn’t know what to do with.

We often don’t know what to do with these ourselves, and that’s where a therapist comes in. A visit to a therapist needs to be as normal as a visit to a GP. Sometimes the treatment will be quick and simple and sometimes we may need a prolonged course of treatment to ensure the problem has been fully eliminated.

If we can implement the taking of medication into our daily routine we can implement the practise of self-care into the day. Developing a good mental health routine will do us good for the rest of our lives. How long can we maintain a course of prescribed medication before it becomes ineffective?

Pay your mental health some attention. Seek help as soon as it begins to feel unmanageable, the sooner you seek support the easier it will be to overcome your difficulties and implement new strategies. Don’t wait until crisis point. Make you mental health a priority.

We are always here to listen and to help. Consider us your mental health ‘go to’ practitioners and contact us today.