For too long, the work of suicide prevention has been thought to be the domain of a few, highly trained individuals, but with the forward thinking of you and everyone around you, we could all become that person to help someone else find the support they need.
Everyone feels low or down from time to time. It does not always mean something is wrong. Feeling low is common after distressing events or major life changes, but sometimes periods of low mood happen for no obvious reason.
You may feel tired, lacking confidence, frustrated, angry and worried. But a low mood will often pass after a couple of days or weeks – and there are some easy things you can try and small changes you can make that will usually help improve your mood.
If you’re still feeling down or no longer get pleasure from things for most of each day and this lasts for several weeks, you may be experiencing depression.
Some of us are more deeply affected by events than others. How we deal with things can also depend on how well other parts of our life are going or how well supported we feel.
There are lots of things you can do and organisations that can help.
www.nhs.uk/oneyou/every-mind-matters/your-mind-plan-quiz
Relationships are one of the most important aspects of our lives, yet we can often forget just how crucial our connections with other people are.
When we experience difficulties or changes in a relationship – with a partner, friend or family member – it can affect our mental health in many ways.
If you’re worried about your relationship and how it’s making you feel, it’s worth talking it over with someone you trust, or you may prefer to use a helpline or online resources.
There are lots of sources of support and information that can help if you need help with your relationships.
www.citizensadvice.org.uk/family/
www.relate.org.uk/relationship-help/help-relationships/mental-health
What about the relationship with yourself?
We all have a relationship with ourselves, just as we have relationships with the other people around us. We all tend to think of ourselves in a certain way and might have certain patterns of behaviour when it comes to ‘interacting’ with ourselves.
When someone says they ‘don’t like’ themselves, what they’re often describing is having a poor relationship with themselves – that they’ve come to think of themselves in negative terms or regard themselves as not having much worth.
However, just like our relationships with other people, it’s important to be able to look after our relationship with self and make sure that we’re able to deal with negative thoughts and emotions so they don’t build up over time.
How can I change this?
The single most important thing is to try to switch up this negative dialogue. How you communicate with yourself is absolutely key to how you think about yourself.
You might like to start by simply trying to listen to the voice in your head and noticing times when it might be phrasing things in a negative way. Many people find it useful to keep a diary of what they’ve been thinking each day. Once you become more aware of what your mind is doing, you may be more able to address these patterns.
Also crucial is that you learn to forgive yourself for the imperfections that make you human. Nobody is perfect. We often hear the phrase ‘treat other people as you would treat yourself’ – well, it also works the other way round. Try to be kind to yourself in the way that you would be kind to others, you may find it gives you the freedom to reject the preconceptions of perfection – to just be you. Be gentle on yourself.
What about at work?
For many of us, work is a major part of our lives. It is where we spend much of our time, where we get our income and often where we make our friends. Having a fulfilling job can be good for your mental health and general wellbeing.
We all have times when life gets on top of us – sometimes that’s work-related, like deadlines or travel.
• One in six British workers are affected by mental health problems like anxiety, depression and stress every year.
• Around 15% of people at work have symptoms of an existing mental health condition
• 9 out of 10 people who experience mental health problems say they face stigma and discrimination and 54% percent of people say they are impacted most by this stigma in their place of work
• As a result, 300 thousand people with long-term mental health problems leave their jobs each year.
Less than half of employees say they would feel able to talk openly with their line manager if they were suffering from stress and 95% of employees will cite an alternative reason to stress when calling in sick.
One in five adults experience suicidal feelings at some point in their lives and with a third of our lives spent at work, it is highly likely that there will be people struggling to cope in the workplace and possibly trying to hide it.
Talking about suicide and understanding it better is necessary to help prevent further suicides in the UK. By opening up conversations about mental health and fostering a culture in which employees feel they can seek support when they are struggling, employers can play an integral role in directing their staff to appropriate support services when they need it.
How can I help someone who may be depressed?
Support them to get help . You can’t force anyone to get help if they don’t want it, so it’s important to reassure your loved one that it’s OK to ask for help, and that there is help out there.
Be open about depression. Lots of people can find it hard to open up and speak about how they’re feeling. Try to be open about depression and difficult emotions, so your friend or family member knows that it’s OK to talk about what they’re experiencing.
Keep in touch. It might be hard for your loved one to have the energy to keep up contact, so try to keep in touch. Even just a text message or email to let them know that you’re thinking of them can make a big difference to how someone feels.
Don’t be critical. If you’ve not experienced depression yourself, it can be hard to understand why your friend or family member can’t just ‘snap out of it’. Try not to blame them or put too much pressure on them to get better straight away – your loved one is probably being very critical and harsh towards themselves already.
Listen carefully, don’t judge and most of all, don’t say, ‘Cheer up.’ It’s just not that simple.
Sometimes solutions are unnecessary, so don’t feel you have to provide one.
