Blogs
Success and failure are pretty common words in our everyday lives and they’re also prominent in conversations about mental health. When we see someone in recovery of any sort, we say they’re successful; we do this with ourselves, too. It’s often only when we’re acknowledging our own mental health recovery progress that failure comes into the mix. We feel like failures if we can’t succeed like those around us; we feel like failures if we have setbacks. It is because of that that I feel it would be better to remove the words success and failure from our mental health vocabulary.
Traveling during eating disorder recovery can be tricky. When we get outside of our normal routine, slips have more potential to occur. With proper planning, however, taking trips and sticking to your meal plan is absolutely possible. Here I share my experience and travel tips for your eating disorder recovery.
My name is Mikaela Mariner and I am the new coauthor of Relationships and Mental Illness. I am here to speak on the reality of mental illness and the importance of relationships. With only a few years of recognizing my anxiety and depression, my biggest takeaway thus far is my ability to identify when my mind is trying to take over. Being married to my best friend has been a huge help for me and my primary inspiration to help others. You could say I’ve always been a writer but it wasn’t until recently that I learned exactly what it is I’m supposed to be using my craft for; realizing how to utilize it was a monumental step in my journey.
Anxiety affects me much more than schizoaffective disorder. You see, schizoaffective disorder is a combination of bipolar disorder and schizophrenia. I have schizoaffective disorder, so I have symptoms of schizophrenia and symptoms of bipolar disorder. Then there’s a bonus--generalized anxiety disorder. Bipolar disorder is often accompanied by anxiety disorders. And it's my anxiety symptoms that affect me the most, even more than schizoaffective disorder.
It's okay to request mental health disability for dissociative identity disorder (DID). Dissociative identity disorder affects each person in different ways -- including his or her ability to work. While many people with DID are able to go to school and work regularly, other people have a more difficult time. Severe mental illness can keep you from working, and DID is no different. For some, mental health disability with DID is their only option.
If you have ever suffered from any kind of addiction, then you know that dealing with addiction cravings to avoid relapse isn’t easy. It’s an overwhelming feeling of need that feels like it can only be satisfied by going back to your addiction. I know how it feels – in early sobriety, I had intense addiction cravings that felt all-consuming. I had to learn to deal with them, or I was in danger of relapsing. For me, learning how to deal with the addiction craving was the key to avoiding relapse.
Evidence shows that using cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) to treat anxiety works. Cognitive behavioral therapy focuses on replacing maladaptive thoughts and behaviors with positive, healthy ones. Patients are taught to recognize, question, and refute negative behaviors and thought patterns, and then to replace them with more adaptive versions. By learning to do this, we engage in new ways of thinking and acting. Using CBT to treat anxiety helps us more effectively manage our anxiety symptoms.
Anxiety disorders and mood disorders are two separate experiences. While both involve thoughts, feelings, and actions that are disruptive to life and disproportionate to circumstances, they have different symptoms (they do often occur together, though). Because these are different disorders, anxiety disorders and mood disorders often have different treatment approaches. What should you do, then, when your anxiety behaves like a mood disorder?
My name is Kristen Schou and I am delighted to join the Speaking Out About Self-Injury blog on HealthyPlace. I am so excited to have a platform to share my experiences with self-injury and give advice to help others. Self-injury is a condition that is very stigmatized which causes people not to reach out for the help that they need. My goal for this blog is to help others who are going through the same thing that I went through.
People often say to those suffering with bipolar disorder, “Others have it worse than you.” This is not a helpful statement. We know that others have it worse than us. In fact, others with bipolar have it worse than us; that’s just math. But the fact that others have it worse than us is absolutely irrelevant to our suffering with bipolar.
Where do we go from here? Most of the family thinks just to let her hit bottom and then if she reaches out to help any we can. Some want to just keep paying her bills and just let her sit in the house with no responsibilities. Never been on medication and impossible to get to her when she refuses to talk to ANYONE.
Help.
On the day we agreed to videochat to make things less awkward IRL she woke up with a migraine so we rescheduled to the day after, I made sure to assure her that it was okay and to take her time. Later that day, in the late evening we had a nice chat but suddenly she stopped replying, even though nothing had happened. The day after I texted her good morning and said I hope she was feeling a little better. she wouldn't open my texts.
A couple days after I sent her a longer text saying that even though I had only known her for a short time I care a lot for her and would like to know how she are doing, telling her I'm there for her, assuring her I'm not going anywhere even though things might not be very easy. She wouldn't open it.
A week later I sent a text saying not to feel bad about not answering and that I will be there when she is able to answer again. It's been two weeks since this and she still hasn't opened my texts. She hasn't been active at all.
I don't know what else I can do. I assumed she might have fallen into a depression. I have tried to just not think about it anymore, and I haven't that much but when I do it sort of kills me inside...