Positive coping mechanisms are ways of coping with stressors without making our lives even more stressful or making ourselves feel worse, they in fact, can help us solve our issues and help us to feel better. When it comes to positive coping mechanisms, it's not just about relaxing, meditating or exercising (although they are all … Continue reading Coping Mechanisms – Part 2
anxiety
Coping Mechanisms – Part 1
We can use either positive or negative coping mechanisms to help us deal with issues, stresses or challenges we face daily and throughout our lives. These coping mechanisms can either help us get through those challenges (positive ways of coping) or they can leave us with the challenges left unresolved and us feeling worse (negative … Continue reading Coping Mechanisms – Part 1
Relapse Prevention
On my last session of CBT, my counsellor and I reviewed everything that we had covered throughout therapy and we created a relapse prevention for me to keep hold of in case I ever needed it after therapy. About mid-way through therapy I was beginning to become fearful of who I was going to turn … Continue reading Relapse Prevention
Self-Criticism
We all face criticism in our lives, whether we are receiving criticism from friends, family or ourselves and the criticism we receive is usually easier for us to believe which can then lead to low self-esteem, negative thoughts/behaviours and mental illnesses. What is self-criticism? Self-criticism is when you refer or point out your own ‘flaws’ … Continue reading Self-Criticism
Self-Esteem
Self-esteem is basically your opinion about yourself. If you have a high self-esteem you will probably think very highly of yourself but if you have a low self-esteem you will probably be very critical and negative about yourself so ideally you want your self-esteem to sit somewhere nicely in the middle of the spectrum. What … Continue reading Self-Esteem
Childhood Traumas
We all know that our childhood plays a big role in our adult lives and what we experience as a child can be carried with us into adulthood, so for a child to experience some sort of trauma, it’s damaging in many ways. I matured a lot quicker than my friends, other people my age … Continue reading Childhood Traumas
Anxious Predictions
We all make predictions, it’s a normal way of thinking but anxiety can cause us to make unnecessarily negative predictions which we believe could be true, resulting in us either avoiding/hiding or bringing ourselves down. Anxious predictions are usually unrealistic and/or negative, these predictions can be anything such as: I’m not going to win anyway … Continue reading Anxious Predictions
Working With Mental Illnesses
I have an interesting history with employment, not so much where I have worked, but more how I was during the times I worked at those places. My first proper job was waitressing at my mums cafe, I loved it, I was earning my own money and keeping myself busy during my weekends at home … Continue reading Working With Mental Illnesses
Finding My Listener
Mental health has reached a point now where it is getting recognised, understood and accepted which is bloody brilliant but there is still an issue regarding listening, it's a skill that we aren’t ever really taught how to use. I’m more of a listener than a talker, I’d rather let someone chat about whatever they … Continue reading Finding My Listener
Writing Therapy
I’ve always enjoyed writing, even in school I enjoyed my English classes, I wasn’t the best at it, but it was something I secretly enjoyed. Once I left school I didn’t really do any writing. I wrote assignments for college but that was more of a chore than anything else and I used to always … Continue reading Writing Therapy
