For a lot of people who suffer with mental health issues, the light at the end of the tunnel seems unreachable. Many people don't believe that there is a way out and turn to suicide and self-harm. According to Selfharm.co.uk, self-harm refers to a wide range of behaviors including physical abuse to yourself either by cutting, scratching, burning etc. Self -harm can affect people from all ages and all walks of life. Everyone starts to self-harm for different reasons and each experience with self- harm is completely different from the other. Although so many people experience it, I feel that there is not a lot out there about self-harming and I feel it is a huge part of Mental Health Issues. So here is my experience with self-harm. For myself, I never thought I would ever feel happy again, it got to the point where I could not even remember what it felt like to be happy. Each day that passed I seemed to get worse and I went into my own little bubble. I began to feel emotionally numb, my family didn't know whether I was happy, sad or angry, I couldn't feel anything. Unfortunately, I turned to self harm. I had no previous experience of it and I didn't know anything about it, but I started to scratch my arms and eventually that led to cutting. For me this gave me a sense of relief, I felt like it was the only way to deal with what I was going through. However at times, I also self harmed as a result of conflict or as a form of punishment. I felt that I had let my family and friends down. I was so angry at myself, how dare I feel like this. I have no reason to feel stressed or sad I have supportive people around me, I punished myself for feeling so selfish. I covered up what I was doing for a short period but eventually close family members realized what had been happening and kept a close eye on me. That is a period of my life that I am not proud of and I want to express that. I am definitely NOT encouraging people to self-harm, if anything self-harm made me feel ten times worse. I just want to highlight that unfortunately people do self - harm, but there is a different and better way to deal with the horrible feelings that you are experiencing. The first and biggest step is to talk to someone about it. Whether it is a family member, friend, colleague or teacher, once it is someone you trust, they will listen to you and not pass judgement. Although people's first reaction to self-harm is that the person should stop immediately, in some cases, self- harm can be an addiction for some people, in which stopping self-harm immediately could do more damage then good. In such cases, I highly recommend setting up an appointment with your GP. My GP was great and referred me to a few places. The place which seemed to be the best match for me at the time was Pieta House. I would highly recommend them, whether you are the person self-harming or your loved one is hurting themselves, they are definitely the best people in my eyes to go to for help. They have many centers located in Ireland and in various areas in Dublin including Ballyfermot, Lucan, Finglas and Tallaght. In Pieta House, I explored the main reasons behind my self-harming habits. For me, although putting an end to my self-harming was extremely important to me, finding out why I was doing it and releasing these emotions in other non abusive ways was the best things that I learned with the help of Pieta House. I picked up little tips along the way to stop me from hurting myself, like instead of scratching or cutting I wore an elastic band around my wrist so anytime I felt anxious or stressed I used to flick the elastic band slightly. Although at first it didn't have the same affect as self-harming did have for me, however as the weeks went by, I stopped feeling the need to self-harm or even wear the band, that moment for me is one of the biggest achievements I have had so far. As I said, I am not promoting self-harm, at all, I am simply trying to encourage people to talk about their feelings and to speak out about their experiences with self-harm. I also want to make people aware of the affects self-harming has on people, why people do it but also how to help those who do self-harm and to show them that the light at the end of the tunnel is closer than you may think! Love EM X
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Hi everyone, Hope you all had a good weekend! Did any of you have the amazing opportunity to see Ed Sheeran live I'm Croke Park. I was lucky enough to see the adorable Ed! He Was unbelievable, an unforgettable experience! Mark bought me the tickets as a birthday Present (a very early birthday present). We have the tickets months and of course I was so excited when we booked the tickets and I was really looking forward to it, but the closer it got to the date, I couldn't sleep with the thoughts of the crowds for days coming up to the concert. I was so nervous but there was no way I was missing this concert. I used to love concerts! I would go to see post man pat sing at concert if I could! I loved the feeling you get when the beats of the speakers make the floor tremble and hit your body like a surge of electricity. I always tried to see at least three concerts a year, I loved the craziness and the crowds. I always tried to get standing tickets, the more immersed in the crowd the better. However now, the further away from the stage the better. At the time we booked the tickets I wasn't feeling great so we made sure to book seating, thank god we did, otherwise I really don't think I would of last the entire concert. My mam, sister and her friend went to the gig too. They had different seats they weren't too far from us so we made plans to have food together first and drinks then make our way in. The crowds heading in weren't too bad. I mean it was busy but you had room to move on the paths and you could breath. Even when we got there I was still relaxed. We headed to the bar and then to our seats, once we were seated I felt safe. Ed Sheeran was incredible! I can't get over the amount of talent one man can have! He just seems so genuine and so humble which showed as he let Kodaline's Jason Boland propose to his girlfriend Etaoin Corr live on stage ( any girl's dream come through). He just wants to touch people with his music and make people happy, which he does flawlessly. The atmosphere was electric and even with the 82,000 people there, I felt so safe and like the concert was just for me, that is how special Ed Sheeran is! When his encore was finished, which included the hit song 'Sing', that's when the mayhem started. It took myself and Mark a half an hour to gt out of the stadium. There were just people everywhere!! We were sitting eight rows up from the pitch so we tried to make our way down there, I was really panicking at this stage. Mark was a brilliant help. He explained to the security what was going on and they let us out onto the pitch. It was a little less hectic on the pitch at this stage as loads of people had already started to make their way out of the stadium. By the time we left the stadium, I thought the crowds would have calmed down but they were twice as bad as what they had been earlier. My chest got so tight and I did have a panic attack. We sat along a wall for a while and I started to do some mindfulness techniques. I became aware of my breathing and soon I noticed I started to calm down. As we started walking again, I tried to think mindfully. I watched the people around me and listened to the sound of the crowds. I didn't analyse them, I just observed and was mindfully aware of what was happening around me. We finally got out of the crazy crowds and met the others at The Living Room in town. The next task was getting home, which proved difficult enough. The ques for the luas were four times the length of the Luas platform and there were no big taxis available. We finally made our way to Central Bank and got the bus home. Although I did have a panic attack and to be honest I haven't really slept that well since Saturday, I am so proud of what I accomplished on Saturday. If the concert was two months ago I wouldn't of even have made it to Croke park never mind being able to stay at the entire concert. Although I still have issues with crowds, Saturday was a big step for me and it showed me that although I probably am not ready to go back to work just yet and cope with stress and crowds on a daily basis, I am getting stronger each day. Every obstacle thrown my way I can get through it. I definitely would not have been able to get through the crowds on Saturday if it wasn't for Mark, my mam and the girls, but one day soon I know I will be able to get through it myself. Everyday I am getting stronger and the fear inside me is weakening, Em X Morning guys! So in the past couple of weeks people have come to me with the same sentence on their lips, that I am so brave for doing this blog and for being so open about my Mental Health Issues. It has occurred to me how scared people are these days of admitting they are not happy or they are not quite themselves at the minute. As you all know, Irish people hate complaining in restaurants, we get embarrassed! If a meal isn't nice or quite what we ordered we just smile and nod when asked how our dinner was and try to hide the look of disgust on our faces. It is the exact same with how Irish people react to the topic of Mental Health Issues. Although the past couple of years, the subject is not as avoided as it was previously, it is still a topic that is not talked about enough in my opinion. People get embarrassed when asked about it and reply to the everyday questions of 'how are you?' with the roll off the tongue response of 'I'm grand thanks, you?', instead of saying how we really are. I am not saying that everyone should be pouring their hearts out to shop assistants, bus drivers or waiters, but why is it that we feel embarrassed at expressing how we truly feel? We bottle things up as a nation and then when things get too much we explode and the situation is ten times worse then it had of been if we had of just opened up. According to Aware.ie, depression alone affects more than 450,000 people in Ireland, one in ten, at any one time. This figure is astronomical but why are we still so afraid to talk about it? When I decided to start this blog it was for a few reasons, to help me get through my Mental Health Issues, to highlight that even with these issues there is light at the end of the tunnel, to highlight how these issues affect people of any ages but my main reason was to show to people that it is OK to talk about Mental Health issues, that we should not shy away from the subject and to encourage people to talk about the subject. We have NOTHING to be ashamed of, if anything we should all be proud. Proud that Ireland has come so far that we are slowly accepting that these issues do affect a large portion of our society and accept that yes, unfortunately many people go through horrible periods in their life but by talking about it and sharing our own experiences that people can get better and grow from their experiences. So guys, lets continue what we have been doing the past few months, lets keep talking about it. Share our experiences, our ways of dealing with situations, our tips and tricks and things like books, poems music etc., that help us get through tough times. I just want to say thank you and also well done to everyone for not shying away and for supporting the blog and people who have Mental Health Issues, we are all making a difference and hopefully soon people will start to talk more openly about their experiences. Happy Saturday!! Em X So last week, I felt like I was stuck in a rut. I felt so low and so down that anything I did just didn't seem to cheer me up. I couldn't put my finger on what had me feeling so miserable. Nothing in particular had happened, I just felt fed up. One of the days I was blow drying my hair and it clicked with me, I needed a change. With everything going on these past few months, I was so busy focusing on getting better and attending counselling that I always had something to think about and work on. The past few weeks I have been improving and getting stronger every day, so now the little things that used to take up all my time and cause me to worry constantly are no longer an issue for me. I am not saying this is a bad thing at all!! It is the best feeling in the world to not feel consumed by worry and upset constantly. Why was I feeling miserable? Then it occurred to me as I looked in the mirror, although I have made so much progress and I was starting to feel happier and more confident in myself, the old me was starring back at me. I know it sounds crazy but although on the inside I had evolved and changed so much over the past couple of weeks, I couldn't help but feel disappointed and held back by my reflection in the mirror. It was like the stress and pain I had experienced the past couple of months was still showing on the outside. I needed a bit of a make over! Yes I know it sounds crazy and a bit silly but the past few months I have focused so much on my mental health that I decided to give my physical appearance a bit of a make over. I headed straight to the chemist in the local shopping centre ( which has had a big sale on for the past two weeks and made me extremely happy!) I headed to the hair section. I needed a new look. I would have loved to go to the hairdresser's and spent the day being pampered but unfortunately I can't afford that at the minute so I have to enjoy pampering at home instead! I usually go on a shopping spree with clothes, shoes or handbags but this was a 'new me' shopping haul! I went for a L'oreal box colour, a few styling products, new nail varnish and a few new lipsticks. At the desk I spoke to one of the girls who said that in the past week a lot of people have come in looking to change their look. It occurred to me, that a lot of people get to the middle of the year and feel fed up, tired and worn out, that it is a normal feeling. It is like when it comes to the end of December and the Christmas period is nearly over. The presents have been exchanged, loved ones have come and gone, all of the food has been devoured and the button on your favorite pair of jeans won't close anymore. Although we have enjoyed the past few weeks, all that build up and excitement has slowly come to an end and it is back to normality soon enough. Then it's time to make those New Year's resolutions were we promise ourselves that this is our year, that we will be happy and that we will exercise until those jeans fit us comfortably again. This determination last's for max three weeks until we settle back into school/ college or work and we forget about these changes and promises we made to ourselves. Well I think that we should keep these promises to ourselves all year round. We do not give ourselves credit, a year is a very long time and we go through a lot every single day. We need new and exciting adventures to keep us going and motivated each and every day. So for me, going out changing my hair colour ( only slightly), pampering myself, re-joining Waist a-Weigh and throwing myself into my fitness again was my new year's resolution to myself. I have come such a long way with regards to tackling my Mental Health Issues and facing them head on. No wonder I was tired and exhausted. I needed a new journey to go on and a new adventure to go on. Your health is your wealth, that is both your Mental and Physical health. I am starting to see that both go hand in hand. We need to be kinder to ourselves. Pat ourselves on the back once in a while, treat ourselves by either a pamper day or a new game for the PS or by buying those new shoes you have had your eye on, whatever your interests are, treat yourself by enjoying them. Set yourself small goals each week, by attaining these goals you will feel a little bit better each day. We are all on this amazing journey, each day we are learning a bit more about ourselves, but for me the main thing I have learnt these past few weeks is to be kind to myself, treat myself, learn to love myself and ultimately stop being my own worst enemy but try to be my own best friend. Love, Em X Morning Guys,
I picked up this cute sign the other day, looking at these little signs helps to keep me positive and happy. Remember you are the person who can change your life, live your dream and write the rest of your story! Take one step at a time, each day as it comes and everything will hopefully fall into place. Have a good day! Em X Hi Everyone! Happy Friday! It is finally the weekend after a very very long week! I have been really busy between baby sitting, exercising, getting back into my Waist A-Weigh Healthy eating plan, doing my online course etc. With only seven weeks until my family holiday,there was no better way to spend my Friday than a girl's shopping day! But first I spent the morning with the two men in my life - Mark and my little cousin Tom. In total I spent about eight hours walking around busy shopping centres' ( I know poor me, imagine the pain having to shop!). Now that I am home and having a good cup of tea, I am looking back on today's shopping trip fondly. Not only with my amazing purchases and a lovely girlie lunch out, but at how far I have come in the past two months. As you are all aware by now, I have suffered hugely with aniexty attacks in crowds over the past couple of years. It got to the stage where I could not go into Penny's without having to leave five minutes later feeling so weak and frightened due to the crowds. Today has shown me how far I have come. For a lot of people a day out in the shops is far from a chore and is not a big ordeal, but for me, unfortunately that is what shopping trips became. For those of you who know me well you all know that I LOVE fashion!! I am that person who gets excited by the new issue of Vogue, who categorises her wardrobe by season, colour and trend, who NEVER throws out an item of clothing for fear that it will come back into fashion in the future and that same person who HATES missing an Xpose episode. So for me not being able to enjoy shopping or socializing, showed me just how much my aniexty was winning. For the first time in a long time, no thoughts of crowds, aniexty or bad thoughts crossed my mind during the day. I wasn't worried about the crowds or about anything going wrong during the day, I just enjoyed myself and came home with a lot of penny's bags! Some people may think that this is silly, but as I said, for me it was a big deal for me to forget about everything and to enjoy the buzz of the sales. I feel like I am finally gaining some control back of my life, that I can do normal things and that I will some day feel not just 70% back to myself but 100% back to normal. Mark surprised me with an Alex and Ani Bangle today and on it is 'Everything happens for a reason', which describes y attitude to life these days,although things may not work out the way you thought they would, everything that happens in our lives happens for a reason! So if you ever feel like like giving up, remember that you have the power to change the situation and that one day you will hopefully look back at this time and see how far you have grown! Night night guys! Em <3 X Hi Guys,
I hope you are all well. Just checking in to see how you are all getting on with naming the four things you are grateful for every day. No matter how silly or small the things you are grateful for may seem, if they are important to you then they are not silly, in fact they are very significant. If you are grateful for a relationship with your friends, your parents, your partner etc., do not be afraid to express this gratitude! You may not realise how much saying thanks, sharing a hug or buying a small bunch of flowers for someone who has stood by you through everything means to them! My four things I am grateful for today are: 1. My relationship with my boyfriend 2. My relationship with my grandparents 3. My determination 4. Exercise Would love to hear from you guys and how you are all getting on with this! Em x Hi Guys,
This week has been a whirlwind of emotions for me. On Monday and Tuesday I started the TEFL Teaching English course. This course is something I have been looking to do for a very long time and just a month ago I booked myself into the course. By Sunday night I was an absolute wreck. I was terrified of commuting to and from town for the two days. I was having panic attacks at the thoughts of the crowds and the course, whether I would be able for the course or not, at one point I really did not think I was going to go to the course. I was so upset and so angry that I felt like this again. I was annoyed at myself for getting so upset, I was determined that I was not going to let my anxiety win this time. I took out my Mindfulness book and read up on some techniques and tips for commuting(I have shared some of the tips which I found helpful while on the Luas in the Mindfulness section). Although I took note of the tips and practiced mindfulness breathing before I went to bed, I still didn't have the best sleep. The weather on Monday morning didn't help as for those of you who forgot or were lucky enough to miss the wind and rainstorms, I had to force myself out of my bed. I got the luas into town, at first I was so overwhelmed with the crowds. I was really tempted to get off at the second stop and just go back home, my heart was beating so fast but I was so determined. Before I knew it, I was at my stop at Georges Dock. I couldn't wait for the day to be over, I was so nervous. However my Mindfulness book really did help me. Any time that I felt nervous or anxious I allowed myself to feel those emotions and then focused on my breathing and on telling myself over and over again that I was ok. The course threw a lot of hurdles at me that three weeks ago I would never have gotten through them. I had to complete two teaching practices, one for three minutes on Monday and and the other for five minutes on Tuesday by myself in front the other students. It was not until Tuesday night when i was home with my TEFL certificate in hand, that I realised how many fears I had overcome in just the two days. I was so proud of myself, I felt like I had knocked down so many demons that had been haunting me since April. I received amazing feedback from my tutor, one including that I was extremely confident in front of the classroom. I haven't believed in myself in a very long time, but the fact that I hid my insecurities and received amazing comments from my tutor, showed me that I am getting stronger every day and that every obstacle that comes my way I can over come. I am so proud of myself as it has showed me that I have come a long way and that I can beat my anxiety and mental healthy issues. It has taken me a long time to gain the strength to overcome those fears but I know that from now on I am going to get even stronger and I will be able to face anything. Em x Just something to make you all smile! No matter what has happened this week, whether it has been a terrible or fantastic week for you, each day is a new day. Pick yourself up, move on and learn from what has happened!
Em x Hi Guys,
I hope you are all well and that you had a good weekend. Stress is something that everyone experiences at some point in their life. Unfortunately some of us experience it more often than others. Although some of us have to deal with anxiety and pressure everyday, there are ways to relieve stress. I know at the time of a panic attack or a bad day it seems like nothing can take away the pain you are experiencing, it is just knowing what works for you and trying new things until you find your coping mechanism. Below is the link to an amazing article on The Thinking About Health Website that gives 10 ways to relieve stress on a daily basis. They are such easy and simple things that you might not think will work, but they do. http://thinkingabouthealth.com/mental-health-2/10-easy-ways-to-relieve-stress/ I found it really helpful, let me know what you think! Em x |
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This page is to keep you all up to date on where I am on my journey, what I am up to and general chat! Archives
April 2018
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