Helps Anyone to Cope Up from Anxieties & Depression
Worrying or having fears is just part of life. No matter how much you try to avoid these things, there will always come a time when you feel uneasy. Do not worry because this is only normal. However, excessive worrying can be dangerous on your part. This is the primary reason why it is best to set an appointment with a psychiatrist so that you can determine whether or not you have an anxiety disorder. Be sure to remember the signs and symptoms of effective treatment.
Depression is not a state of mind but a mental health sickness that needs immediate attention. When a person is clinically diagnosed with depression, it is essential that you know how to deal with her properly. There is a necessity to be careful with whatever you do or say whenever she is around. In this article, we are going to list down some of the words or sentences that your depressed wife must never hear from you. Remember that some things are better left unsaid especially if they will cause harm to your partner.
One of the things that you need to remember when it comes to caring for your husband is that you must know his struggles and problems. It is essential that you motivate him in opening up to you, especially during a time when he experiences a loss in the family. Take note that no matter how strong your partner is, he will always feel a little low when someone in his family dies. Below is a list of the things that you can do to help your partner in this difficult situation:
When the burdens of anxiety and depression reach an uncontrollable level, the body and the mind go through a meltdown. Meltdowns are periods of intense mental distress wherein people fail to function correctly in their daily activities. Unique to each person, stressors, traumatic events, life changes, and chronic medical conditions may trigger these meltdowns. However, it is essential to remember recovery is always possible even after such outburst.
How It Helps In The Recovery Process
The main culprit of a mental breakdown is stress. “Stress can seem omnipresent. Between working, socializing and taking care of the home, it sometimes seems we don’t have a minute to ourselves, let alone enough time to really take care of our bodies and minds.” Sonja Seglin, LCPC elaborates. Anything that triggers or stresses us is capable of shutting our mind and body down. This highly possible event happens when undergoing heavy but regular stressful events. We must learn to tame our mind and pace ourselves to take back our control.
And this is where holistic health comes in. A holistic lifestyle starts with a certain amount of mindfulness as a critical component. It means accurately knowing how you react to situations or merely acknowledging your strengths and weaknesses. Using a holistic approach in this article, we will enumerate steps on how to live a holistic lifestyle after a meltdown.
Recovering From A Meltdown
Practice Mindfulness
Sometimes meltdowns come with raging outbursts or embarrassing bawls in the presence of others. Park that embarrassment for a while and look back to what had triggered that meltdown. Was it related to a person? A particular assignment at work you thought you could not accomplish? Was it an offensive remark someone had said or were you just extremely vulnerable that day? If this is not the first meltdown you have experienced, assess the other times you have had anxiety attacks. You will realize more things about yourself, and this will empower you to become better. Because according to Jennifer Bradley, Psy.D., HSPP, Clinical Psychologist “I believe that human beings have an inherent longing and need for wholeness and balance, which is our natural state of being.”
Allocating time assessing yourself and the situation is considered mindfulness. Identifying your trigger points will be useful for further exercises in the future. Once you have started practicing mindfulness, you can easily apply this in other daily activities like mindful eating and managing emotions.
Other exercises of mindfulness may be meditation, daily examination of conscience, and introspection.
Respect The Limits Of Your Body
Mindfulness also comes with respecting our body’s limits. Avoid activities or situations that are “too much” for you. These activities may cause stress and adversely affect both your mental and emotional health. It is good to disconnect once in a while. Simple meditation or downtime can melt away the angst.
Eat Clean
“It’s important to underscore here the importance of monitoring your mental health and knowing how different medications and lifestyle changes can impact your mental health.” Julia Hogan, LCPC sais. With that, eating clean, green food is only one component of holistic practice. It works hand in hand with other measures that promote mental and emotional health. Eating vegetables, a balanced diet, and healthy food nourishes our bodies and flushes out toxins.
If you are not a fan of vegetables, try a cup of tea a day. It has soothing effects on the body and the mind. A cup of green tea can calm away nerves.
Stay Active
Regular exercise serves as a stress reliever. Whenever you feel overwhelmed, do an activity or exercise to blow off some steam. For others, it serves as a momentary distraction.
If your work entails long sedentary hours, take a break once in a while and walk around the office. Getting your red blood cells moving can help you channel negative energy into something more productive.
Your recovery is possible by leading a holistic lifestyle. Holistic health encompasses the spiritual, physical, mental, and emotional health of a person. Start living a holistic life through the practices we mentioned above.
Coping with depression is not an easy feat, and patients with depression need a lot of support from family and friends. A family’s involvement in a person’s recovery does not stop at support and care.
People need to understand that depression and mental health problems affect not just the individual but also the whole family. When you have a depressed family member, the effects of that condition spread to other family members. For this reason, a family needs to be aware of how depression could affect the entire unit.
Depression Is A Family Matter
Medication is only half the battle when dealing with depression. A patient also needs proper counseling as well as a reliable support system. This support system typically comes in the form of family.
Family makes up the majority of a person’s social environment. In most cases, people with depression are under the care of family members. Even before considering treatment and recovery, a person’s family situation has massive potential in influencing his or her mental and emotional well-being.
When dealing with a person with depression, a family member’s input is vital in coming up with an accurate diagnosis. Sometimes, a patient might not be honest about his feelings. Other times, the patient doesn’t understand or is not even aware of his condition. It is a common manifestation of depression, which is why family input is essential in determining a person’s mental state. Members of the family can observe a person with depression and provide a detailed account to a therapist or psychiatrist.
Impacts Of Depression In A Family (And How To Address Them)
People with depression experience multiple symptoms that can bring down even the best of us. Caring for a depressed person is no match to experiencing depression, but this job still presents a considerable challenge to anyone. Depression has a particular impact that affects not only the patient but also everyone in the family.
The most apparent impact of depression within the family is the disruption of family dynamics. When a person is depressed, this often manifests in loss of will or motivation in many things, most notably in interacting with others. Isolation happens not only in external events like socializing with friends but also in communicating with family members.
An uncommunicative family member creates tension due to avoidance of issues. This situation is most prevalent at the onset of dealing with depression in the family. Most family members might not yet be used to the presence of depression in the family. This uncertainty makes them tiptoe around their depressed family member, unsure of what to say and how to deal with them.
Tension from lack of communication often blows up into conflict. A depressed person’s mood varies from time to time, and a family member’s fuse might shorten in time as well. Lack of communication results in a lack of understanding from both parties.
As a family, communicating through the negative impacts of depression is a must. On the one hand, family members need to stretch their patience when dealing with a depressed patient. On the other hand, depression should not become a person’s excuse to refrain from engaging in healthy discussions in the family.
There are numerous challenges both on the part of the patient and his or her family. It is common for misunderstandings to pop up. Still, everyone in the family must learn to keep communication lines open as much as possible to foster a healthy environment fit for a depressed person’s recovery.
It is not a secret that everyone has experienced stress eating at least once in their life. It is a usual scenario when one experiences a sudden stressful activity. Such might be a sudden influx of workload and tight deadlines. What follows is the immediate desire to eat whatever it is that you have been craving since last week. You will feel that a single serving is not enough at the moment.
While emotional eating is a common effect of stress, it does not produce any good result to anyone. Maybe it somehow helps us feel better, but the long-term effects are not worth it. Find out how you can manage and control emotional eating in no time:
Keep a food diary. If you are a calorie-conscious person, then keeping track of your food intake will help. Jot down what you ate for breakfast, what you had for lunch, and every drink or small snack that you took for the whole day. Once you have a record, there is a chance that you might find some connection between your mood and the food you eat.
When you feel like stress eating, keep in mind your calorie goal for the day. Think of the possible consequences on your fitness goals if you grab those multiple servings of sweets from your cabinet. While cheat days are completely tolerable, frequent and excessive eating is detrimental not only to your physical figure but also to your mental health.
There are other healthy alternatives to the food you are craving. On your next grocery shopping, look for other options other than junk food and fatty snacks. As an example, you can opt for a frozen yogurt rather than a pint of ice cream. Aside from the fact that yogurt is good for the digestive system, it is also helpful in maintaining our body weight as it does not have many calories.
When we are stressed, we often crave for junk food or meals from fast-food chains. Bear in mind that this stuff mostly contains excessive fats, calories, carbohydrates, and processed sugar that are harmful to the body. Make sure that there are available healthy snacks near you for your emergency stress eating.
Every time you feel like you are about to stress-eat, ask yourself first if you are really physically hungry. Maybe you only need to drink water, breathe, and de-stress for a while. Make it a habit to do this self-questioning so that you’ll know when the hunger is real or it’s only an unhealthy urge to stress-eat.
Most of the time, we only need someone to listen to how our whole day went. It will not only address emotional eating but will also be beneficial to our mental health in the long run. Emotional support can be the best cure for our stress.
Let’s all admit that stress and mild anxiety have already been a norm in our lives nowadays. Nonetheless, it does not mean that we have to accept that it will eventually go away on its own. Having healthy alternatives alone will not cure the cause of stress-eating. We also need our own determination to live healthily and the support of others for a better us in the long run.
Whenever people hear the word “journaling,” they picture a teenage girl writing in her diary with her feet dangling from the bed. This visualization is a misconception that journaling only caters to the young generation. However, this technique is perfect for all ages, especially for individuals battling anxiety and depression.
Effective journaling helps you improve your quality of life. There is no single approach to this, and it varies from person to person. Overall, this writing practice has been proven to deliver the following results:
To get you started, here are some tips on the best practices in creating and maintaining your self-help journal.
Make It A Habit To Write
Remember, making a regular habit out of journaling will help you feel its benefits more. Decide on the time of the day where you will sit down, reflect on your emotions, and start writing about it.
Some people prefer to do this practice in the morning to go forward and start their day right. On the other hand, some are more inclined to journaling at night to check up on themselves with regards to how their day went. Whichever you choose, make sure to have a place for this activity in your daily routine.
Focus On Your Intention, Not Your Plan
Making a plan defeats the purpose of journaling. If you’re not the type of person who is spontaneous when it comes to writing, then focus on your intention or goal instead of a detailed plan. Avoid dictating what the outline is and what you should and should not include in there. Take note that your journal should be a safe space where you can jot down uninhibited thoughts and emotions. This practice will help you relieve your anxiety.
Take Note Of Important Questions
The best way to tap your real emotions is to connect with the realities of your life. Here are some questions that can guide in your self-reflection:
Make sure to answer these questions as honestly as possible so that you can adequately express and process your emotions.
Practice Non-Judgement
It might be a little bit challenging not to be horrified with what’s happening with your life if you’ve been through a lot. However, you must always remember that even though things may get ugly at times, it does not mean that you are an awful person. Almost everyone goes through this stage.
What you should do is to practice self-compassion and non-judgment every day. These should be present, especially if your journal is full of negative narratives. Once you reach this kind of mindset, it will be easier for you to write, assess, and forgive yourself for what you are currently going through.
Anxiety and depression are difficult to address. With the help of journaling, however, rest assured that you will ease the burden brought by these mental health issues.
We all know that depression is a mental illness. It is something that gets rooted in extreme emptiness and isolation. The condition is something that we usually misinterpret as sadness. It draws us away from everybody as it grew bigger and bigger. That is why a lot of therapists aim to assist people with depression’s adverse effects. However, are we sure enough to understand all the things about depression? Are we sure that we can immediately identify its signs and symptoms by just looking at someone? Well, perhaps we should entirely look closely into it. Here are the things about depression that not all of us can see.
It Can Hide In A Happy Face
The primary physical description of depression is a sad and gloomy face. It is where we experience a prolonged and unstable emotional aspect, which reflects in our facial expression instantly. However, not all depressed individuals show it openly. There are those people who can hide their emotions by showing a happy and cheerful vibe. These are the ones who master the art of controlling their emotions for the perfect use of facial deception. But it does not mean they are manipulative and liars. Some of these individuals are just lucky enough to keep hold of their fear and sadness into their selves. Admittedly, it is not a gift. It takes a lot of time, practice, and a hell of traumatic experience to be able to self-contaminate unwanted emotions. “Loneliness is an epidemic, We’re the most socially connected society, yet so many people experience extreme loneliness.” psychologist Amy Sullivan, PsyD. said.
It Lasts Forever
Contrary to what others believe, depression has no cure. Once we have it, there is a tendency that we might suffer with it forever. However, that does not mean we can’t do something about it. There are a lot of things to try every day that will keep the mind and body away from the mental condition. And yes, those methods only keep us busy. The truth is, there is no definite certainty as to when and where we will experience depression. It occurs at any time of any day. That is even if when we think we are in the most exceptional circumstances that we are currently at. Same goes to its schedule in leaving our lives. We can’t control it from coming in, and we can’t quickly get rid of it even if we want to. That is the primary reason why we seek out for professional help. Because according to Dr. Kurt Smith, LMFT, LPCC, AFC, “Depression is a serious and tricky illness. Unfortunately, it can also go unrecognized for a long period of time”
It Does Not Follow Rules
Depression is something that changes almost everything in our lives. It does not spare anyone, not a child, not a teen, not adults: genuinely not anyone. When it strikes, it intends to hurt us. It does not offer a pause or a rewind. Its main reason for existence is destruction. That is why a lot of depressed people often end up hurting themselves. Some of them condemn people, while others take their lives and commit suicide. However, in some providential cases, other individuals use it as motivation. These people are the lucky ones who can turn things upside down with the help of the mental condition. Unfortunately, these significant people are limited.
It Does Not Make You Stronger
“Depression is more than an emotion or a state of mind, it is really a process. It is a combination of thoughts, emotions, and behaviors.” Robert Allison, MA, LPC said. As much as we want to stay certain, we think that depression makes us stronger. That is because inside its elements are both bad and good thoughts that we can use to handle things around us. But honestly, depression is far from being a helpful motivational tool. Depression kills us inside and out. When people say that it makes you stronger, that is a lie. It does not support any of your mental health at all. Depression exists only to give you a massive amount of self-doubt, lowered self-confidence, isolation, sadness, anxiety, and stress. And if you have not noticed, the mental illness supports your weakness, vulnerability, and incapability in dealing with the challenges in life.
It Grows Naturally
When we are depressed, we feel life is in its worse case. We begin to realize that we need significant improvements and all that. There is this sense of acceptance that the mental condition appears because it is normal. But it is not. Depression grows bigger and bigger because we feed something to it. We let it have what it wants from us. We allow it to grow fundamentally where we often end up embracing it and longing for it. We stay and stick to it because we think that its existence means something into our lives. That with depression by our side, we can work our way out and recover from emotional and mental damage. But then again, it is not like that.
Understanding depression may vary from one person to another. People might not agree with how others may describe it, but it doesn’t matter. What matters is all individuals should find a reason not to let it be in control.
Mental health illnesses are a very sensitive topic, but it can be overcome. It’s not the same as overcoming financial problems or relationship issues. Mental illnesses like depression, anxiety, and OCD, as explained in psychology, happens when the brain malfunctions. This can take a toll on your daily activities, making it hard to accomplish even the simplest of tasks.
Continue reading “Coping With Mental Health Illnesses – What Will And What Won’t Work”
A lot of today’s youth report struggling with mental health issues – especially anxiety. Many of us may wonder, “They’re so young; what do they have to worry about?” Well, the truth is that there’s a lot. Here are some reasons that are making the youth feel anxious.
The Pressure To Be Happy
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As Bobby McFerrin (and not Bob Marley) says, “don’t worry, be happy.” This saying is often the piece of advice people offer to us during stressful periods of our life. If only it were that easy. Worry isn’t something we can immediately turn off with a switch. But here’s the thing: you don’t always have to be happy.
When adults always tell the youth to cheer up, it actually puts a lot of pressure on them. Teens will start to feel as if they have to be okay all the time. They may think that they have to be happy all the time. When they begin to experience anything else besides joy, they start to panic because they don’t know how to deal with other emotions. Remember, “The sensation of pressure doesn’t have to be negative—it can be a positive challenge and motivating.” Alicia H. Clark, Psy.D. said.
Biological Reasons
Unbeknownst to many people, anxiety doesn’t just stem from experiences or one’s behavior; biology can also make you a worry wart.
“Mental health issues can be caused by a combination of biological, psychological and environmental factors, and can have a minor or major impact on a person’s thoughts, feelings and behaviors.” Christina L. Gmyr, LMHC, NCC said. Just like how we can’t always control our anxiety, we can’t control how our bodies are pre-programmed. Unfortunately, some people are more likely to become more worrisome than others. If one of your parents suffers from an anxiety disorder, you become more likely to develop one as well.
Additionally, a teen’s hormones will be all over the place. You can blame that as the cause of your pimples, mood swings, and anxiety. As they go through puberty, they’ll feel added pressure as they don’t know how to deal with things yet.
Lastly, brain development also has something to do with the youth’s worries. As parents expect their teens to take on more responsibilities, they aren’t always ready for it. They still have to go through a lot to mature. It’s normal to make mistakes – but teens won’t realize that immediately. Frustration over failures and naivety can lead to anxiety.
Negative Body Image
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Many companies, such as Dove and JCPenney, have gained attention for their body positivity campaigns. Despite these movements, a lot of people still hold unrealistic beauty and body standards. Magazines airbrush their models, celebrities endorse unhealthy diets, and the internet keeps coming up with successors to the thigh gap trend.
Because of these high standards, teens feel pressured to look a certain way. Otherwise, they fear their peers shunning them. This issue is a massive blow to their self-confidence and opens up the road for anxiety to develop.
This problem isn’t limited to only female teens either. Young men also feel the need to be fit, muscular, or buff. They’re also starting to become more conscious of what they wear.
High Expectations
Similar to how the youth feels like there are high standards for beauty, they also feel pressure from high expectations from other aspects of life. Parents often want their kids to succeed in school. They also need to excel in extra-curricular activities. Add all this to the pressure of having to maintain a thriving social life. It can all become too much for a teenager to handle.
Teens may then feel anxious about having to achieve all of these. Likewise, they may feel guilty if they fail to meet other people’s expectations. All of this can also lead to further sleep deprivation, causing them additional stress.
Sleep Deprivation
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Different age groups need different amounts of sleep. Studies show that adults need roughly 7-9 hours of sleep per night. Additionally, we all know that kids need more hours each night, clocking in at about 9-11 hours for school-age children. In between that, we have teenagers. For them, they still need about 8-10 hours per night.
One reason why teens become stressed and develop anxiety is that they haven’t adjusted to the fewer hours of sleep they get per night. Moreover, they often don’t even get 8-10 hours. This problem is due to having heavy school workloads, joining extra-curricular activities, and trying to maintain a social life with peers.
Conclusion
“Depression is real and painful. Just because you can’t see or touch it doesn’t make it any less real.” Charmaine J. Simmons, LPC explains. Many of us adults forget what it’s like to be a teenager. Admittedly, we’ve had our fair share of anxiety during our youth. From high expectations to biological factors, there are many reasons for teens to feel anxious. However, we can’t let that get in the way of us succeeding. Knowing and understanding the causes of our worries is the first step to becoming more self-assured and kicking anxiety out the door.
BetterHelp is an online avenue which contains a selection of “friends” that you can talk to when you are feeling down. Check this article to know more.