Self-Care for Bad Mental Health Days

Let’s chat about bad day’s. More specifically, bad mental health day’s. These days have such an impact on the way one feels, we have to work together to ensure that instead of unhealthily loathing, we learn how to deal with these feelings in a way that won’t leave an everlasting negative effect on you.

You may not be able to control your mental illness, but you can work to control your mental wellness. Having a self-care and a nourishing routine can completely change the extremeness of your bad mental health days. I’m writing this today to show you different ways you can healthily work towards feeling better in the midst of bad days.

If I could give you one piece of advice for when you are feeling this way, it would be to find your thing. For me, it’s watching tv, dancing, reading or interacting with my cats. I find these things to help me relax my mind and helps me to take it easy. What’s your thing? It’s important to be able to differentiate the things that make you feel mentally better and the things that help you ignore your feelings. When you spend a significant amount of time with your thing you should walk away feeling lighter. Sometimes binge-watching your favourite show on Netflix can make all the difference. Other times it’s hours later and you still feel like crap. That makes Netflix not your thing.

On bad days, it can be hard to find the energy and motivation to do things. This is where you have to summon every ounce of will you have to do that thing. Do it before it gets too hard. If you’re already to deep into this place, keep trying. Soon enough, you’ll get to the point where it’s automatic. Where your thing builds up resistance and immunity to those sinking feelings and your body/mind automatically trains itself to just go there.

I can’t guarantee that this will help you. I can’t guarantee that you will feel an automatic positive response to this method. What I can guarantee you, is that if you work towards pursuing healthy habits for bad days, no matter what it is, you will notice an increase, big or small, positively in the way you’re feeling.

Check out more things you can try on bad mental health days, at these links!

https://themighty.com/2018/07/bad-mental-health-day-what-to-do-self-care/

https://sossafetymagazine.com/health-and-well-being/how-to-take-care-of-yourself-on-a-bad-mental-health-day/

As always,

Thanks for reading.

-Jenna:)

 

 

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Mental and Emotional Well-Being

Being mentally and emotionally well is not just about the absence of a mental health problem, nor is it about the absence of feelings. Instead, being mentally and emotionally well is about being able to positively express your feelings and emotions, live and work productively, build healthy relationships with others, feel confident and happy with yourself, as well as deal with unexpected life manners with a calm attitude and in a healthy way. These are just a few of the many ways that one can express a positive emotional and mental well-being.

There are many things that can negatively affect your well-being, but it’s so important to be able to either deal with these feelings and emotions in a healthy manner or prevent yourself from feeling them in the first place.

It truly is the small things that make such a huge difference between having a strong and healthy personal well-being and having a poor one. What things can we do to build and maintain a healthy mental and emotional state?

Physical Health

You are less likely to feel mentally unwell if you take care of your physical health. This includes eating healthy, exercising regularly and getting enough sleep. Neglecting your physical health is one of the biggest factors in the way you’re feeling.

Stress Management

It’s natural to feel stressed at points in your life and learning to cope with your stress is vital in having a healthy well-being.

You can read more about stress management tips at this link! – https://www.psychologytoday.com/ca/blog/what-matters-most/201701/10-new-strategies-stress-management

Mindfulness

Teaching yourself to stay in the present, learning to relax and accepting yourself can have an extremely positive impact on your well-being. You can achieve this by using relaxation techniques such as meditation which can lower stress and boost your mental well-being quickly.

Through this link, you can find quick and easy strategies that work with mindfulness – https://www.pocketmindfulness.com/6-mindfulness-exercises-you-can-try-today/

If you work with these three tips and still aren’t noticing an increase in your positive well-being, you may want to consider reaching out to get help. It might be more serious of a problem than you think.

Thanks for reading,

Jenna:)

Self-Validation

Why is it that we have become so dependent on fueling our personal self-love through other people?

So often people wait for other people to validate how they look, their body, their hair, and almost any other part of a person somebody can comment on. Physical traits alongside emotional and personality traits. If somebody doesn’t comment on it, you begin to feel like maybe you don’t look good or you’re not as good at something as you thought you were. Having these voices inside your head that tell you ‘something doesn’t count before somebody tells you’ are normal, but we need to work to make them stop.

Compliments are great. We all love to receive them. It’s when we start to depend on them for our own self-validation that they are unhealthy for ourselves. We try so hard to impress other people that we have forgotten what ultimately should come before what other people think of you. What you think of yourself.

I don’t want you to wake up in the morning waiting for somebody else to validate how beautiful you are. I want you to wake up and walk to the closest mirror and look at your bed head, under-eye bags, eye crusties, the new pimple that formed on your forehead overnight and the hairs that are beginning to form on the space between your eyebrows. I want you to look at the things you claim as “your flaws” and say to yourself that despite the flaws I see, I am beautiful, I am versatile and I am strong.

I know it’s tough to not only be able to say these positive statements about yourself, but to believe them. What are some things we can do to be able to work towards being able to believe positive comments you make towards yourself?

1. Everyday, write one positive thing about yourself in a journal or in the notes app on your phone. This can be something as big as a physical trait you have or something as little as the way you liked how you handled a tough situation you faced that day. Writing these down and being able to see them on paper can change the way you perceive yourself.
2. Similar to the one above, except instead of writing them down, stand in front of the mirror and vocally say the positive things about yourself. It will feel really strange to do this but you will almost always feel a boost in your self-love.
3. Breathe & relax. We get so worked up over the tiny things that it can flood our positive thinking. Taking a few minutes everyday to push away the stress and pressure to get things done to remind yourself of positive things.

There are so many online resources for even more things you can do to build up your personal love, I’ve attached some below!!

https://tinybuddha.com/blog/21-tips-to-release-self-neglect-and-love-yourself-in-action/

https://www.lifehack.org/articles/communication/30-ways-practice-self-love-and-good-yourself.html

Thank you for reading.

– Jenna:)

Social Media: The Impact On Your Mental Health

Nowadays more than ever, it’s so easy to compare yourself to other people. With social media being everywhere, seeing people display themselves in the light they choose to, can ultimately affect a person’s mental health. You see their perfectly captured, perfectly filtered, perfectly posed, post and you think to yourself “why can’t I be them?”. It’s not abnormal to feel these emotions, with having so many different spaces to see people portray this ‘perfect’ side of them you can begin to feel engulfed by self-deprecating thoughts.

It’s important for you to realize the stuff you see while scrolling through Instagram, Twitter and through the stories on Snapchat is the highlight reel of someone else’s life. They aren’t posting about the opposite part of their lives that you are comparing yourself to. They aren’t posting about the mental illness they’re suffering from, they aren’t posting the picture from when their hair was greasy or when their face had broken out or from when their double chin was peaking out. You are ultimately only seeing the side of that person that they have chosen to share with the world and you’re comparing it to the side of you that is laying in bed scrolling through social media, or to the you who woke up this morning looked in the mirror and noticed that the space between your eyebrows was now home to stray hairs, or to the you who despite your endless fights can’t seem to get rid of the demons inside of you.

It’s not even just the pictures people post that can end up affecting you. It can be follower count, amount of likes on a post or the number of comments beneath it. It’s sad to me the way social media can now be seen as more of a ‘popularity contest’ than to be seen as just a space for people to share their vacation photos, creativity, or pictures with their friends. It’s important for you to realize that the numbers that make-up your account really DO NOT matter.

The point to this post wasn’t to automatically change your mindset, I know it’s really not that easy. These types of thoughts don’t go away with a simple 4 paragraph long blog post. It comes from within yourself. So, what are some things you can do to help to change the mindset you have on yourself vs the people and the posts you see on social media?

• Change the “why” questions (“why can’t I look like them?”, “why can’t I have a body like theirs?”, etc.) to “I do’s”, “I can’s”, “I will’s”. These simple changes to the construction of your thoughts can change the way social media affects you.
• Realize that because your life is different from someone else’s, that doesn’t make your life any less spectacular.
• Change the self-criticism to inspiration. If you see a post where you think someone has better style than you or anything else, don’t beat yourself up for it. Instead, use it as inspiration to create a version of it for yourself.
• When you start reacting in an emotionally negative way to someone else’s post’s, single out what about it made you react the way you did and create goals to try and either find them in yourself or to achieve them in yourself.

These are just a few things you can do to change the way social media affects you, they won’t change it immediately, it all comes with time and staying positive.

Here are some links to read further on this topic!

https://www.cosmopolitan.com/lifestyle/advice/a38572/social-media-self-esteem-effect/

https://puckermob.com/lifestyle/dont-let-social-media-affect-your-happiness-do-this-instead/

I hope this has helped you in some way.

-Jenna:)

Supporting The Ones Who Need It: A Short Guide

Mental illness will affect 1 in every 4 people at least once in their lives. It is common that you will be around either a family member, friend or peer who is struggling with a mental health problem.

It’s not unusual to be confused about how to support said, people. In this post, I have compiled a list to help you when these topics arise.

The first thing you should always do when you discover somebody dealing with a mental illness is to inform yourself of the illness. There are many online resources you can use to research the topic, this information will help you to support them further.

One of the most helpful things you can do is to do nothing at all. What I mean by that is, lend an ear when they are talking to you. There are a time and place to give your advice and wisdom and sometimes when somebody is struggling mentally, that isn’t what they necessarily need from you. Listen to them. Make it known to them that you are there for them.  Be patient and understanding with them. Also, continue to check up with them throughout the day.

If the person who you’re supporting takes any type of medication to help with their mental illness, you can help remind them to take their medications and/or inform a doctor when they’re not being taken (although the person you’re supporting may not want you to tell, it will ultimately help them.) The same goes for reminding them to do their counselling homework if they have any.

When someone is struggling with their mental health, it can be easy for them to forget to take care of their personal well-being. It can help them improve their mood and can also help the side effects of some medications when they are practicing positive habits. There are many things you can do to help the person stay active and to eat well. For example, you can invite them to go on a walk with you, go swimming, or even to join you in doing at home workout videos. You can also ask them to do some cleaning around their house. You can join them and help them out with said cleaning, keep it fun and simple. They may be reluctant to do these tasks but it’s important for them to have routine and responsibilities throughout the day. It’s also important for them to have a balanced diet, it can make getting better harder when they are eating differently than they should. You can ask a general practitioner, doctor or dietitian for a healthy diet plan for them to work with.

These are just a few of the many things you can do to support somebody in your life who is struggling, there are many places you can read more on this topic so I have supplied some links below if you choose to read further.

https://www.rethink.org/carers-family-friends/what-you-need-to-know/supporting-someone-with-a-mental-illness

http://www.heretohelp.bc.ca/factsheet/supporting-a-friend-or-family-member-with-a-mental-illness

https://ie.reachout.com/mental-health-problems/supporting-someone-with-a-mental-illness/

Reminder: These tips are not going to make the trip to recovery for anyone any more linear, they are just a few small tips from me to you so you can support somebody dealing with mental health problems in the right way.

I hope these tips will help you.

Thanks for reading, and continue to check in every Friday for new content.

-Jenna.