Author: Deana Morris

When life gives you lemons…

Deana Morris Uncategorized , , , , 1 Comment
When life gives you lemons…

‘The truth will set you free. But first, it will piss you off.’
Gloria Steinem

 

OK, I’m just going to say this.. Straight out.

Sugar.

It’s as addictive as cocaine and amphetamine.

 

Yup, that’s right. Just as addictive as the drugs you associate with recklessness, the people who squander money on junk, for a high that’s not real, ruining their health… Oh wait…

Hear the sound of a penny dropping…?

Yup. It’s true.

It’s been 10 years now since Princeton scientists discovered rats behave in exactly the same way, whether you feed them coke, speed or sugar water.

Sugar, just like cocaine and amphetamine, has a special relationship with the dopamine receptors in our brain. The Princeton psychologists concluded that sugar releases dopamine into the nucleus accumbens in a similar way to these drugs.

Feel yourself resisting this knowledge? Then welcome to the world of an addict in denial.

Once upon a time, back in the 1990s, I had a friend with a pretty regular cocaine habit who insisted, with a completely straight face, that cocaine wasn’t bad for you. Now maybe he wasn’t addicted but cocaine is not good for our bodies. Ok, maybe high in the Andes, a couple of coco leaves sucked in the corner of your mouth will help you manage altitude sickness, but in its refined form, absolutely not.

And just as cocaine is refined, so sugar is refined. Would gnawing on sugar cane have the same impact on your mood as a can of full fat coke? It’s the refining process thats the issue.

I could write for hours about how sugar wrecks your teeth, your arteries, liver, kidneys… the obesity risks, type 2 diabetes, amputated limbs… but you know this stuff. Same as you know cocaine isn’t a healthy lifestyle choice.

Now not everyone gets addicted to sugar. Some people can take it or leave it. And frankly, in a famine scenario all those ‘Oh, I forgot to eat today’ people would be toast. 

Most of us are designed to survive food shortages, just not the 21st century fast food, muffins (let’s face it, they’re cake) for breakfast, cookies with coffee, constant grazing culture we’re living/dying with. 

Our brains are designed to crave sweetness because our brains are designed to keep us alive in environments we lived in thousands of years ago. Not for the post-World War 2 processed food revolution, fast food a-go-go lifestyles we pick our way through now.

My grandfather was Irish. I am descended from people who got though a potato famine. We did not survive by being fussy eaters.

I am well aware of my sugar issues.Today my sugar addiction lies in what I call ‘sugar in disguise foods’. 

Bread. I love freshly baked bread. German rye bread, fancy walnut bread, good old Italian … I’m salivating just thinking about it. Lashings of butter – oh my…

And yes, a slice would be fine. But can I stop at half a slice? No. Half a loaf? Possibly…

Because here’s another hard, cold truth… flour is sugar in disguise. It behaves in the body just like sugar. It is not good for you. In any form.

I learned how to make myself feel ‘better’ with sugar from an early age. I have an emotional response coupled with an addiction propensity. I know myself. I heal myself. And I get to help others heal too, which is incredibly satisfying.

Am I perfect? I am not. I’m a work in progress, but I do make progress. Eating well is a journey, not a final destination.

And I do believe finding calm around food is available to all of us.

So when life gives you lemons, DO NOT MAKE LEMONADE! 

Fizzy water with ice and a slice is what your body needs.

IMG_4772

When anger bites

Deana Morris Uncategorized , , , , 2 Comments
When anger bites

‘Holding on to anger is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.’
~ Buddha ~

If you have drinks on Friday nights, mentally praising the heavens for your two day pass … chances are there’s someone in your work place pushing you buttons.

If you spend your Sunday nights worrying about Monday, that’s another big clue.

Feel sick when you walk in the office or do you find yourself comfort eating to compensate for how you feel after a long day in their presence?

Does this person blame others when anything goes wrong? Is there shouting? Sulking? 

An atmosphere you could cut with a knife when you walk in the room?

Yes, sometimes the work can be dull, but if you’ve got a difficult boss or a colleague who’s a bully then you’re likely to feel anger at least some of the time.

Anger at the injustice.

Anger at the unfairness.

You might call it resentment. You might call it irritation. Especially if you’re a woman, because women are taught at an early age that anger isn’t an emotion you should be feeling.

If I had a pound for every time I was told not to be angry. It wasn’t ‘ladylike’…

But the problem with anger that doesn’t find an outlet is, it simmers…

It stays there in your body and it festers.

Anger is described as an intense feeling in response to feeling frustrated, hurt, disappointed, or threatened. Shame, inadequacy, fear and powerlessness can all be in there too.

And it can cause havoc in the body. A major anger episode can almost double your blood pressure, putting you at risk of stroke or heart attack. Science shows angry people have a 10% increased chance of having a heart attack. 

Your heart is pretty essential, so dealing effectively with anger is so much wiser.

5 keys to handling others’ anger

  1. Find somewhere to ground yourself. Decide on somewhere you can go, inside or outside, where you know you can take a break, get some space, and get clarity.
  2. Establish boundaries and stick to them. Decide what you won’t tolerate. Certain words. Actions. Tones. Know what your internal boundaries are too. Isolate the feeling, the shift physically that signals to you that someone’s anger is intolerable for you and be clear on what that is. Your boundaries are sacrosanct. They are yours. They are not to be compromised.
  3. Nurture yourself. Show yourself a lot of love. Sleep. Good diet. Self care that relaxes you – go for all of it.
  4. Articulate your own anger. Someone’s anger will always trigger yours. Make space to process it. Don’t hold it in. Find your own words for how you feel – journaling is excellent for this.
  5. Stop struggling. Accept what you can’t change. Look for what you can control. You’ll have a lot more success focusing on what is within your power.

5 keys to handling your own anger

  1. Ever heard that phrase: ‘You can be happy or you can be right? Which do you want?’ Your ego wants you to hang on to being right. The ego loves righteous indignation. But in a year from now, in 20 years from now, does it matter. Really? If it’s already happened, can you change the past?
  2. Don’t take it personally. This is just someone’s opinion. It’s not yours. You don’t own it. If you don’t like the look of it, don’t take it on. This is about them, not you.
  3. Let. It. Go ‘Why does this ALWAYS happen to me?’ ‘Why can’t I EVER get my own way?’ Welcome to life, lovely. No one, but no one gets what they want 100% of the time. But when you let go of the need to have everything go your way you’ll start to notice when it does. And extreme language does not help you. It just upsets you. Chill out.
  4. Be Mindful of what’s going on in your body. If I don’t get fed regularly I go from mildly grumpy to growling narkiness very quickly. Five mile hikes looking for the right restaurant do not bode well for my dining partner if I’m ravenous. So I plan ahead. I take snacks. Tiredness. Being too hot. Stress. They’re all anger triggers. Be aware.
  5. Connect to yourself. The more aware you are of your shifting emotions, the better you’ll be at expressing yourself and controlling your own reactions.

If you find emotions effect how you eat, you can join my free Me First Tribe, support group on FB where emotional over and under eaters have a safe, non judgemental space to connect and support each other.

Emotional eating, the morning after

Deana Morris Uncategorized , , , , , , 0 Comment
Emotional eating, the morning after

In victory, you deserve champagne. In defeat you need it.
– Napoleon Boneparte

Ever noticed mood changes on the day after the night before a few too many drinks? Perhaps you’ve been out a few nights in a row. You feel off kilter and not just because you’ve got a headache.

Somehow the aspirin doesn’t quite sort you out… you need something else. 

Carbs!

The reason why you’re feeling low is likely to be your serotonin levels are a mess – alcohol is basically sugar-in-disguise – you’ve been bingeing. 

Now you’re crashing and your mind is working hard to get your body back somewhere near balance.

The mind’s job is to move you away from pain towards pleasure and so that’s why you’ll crave sugary drinks. And food. Lots of food. Not broccoli either. Funny, that.

Of course sugar does have a practical purpose – it boosts serotonin. This is why you crave carbs around your period – hormone fluctuations can mess with your serotonin too. So perimenopause and menopause will impact on your serotonin levels when estrogen drops.

Of course, the problem with white carbs is they only work for a few hours, like pain medication. Three hours later and you need more.

It’s not just the wine and Netflix evening that messes up your healthy eating aspirations, it’s the day after too.

So how do you boost your serotonin levels effectively without plunging off into sugar spiking bingeing.

There are complex carbs that do the job. Sweet potato, oatmeal, quinoa, lentils are all ideal. All you need is 30g, according to Dr Judith Wurtman, author of The Serotonin Power Diet.

If you want to get them into your bloodstream fast, eat them without protein or fat, as this slows down digestion.

Nutritional cures for a hangover are one thing. But addiction recovery expert and yoga teacher, Tommy Rosen, has linked poor diet to other addictions. He has first-hand experience of dependency. In conversation with Dr Mark Hyman, medical director of the UltraWellness Centre and best-selling author, Tommy Rosen linked his own progression into addiction with a poor early diet. Plenty of highly-processed preserved meats, lots of sugary foods and absolutely no vegetables were his staples growing up.

Dr Hyman said there is certainly evidence that while some people are satisfied with one glass of wine, others need far more to achieve the same level of satisfaction and that may be linked to a sugar-heavy childhood diet.

If you’ve grown up eating all the wrong foods it doesn’t mean you’re destined to be an addict, but it’s likely that your brain is more familiar with the highs and lows associated with sugar rushes and crashing and so you may even find the highs and lows of alcohol, cigarettes or drugs more familiar than frightening.

Not having your cake and eating it too

Deana Morris Uncategorized , , , , 0 Comment
Not having your cake and eating it too

‘Pour some sugar on me, in the name of love,’
Def Leppard

Doughnuts… ice-cream… black forest gateaux… cookies… Belgian triple chocolate chip cookies dipped in chocolate…

If your mouth is watering just reading those words then you’ll have a thing for sugar. I mean who doesn’t, right?

But for some of us, sugar-lust can get out of control – and never more so when we’re feeling low.

Emotional eating is rarely triggered by having a great day. It’s triggered by feelings that bring us down. Like feeling judged, feeling sad, feeling lonely, feeling less than in balance…

Sometimes the strangest things can throw us – and before we know it we’re stood in the kitchen, fridge door open and scanning for the foods that satisfy our personal craving needs.

Of course, a Rapid Transformational Therapy (RTT) session will help you identify what happened in your past that created these associations. 

Reframing these associations in hypnosis can be incredibly powerful because the subconscious is then on board with what you want. It stops the ‘go on, eat the cake, cake makes you happy’ mantra because the whole of the mind – conscious and subconscious – understands that it was never really about the cake. 

The mind’s job is to move you away from pain towards pleasure. Once the mind understands that the craving is triggered by a memory, the need for the cake evaporates.

Let me give you an example. On my 18th birthday my mum took me to London. A big treat. We had lunch in a pizzeria in the Brompton Arcade and in the afternoon mum bought me a glass necklace in Harvey Nichols as my present. There, we went to the cafe for a drink. 

While I found us a table she bought us three slices of cake each, plus fizzy drinks. I remember remarking on the amount of cake she’d bought, but I also felt duty bound to eat it all with her. You never left anything on a plate in our house. My parent were World War II children, food had been rationed in the UK and going hungry was not unusual. Food was not to be ‘wasted’. Besides, leaving any would have made me ungrateful and I didn’t want to spoil the day.

Children look to their parents constantly for cues on how to behave. ‘Food as a reward’, ‘over-eating as a privilege’ are both powerful messages.

Did this one incident turn me into a cakeoholic? Not entirely, but it was key and it was reinforced with lots of ‘cake = rewards’ messaging over the years beforehand and so my ‘sugar = reward’ thinking was a sealed fate.

Now I understand that these scenes are really about love. The cake is merely the messenger. Connecting to the memory of love is just as powerful. And my subconscious understands that now too.

The need to binge can be complex, but it is invariably about recreating an emotion or sometimes pushing one away.

Understanding is power, but understanding in hypnosis is a phenomenal power because the whole mind is engaged in your desire to change.

I now hear myself say ‘No thank you, I don’t really like cake.’ Because really it’s just a mush of sugar and fat that makes me feel a bit giddy and then slightly sick.

If you want this kind of change for you, contact me for a free first consultation.

Mirror, mirror, on the wall…

Deana Morris Uncategorized 2 Comments
Mirror, mirror, on the wall…

“I have done it again. I have been here many times before / Hurt myself again today / And the worst part is there’s no one else to blame.” Breathe Me. Sia

‘You’re fat. You’re looking old. Oh my God, you’re so looking so old. Look at your lines. Who do you think you are? Seriously? Everyone thinks you’re pathetic.’

In this third in my series of blogs on bullying we say ‘hello’ to an inner bully.

Oh yes. This lovely little madam isn’t at high school, she isn’t an internet troll. She’s not working in an office, fiercely polishing her nails as she plots and seeks to control her own fear by picking on others. She lives inside a woman. And pretty amazing woman at that.

This particular inner bully lives with a highly articulate, career-loving queen of multi-tasking who has achieved in just about everything she touches; from her ‘oh I don’t like to talk about it’ charity work to her beautiful family.

And she’s not alone. I work with women who win multiple awards, have their own successful businesses or jobs, lovely homes… in short, on paper, look like shining beacons of ‘having it all’. But what they also have is an inner bitch.

Why is this woman so hard on herself? Would she think this or say this about anyone else? Not even if that woman were jabber-the-hut proportioned and 2,000 years old. But it’s ok to say this to yourself.

So what’s going on?

If this scenario is familiar to you. Then I expect you’ve been living with an inner critic for years and I bet you bumped along with yours for years before you noticed the condemning look from the mirror. From the reflection in the shop window. In the eyes of the waitress at the restaurant. 

When you hear this bully making her presence known, remember this:

  1. Her presence is not your fault.
  2. She is using everything in the book to keep you small. It’s not true.
  3. You need to hear the very opposite of her crap but you also need to do some homework first
  4. A bit like in a fairy tale, when you understand her and disarm her, her witch power starts to evaporate.

So where did this little madam come from?

A common thread I see amongst the women I work with is they have, at some point, been shamed by a parent. Usually the mother and/or mother-figure in the house is the one whose actions are at the root of this.

Now we all do things wrong as children and we all get punished for our misdeeds, or we annoy the living daylights out of a parent and they use harsh words or actions in the moment. And of course there are the parents who are unfit parents and they will mess up their children deliberately, but by the large, this is not deliberate child sabotage.

They can’t or just forget to tell the child that regardless of their misdeed they love the child unconditionally and completely. Perhaps they don’t value themselves enough to realise how important they are in their child’s growth. Perhaps they do believe love is conditional and can be justifiably withheld. When the parent doesn’t sit down with the child and emphasise how loveable they are, regardless of what has happened, the child starts to focus on being defined by the perceived weakness.

Women constantly look to their mothers for cues on how they should grow and consider themselves. They may admire their mother’s strength and resilience and so they take on board their mother’s criticism and hold it in their hearts where it sits, echoing its mantra of self-criticism year after year after year…

Want to shut her up?

If you’ve woken up to your inner bully then you’ll have probably come across the idea of positive affirmations. You might even have stood in front of the mirror and tried telling yourself the opposite of what you’ve been calling yourself. And then felt a bit ridiculous. Then thought ‘oh it doesn’t work for me because I am fat/old/ugly/different’ (whatever your poison of choice is, insert here).

Swamp her with understanding

Understanding where this inner bully comes from is a huge step in dealing with her poison. If you can understand where this all began (and working with an RTT Therapist can be hugely effective in achieving this because your subconscious is completely immersed in the process with you) then you can know on a deep level that this hate mantra she spouts isn’t true. 

I’ve seen sea-change behaviour shifts in clients. In a matter of weeks they’ve moved from ‘I can’t go to a yoga class because everyone will think I’m fat’ to ‘oh I love it, I could go on my own. Actually, I’ve noticed I’m more flexible than other women in the class. And not everyone’s thin either.’ Change is possible.

The ‘you’re fat’ mantra comes up a lot. It’s not actually true though, is it. No one is literally fat. You are a mass of cells arranged in the shape of a human being. You are not literally ‘fat’. You may have fat cells, but you have many other types of cell too. Disarming the words’ power as playground name-calling is a start. Showing kindness to the inner bully, acknowledging she’s got it wrong and that you do have the power to change anything, including your own body, if you want to, quietens her. Because that is the truth. You have the power.

Listen for the quieter voice that speaks up when you’ve done well. Turn up her volume. Hear her admiration for your achievements. Your cleverness. Your capacity for nurturing and loving. For others and for you.

Becoming a loving parent to yourself

There are theories in psychology that we have within us our child self, our parent self and our adults self. Sometimes, in order to live fully as adults we need to practice parenting ourselves. Daily. Connecting to the child we were and making space to hear the words we longed to hear, from us. Who better to do the job now? 

I keep a photograph of myself as a two year old out in my bedroom. I pass it everyday. My grandad’s arms are around me. He’s looking down at me. I can see he’s smiling. I’m looking up. I know, in that moment, I am so loved. If you believe that love is an energy and that energy never dies then surely that love lives on in me. I keep it alive. So when I pass that photo and think ‘I love you’, yes I am talking to my grandad, but I am also talking to myself.

 

 

 

The fine art of balancing

Deana Morris Uncategorized , , 0 Comment
The fine art of balancing

‘Thunder only happens when it’s raining’ 
– Fleetwood Mac, Dreams

Once upon a time, not so very long ago, I was a young, ambitious junior reporter setting out on her first job.

Because I was an adventurous spirit (or knew no better, whichever way you choose to look at it and both were probably true) I left my sleepy Oxfordshire hometown for a job on a weekly newspaper in the Manchester hinterland.

I’d studied journalism in Sheffield so I thought I knew what a city was like. I didn’t realise they came in such different sizes.

The bright lights of Manchester were pretty dimmed in those days. And I was at least an hour away from any city centre life. I lived in a bedsit, on the edge of a place called Hyde (ironic when I think about it) where my view of the world was scrubby fields, at the edge of which stood the gleaming towers of a housing estate called Hattersley. It’s probably a much nicer place to live now but then, back in the 1980s, they had just demolished the former home of Hattersley’s most infamous residents, child killers Ian Brady and Myra Hindley.

My first newspaper had three reporters, which is probably a luxury these days, but we didn’t have the internet from which you could scavenge for inspiration. You had to get out there and find your news, or at least phone people incessantly. Or take copy over the phone. I know, actually talk to people! It was a labour intensive job, clattering away on typewriters, and we worked some hours.

Occasionally I’d go out socially with one of the other reporters, for a few drinks after work, but I didn’t know anyone except the people I worked with. If I could divide up how I spent my time and what dominated my life, it looked a bit like this:

Work

I liked my job and it was hugely varied. But my editor was very demanding, quite shouty and, well, let’s just say his people skills weren’t strong. Not surprisingly, the wheels started to fall off my wellbeing.

I didn’t earn very much so I cut back on buying food, so I could spend more on cigarettes. This somehow gave me a sense of control, but of course I had none anywhere else, so odd though this sounds, it did work for a little while. But shortly after the crying began. After various sobbing episodes I took myself off to see my GP who asked what my work life was like. The doctor signed me off for a fortnight with ‘nervous exhaustion’ and the retort ‘we don’t send children up chimneys any more’ which gives you an idea of the kind of hours I worked and how pathetic I must have looked. GPs are hardly slackers, after all.

In her book Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway, Susan Jeffers gives the example of a whole life as looking like this:

AWholeLife

Big difference, huh?

There is a very good reason for not putting all your eggs in one basket. If that basket starts to fray at the edges, so does a big part of our lives. We need balance. So whether you’re a workaholic or obsessed with being in a relationship or you’re obsessed with running, your happiness isn’t in a safe place. And who wants that?

For me the big flag that I’m out of balance is my eating goes haywire. I’ve had phases of bingeing in the past as well as withholding. Really until very recently I found it impossible to talk to friends about this and I felt very isolated.

If this feels familiar to you and you’d like to work on getting more balance, I may have a solution for you that’s also going to help you feel less isolated.

I’ve created a Facebook group for women like me, perhaps ‘us’, called the Me First Tribe. We share ways to get balance in a stressful world, where food takes on far more emotional headspace than we know it should.

If you’d like to join, there are just a few questions to answer, really about engaging and supporting your fellow group members.

Hope to see you in the group. xox

 

Mental Health Heroes

Deana Morris Uncategorized 0 Comment
Mental Health Heroes

It’s Mental Health Awareness Week here in the UK (May 14-20).

Seven days where we focus on talking more about our mental health and hopefully shine as bright a light as possible on it until people talk about their mental health issues just as they would chat about a shoulder injury or their arthritis.

Because we still don’t, do we?

So I thought I’d start Mental Health Awareness Week by asking you to share who has inspired you. Who do you admire? Whether they are a leader in mental health wellness or someone who champions open conversation about mental health… let’s celebrate their greatness.

For me, and goodness knows there are many people I admire, one woman stands out. Carrie Fisher. I just thought her brave, intelligent honesty and openness was so articulate. And now she’s gone. And that’s so sad.

There was an article in the Guardian magazine a couple of years ago where she talks about how her relationship with Harrison Ford began.  She was in the UK, working on Star Wars, with all these older men and they introduced her to alcohol. It was that evening, muzzy-headed with drink, that the affair began. She was still a teenager. He was 15 years older than her.

Something about her vulnerability in that moment and her pragmatism about how she viewed her situation.. in some ways it broke my heart. In some ways I admired how she rebuffed victimhood. She was such a badass. I mean, she’s Princess Leia.

So who’s your mental health inspiration? Let’s celebrate their greatness. Names and whys in the comments below… I’d love to hear.

Where’s the community in ‘social’?

Deana Morris Uncategorized , , 0 Comment
Where’s the community in ‘social’?

“I hate it when women wear the wrong foundation colour. It might be the worst thing on the planet when they wear their makeup too light.” Kim Kardashian

We live in times when we’ve never been more ‘connected’. There are more varieties of social media than I can count or certainly grasp the point of.

They fade in and out of popularity like jeans fashions, all promising something new, something aspirational.

So why is it so hard to feel a real sense of community in the social whirl? Social media is defined as “websites and applications that enable users to create and share content or to participate in social networking.”

Do you feel like you’re ‘sharing’? Do you feel like you’re ‘networking’? Social media sounds like it should bring us closer together, but is that happening?

It is difficult to see the community within the network of communication opportunity. Is that the ‘can’t see the wood for the trees’ effect or are we becoming increasingly isolated by the social media moguls – those who sell us ‘happiness’ through the kaleidoscope of celebrity connection?

Social media certainly plays a very heavy hand in the amplification of celebrity culture. What can be more alienating than being bombarded by images of heavily photoshopped, demi-deities, draped in clothes and jewels way beyond our salaries?

Never have we been more aware of what we don’t have. From handbags to our very bodies, what is culturally revered seems extraordinary. And expensive to maintain. Have you ever met anyone the same shape as Kim Kardashian? She’s an extraordinary woman… in a hundred different ways. That foundation quote is astonishing. Maybe it’s taken out of context. Perhaps it’s deliberate in its apparent shallowness. World hunger? War? Global warming? No, for Kim it’s all about makeup. A conscious choice to fan the flames of controversy and sell more of whatever it is she sells, perhaps…

I’m in no way criticising her or her existence as a current icon, I’m more fascinated by its emergence. Her imperious, bambi-blinking countenance, her stony-faced family, the equally unsmiling husband and clutch of strangely named children, it’s all oddly familiar yet alien at the same time.

Undoubtedly she is a queen of selfie culture, and it is this phrase, which in itself is less than five years old, is already officially more dangerous than sharks, if you compare shark attacks v selfies cited in deaths in 2015.

Selfie culture has been pinpointed as a potential factor in the suicide rates among young UK women, which have doubled in the past 10 years.

Calling for more research, Chris O’Sullivan of the Mental Health Foundation said: “Young women and girls face an enormous range of challenges and a lot of these are emerging at a pace that adults don’t understand. The digital world and how young people relate to it is something we need more research on.

“And this particularly reflects young women and girls in terms of body image: The ‘selfie’ culture and the need for physical perfection. We need a better frame of understanding on the way modern life impacts on our mental health including our use of social media and other technology.”

With self harming being there times more common amongst teenage girls than boys, according to a study by Manchester University, let’s hope more research happens soon.

And if anyone finds true community within the social platforms, let’s hear about them.

Caring for elephants

Deana Morris Uncategorized , , 0 Comment
Caring for elephants

Mental health is the elephant in the room of our wellbeing, one that fades in and out of view.

It’s always there, it’s just that sometimes it’s invisible. Like when everything’s going great – then, you can’t see Mental Health Elephant, can you?

But when all is not so good we start to catch sight of it, out of the corner of our eye.

As our issues snowball Mental Health Elephant starts to materialise. It stops hiding in corners.

And when all is very bad, Mental Health Elephant sits on our chest, glaring fiercely at us, looking pretty terrifying.

Some people get crushed. Literally.

One of the ironies of good mental health is we know it’s important, but we don’t prioritise it.

Even though one in four of us will find our mental health impacting on our wellbeing, for employers health and safety seems to mostly focus on where the fire exits are and who’s a first aider. Pound to a penny the first aiders know how to dress a head wound, but not how to handle a colleague sobbing hysterically in the loo.

Even though 25% of us will be effected – and according to the charity, Mind, that’s every year a quarter of the population find their mental health straining at the seams… we don’t like talking about it.

And because we don’t talk about it we don’t know what to do when our mental health starts to fall apart.

We might go to see our GP, we might even get referred for counselling straight away. But if the GP is unsympathetic, or so stressed themselves their reactions make us feel worse, it doesn’t occur to us to seek help somewhere else. If our first counsellor isn’t connecting with us we presume there’s something wrong with us.

Mental health professionals and the therapies they practice vary enormously. Unfortunately, by the time people seek professional help Mental Health Elephant is very much in view. It’s blocking our view of the big picture.

In some ways going to therapy is like going on holiday; just because you don’t like the first one you try, it doesn’t mean they’re not for you.

If you went on holiday and it was ok but the climate didn’t suit you, the food upset your stomach and you didn’t like the hotel, you wouldn’t throw your hands up and say ‘Well that’s it, I’m never going on holiday again. Holidays don’t work for me.’

You’d try a different formula. Maybe you went walking in Scotland when a beach holiday in the South of France would suit you better. Maybe you like the beach, but you love tapas… so you’d look at Spain.

But because we don’t talk about mental health, we don’t know our options or understand the therapies that are out there.

I trained in Rapid Transformational Therapy (RTT) because I found its impact instant, the insights incredibly powerful and the experience continued to give for me. RTT may not be a fit for you, just as Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) suits some people, but not everyone. Everyone has choice. Discovering that there is always choice, that seems to be news to people. And, of course, when our mental health is less than great, it’s difficult to take control when you’re being told one choice is your hope.

This week I attended an event at UK Fast, quite broadly titled Entrepreneurs and Mental Health.

Entrepreneurs do face unique mental health challenges. Working for yourself is, of course, more isolating than in a large organisation. Although as some of you all recognise, feeling isolated in a crowded office is just as lonely a feeling, if not more so.

Speaker after speaker took to the stage, bravely telling how they reached crisis, their tipping points and their experience of the care they found, or didn’t.

Several channelled their energy into helping others, including comedian and writer, Jake Mills. Jake’s despair took him to a suicide attempt. His Hub of Hope is a first of its kind national database of mental health advice and support.

Jake’s database – available as an Apple app, or through a website – finds you the mental health care support in your area. Or someone to talk to. Instantly. You can just type in your postcode… and watch your elephant start to fade again.

www.hubofhope.co.uk

Please share, Hub of Hope could save a life.

A letter to my school bully

Deana Morris Uncategorized , 7 Comments
A letter to my school bully

‘All cruelty springs from weakness.’
—Seneca, 4BC-AD65

Dear Bully

For every time you walked behind me, calling me names, I want to thank you.

For every time you deliberately stood on the back of my heels, I want to thank you.

For every time you made me question my worth, I want to thank you.

For every tear, for every ache in my chest, for every stifled sob, I want to thank you.

For every time I pretended everything was fine while your words and meanness tore into me, I want to thank you.

This is why I thank you.

The moment I turned round and faced you, the moment I let go of my fear, the moment I pushed back, the moment I saw the shock in your eyes…

… and seeing you come late and tearfully into the French class, and realising as the days went by that you would leave me be now, that was life-changing for me.

You see, school for me was a sanctuary and I used it to feel safe and secure. Without that, I was struggling. I doubt that you saw that, you just instinctively recognised someone vulnerable. I’m sure you had your own problems, otherwise why would you need to feel powerful by hurting someone else? Perhaps you were being bullied at home, I don’t know.

But what you taught me was bullying won’t go away unless you take control. You taught me to stand up for myself and let go of fear. And although I sometimes I forget to live by this, by the large, when I remember, it serves me very well.

So with love, light and my very best wishes,

Deana xox

****

I write the above for a number of reasons.

Firstly, I’ve been doing a lot of letting go of fear recently, and that includes the fear of being vulnerable. So, trust me, from that place, the above serves me very well.

Secondly, if my story helps anyone stand up to a bully, whether they be in the workplace or in the classroom or even in their own home, then I  have spent an hour doing something worthwhile.

I am not for one moment suggesting you take the approach I did, which was to punch this girl on the nose. I’m not proud of what I did, but for a super-geek kid whose whole self-worth revolved around being thought well of at school, it was a massive demonstration of ‘enough’. I really didn’t care if I was expelled at that point. I don’t think I hit her that hard, although she did fall over, but it was her recognition that I wouldn’t stand for any more that saw her off. As it was, nothing happened. She barely spoke to me again at school.

So if you’re being bullied at work, see HR, demand a meeting and look your bully in the eye. Mediation is really only going to work if both parties are willing to enter into the process. Bullies aren’t invested in changing behaviours that feed a deep, dark need so, call me cynical, but I doubt you’ll get much from the bully. But the point is you are taking back your power and this means communicating you’re not standing for any more. If the bully is not for changing and you can’t get yourself moved from their influence then my advice would be focus on getting another job. It’s just a job, it does not define you. If you’re being bullied at home, get professional help. Talk to someone you know you can trust. If you’re being bullied at school, talk to a teacher you trust.

And that’s not easy, I know. Fear will kick in. The mind spends all its time trying to move us away from pain. If it perceives us hesitating then 101 reasons not to do anything will spring up. Just lean in to the uncomfortable feelings. Don’t spring back. Hear the excuses your mind comes up with, listen and smile and then take a step further towards freeing yourself.

If you’re wondering what happened to my bully, I can tell you.

Remember Friends Reunited? Back then she got in touch and told me how she’d had problems in her own life but she was happy to see how I seemed to be enjoying mine. I thanked her and told her I was.

Living life knowing I have the strength to stand up for myself has saved me from a lot of pain on numerous occasions.

It felt like the end of the world at the time. But it wasn’t. Everything is temporary. Everything changes.