Tag: #faceofdepression

Stable isn’t a Thing, Darling

Ellen Thomas1 Comment

I had a conversation the other day in which I posed the controversial question of “can you think of one person that you know that you would describe as completely stable, with no hint of a mental health problem?”, the person I was asking looked puzzled and thought for well over 2 minutes. “I actually can’t”.

What is stable? What are we all meant to feel like? Is there a pattern of behaviour that’s right? Or is it just that society has made us believe that there are certain behaviours which put you in the “normal and stable category”. As discussed in a previous post, I don’t believe in “The Face of Depression”. I believe we all have a face, and that face tells nothing of what’s on the inside.

‘Mental health’ and ‘mental illness’ are increasingly being used as if they mean the same thing, they don’t. Everyone has mental health, just like everyone has health. In the course of a lifetime, not all people will experience a mental illness, but absolutely everyone will struggle or have a challenge with their mental well-being (a.k.a, their mental health) either continuously or for a period of time, just like everyone will have challenges with their physical well-being from time to time.

Health isn’t like an on/off switch. There are different degrees of health. People move on a continuum ranging from great or good health to so-so health to poor health to illness or disability. Some people have serious health problems that last for a long time, and others have serious health problems that resolve very quickly. Many people fall somewhere in the middle—they’re generally in good health, though the occasional problem may come up. Mental Health works in exactly the same way, and I struggle to understand why it’s still not viewed in the same light.

Just as someone who feels unwell may not have a serious illness, people may have poor mental health without a mental illness. We all have days where we feel a bit down, or stressed out, or overwhelmed by something that’s happening in our lives. Good mental health isn’t about feeling happy and confident 100% of time and ignoring any problems. It’s about living and coping well despite problems.

I do recognise that I have struggled with my Mental Health for a very long time. But I know I’m not an acute case, a rare case or even a particularly severe one. I know that there are so many people struggling through a mental health journey. Alone. I also know it is in no ones interest to treat the entire population as if they were mentally ill, they save that treatment, most of the time, until you’re truly on the edge. But what if it was different? What if struggling with your mental health wasn’t something that you miraculously found out about someone or “didn’t expect” from someone. What if it was viewed just a part of our make up, and needed as much maintenance as getting our hair cut, and keeping it in check was as normal as doing the weekly food shop.

I don’t think that everyone with a worry, a concern or going through a tough time needs to see a specialist or a professional. But it wouldn’t hurt for us all to start taking care of ourselves a bit better. For us all to start taking care of each other. If we spoke about our struggles more, we could maybe begin to normalise it. Speak up, speak out, I can assure you that no one is going to be too surprised, marginally because they are probably feeling the same way. Let’s start talking about our mental health in the nail salon, when passing on the street, and when out for lunch. Let’s not settle for the answer “I’m fine”. Let’s be honest. Let’s be understanding and for god sake let’s be kind. None of us are stable, stable isn’t a thing, darling.

Hang in there.

Ellen on the Edge xx

Give up the booze for a bit

Ellen Thomas4 Comments

Alcohol surrounds everything. It’s surrounded my social life and me since the moment I turned 18. I have very few “tee-total” friends and have spent a lot of my weekends over the past 7 years drinking alcohol. Drinking alcohol is fun, and for me (especially in the past 2 years) it didn’t always end in disaster. There’s dancing on tables, lots of loud singing and screaming, meandering conversations that wound on late into the night, and much laughter. Me and my closest friends are regulars at the millennial English tradition of “Prosecco brunch” where we would in a very classy style, scream at waiters to fill us up faster as we downed glasses of cheap Prosecco. It is great. But there were also the darker repercussions of drinking, I hate feeling out of control, my anxiety and feelings of utter hopelessness come thick and fast when I wake up with a hangover and I was increasingly becoming appreciative of Sunday’s well spent.

Alcohol is a depressant. It’s a fact.

In the months leading up to the breakdown I experienced in August 2019 I was really not enjoying drinking, but was craving the effect of delusion and escapism it gave me from my own thoughts. I began regularly drinking, everyday. I would have a couple of glasses of wine every evening and was finding that, momentarily, this was taking the edge off. And due to its casual nature, went completely unnoticed by anyone close around me. But this edge was only taken off for a very limited time and boy was I paying for it. When I was going out with my friends I was finding it difficult to get “fun drunk” like I had in the past and was feeling like I wanted to go home when I went on nights out.

I realised I might need a break from alcohol following one evening in July, when on a weeknight, I was home alone, and drank a bottle and a half of wine. I was watching a TV programme about mental health and was struggling with the content, and so rather than turning it off, I turned to the bottle in order to numb how much I was relating to the sad and raw reality of the programme. This wasn’t right.

It was the following week that I went to the doctors and described the slippery slope I felt I was on, and that I felt depression was consuming me. I was signed off work and placed on some medication.

Like every other millennial, I’m a google searcher. I google everything, and usually look for the worst case scenario before I stop. I was googling the medication I was on the moment I got it. “Will it make me gain weight”, “Will it make my hair fall out”, “Will it kill me”, and the clincher “Can you drink alcohol”.

I knew what I was looking for with the final question and it wasn’t what I thought I was; “You can continue to drink alcohol while taking sertraline but having the two together might make you very sleepy and unsteady on your feet. … Drinking alcohol every day, or in large amounts, can make your symptoms worse and the sertraline will not get the best chance to act.” This was enough, this was my get out clause, this was the excuse my brain needed to stop. I wasn’t to drink for the next few months, and give the medication the best chance to help me. After that I would see how I felt and may continue to drink, but hopefully I would be more mindful following a break.

What I quickly realised however was that I was relieved, I was relieved because I had an excuse, and I never had had one. I was able to approach the dreaded “don’t you drink?!” question by explaining that it didn’t agree with the medication I was on. My body was thankful for the break and Tesco own brand orange fizzy is a new favourite. But that got me thinking… why the BLOODY hell should I feel the need to have a viable excuse, why should I need an excuse at all. We live in a society which excludes non-drinkers as “boring”. However people don’t often stop to think about the background that may surround this lifestyle choice, the dark and extremely painful past that someone may have with their relationship with alcohol, the despair and the fact it may exasperate an underlying condition. And actually whether it is any of their goddamn business.

I’ve not drank alcohol for 2 months now, whilst this is a choice, I appreciate that I have not occupied spaces that have massively encouraged me to drink and I have no intention of ‘never touching a drop again’, living an openly sober life, or an intention of making it a big deal. I would never insist on sitting and preaching to people about why they should stop and take up a sober trial, least of all, it’s none of my business. But its working for me right now, my mental health is improving at the moment and I feel good. I am increasingly going off the idea of alcohol and would quietly advocate giving it a go, even just for a short period, for your physical and mental health, and your confidence. Our society is so dependant on consuming something to numb reality or give us an altered rose tinted fun experience, that when you stop turning to alcohol, you realise that real life, and feeling raw experiences with nervous clarity, can be just as much of a high as that tequila shot.

Hang in there.

Ellen on the Edge xx