Tips For Those Who Support Others (Part One)

On the courses I ran as a mental health awareness facilitator, I was able to speak as someone who has  experience of living with extreme mood swings, depression, recovery from childhood sexual abuse and addiction.

I was often asked for suggestions that would help others - partners; support workers; psychologists; friends; therapists and other professionals - in their relationships with people like myself with mental health challenges, (which is a lot of us.)

The next three blogs will cover the ideas I put together that might help others when they are supporting me. I thought they might be useful in your relationships with others.

This is Part one.

One tip is to create what I call  an ‘emotional weather barometer.’

At home, on the kitchen wall I have my ‘emotional weather barometer’. Shaped in a circle, one half is red. The other blue. Segments named according to my various moods:

Red Side:  Mellow. Contented. Excited. Happy

Blue Side: Anxious. Scared. Angry. Sad.

It has a clock-hand arrow, which allows me to move around the board to suit the mood of the day.

Before the arrival of my barometer, my husband Jonny would search my face each morning for signs of my mood, asking:

“How do you feel today?”

Living with me is challenging and he was only trying to be supportive. The problem is that I cannot always find the words to describe my emotional state and his question reinforced my belief that being smiley is good and being sad is bad!

One of the things that keeps us together is that we’ve learned how to talk through the difficult stuff. I explained to him my reaction to the question and how I found it unhelpful trying to find words, when all I wanted to do was withdraw into silence.

Ever the practical one, he went off to his workshop and designed this wooden gadget, that is now my Emotional Weather Barometer. My EWB.

Now I come down each morning and can match the arrow to my mood. He no longer has to keep enquiring, and my frame of mind is identified without a struggle for descriptions. It also helps me with the slow process of accepting that however I’m feeling, is OK. Nothing more. Nothing less.  Red side. Blue side. That’s how life is for me this day.

Simple. Colourful. Effective.

You could make one out of cardboard, and use a post-it to move around the segments of the board, according to how you’re feeling.

I mentioned my barometer on the courses I facilitated in the mental health field and judging from the replies: Where can we get one? we could make our fortune if we manufactured them. Perhaps we should go on Dragons Den!

Other ideas will be included in my next two blogs.

My list of suggestions is included in my book - ‘Wearing Red, One Woman’s Journey to Sanity’ . The book contains details of my experiences living with mood swings, depression, addiction recovery and as a survivor of childhood sexual abuse. It’s a life affirming story of courage and hope.

It also contains tool kits, as a manual of self-care for your mental well-being.

The book is available on www.amazon.co.uk  and www.browndogbooks.uk