Mental Health

We know that taking care of your emotional well-being is an important part of life however sometimes we don’t act in time or we miss subtle hints in life that suggest we should stop and pause for a moment to see or feel what is happening to us and around us. Recognising signs and symptoms early, understanding why you ‘think how you think’, ‘feel how you feel’ or ‘do what you do’ can help us appreciate that we are human. The trials of work and life can sometimes be out of ‘balance’. But what is balance? We talk about a ‘work-life’ balance but isn’t it all just ‘life’? Perhaps the key is knowing what makes you happy and what doesn’t make you happy.

It’s not any easy question to answer but once we have given it some thought we can sometimes find solutions, insight and purpose into who we are, why we respond the way we do and why certain situations makes us feel the way we do.

Looking after your emotional well-being can mean many things for many people. It can mean:

• Ensuring we recognise the signs of stress to keep it at bay

• Learning to say ‘no’ so that we manage expectations at work and at home and live within our capabilities

• Keeping ourselves safe by avoiding fearful or scary situations or events 

• Keeping good company and having a laugh with friends

• Taking time for yourself

• Avoiding stressful situations

• Doing things to make us feel good in order to release good hormones in our body to keep us happy

• Looking after our mental health

Mental Health can refer to many different conditions, just like Physical Health. Sometimes it’s easier to make sense of physical conditions because we are more familiar with them and they are talked about a lot more. If we asked you to talk about physical conditions, it may be an easier task – you might come up with things like, angina, arthritis, back pain, sciatica, tennis elbow and so on.

The first thing we can do is help you start to understand the most common mental health conditions. We would suggest that you take some comfort and reassurance that the description ‘common’ is a good thing. Many people experience mental health problems at some point in their life and many people learn to understand them, feel less embarrassed, more open and in a better place by seeking help. By clicking on the condition-specific links you can better understand symptoms you may experience, what the risk factors there may be and what you can do to make yourself feel better. We will cover:

• Depression
• Anxiety (Generalised Anxiety Disorder)
• Health Anxiety
• Panic
• Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD)
• Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)
• Stress