Hello and welcome to The Oh Shit Podcast!
Today we are asking what we can do when our mental health makes us feel like a burden. Chances are, if you struggle with your mental health, you will have felt like a burden at some point in your life. I have been incredibly lucky to have been loved by 3 partners throughout my experience with mental health who were my number one supports throughout my years of being a mental health warrior. But everything changed for me when I came out of my marriage earlier this year.
Suddenly I didn’t have a partner to depend on anymore … I was out in the world as a single person for the first time since I was 13 and it very much changed the way I managed my mental health. I no longer had that one person to go to, to chat things through with as I had done for the rest of my adult life. I didn’t feel like I should reach out to friends and so I wasn’t processing externally in the same way, I felt heavier emotionally. And because I was going through so much at the time, my mental health deteriorated and I found myself needing more support than I had done in previous years.
A consequence of this shift was that I did have to reach out to close friends in crisis situations and although I was welcomed with open arms and supported through the difficult times, this pervasive feeling of being a burden followed me through the next few months. I became really nervous that I’d caused trauma or that the experience had lead to a wedge forming in these friendships and it left me wondering what I could have done differently.
On the podcasts we talk in detail about some of the experiences we’ve gone through in previous years, so I won’t go into them in detail here. But one of the things I’ve done over the last month is work to remedy that feeling and we came up with a few ways for others to avoid this feeling. Here’s what we have come up with…
First, make sure you are surrounded by people that you feel you can be open about your mental health with. On this week’s podcast, Leora talks through a process called value mapping whereby you sit down and get really clear on what’s important to you and make sure that those around you are in line with those values.
Instead of waiting for a time of crisis, have conversations with your network ahead of time. Explain that in the future, you could be in need of more support and ask them if they feel comfortable being a support for you when that happens. What this allows for is an open conversation about boundaries for both you and them, what they can expect and it also gives you an opportunity to say what you might need a head of time. This can be really important as when we are in the thick of our struggle, sometimes it can be hard to communicate what we actually need.
Understand that not everyone is going to be able to be supportive. You may have people who don’t like you or can’t understand what you’re going through and it’s important to remember that that is ok! You don’t need everyone to like you. We talk through this in more detail on the podcast and how both Leora and I had to let go of pleasing everyone when we started the podcast.
Self love and radical self acceptance are key. Remember that you are worthy and deserving of support and love and kindness when it comes to your mental health. All of this is about getting prepared and giving yourself compassion. Sometimes it can feel like we are alone so make sure to use all the resources you have access to to remind yourself that you’re not alone. Crisis lines, warm lines, and therapists are great tools to use when you are struggling with this. But so are books by those who have come through hard times and found self love.
First We Make The Beast Beautiful by Sarah Wilson
It’s Not Ok To Feel Blue and Other Lies curated by Scarlett Curtis
For more in depth discussion around these topics, head on over to http://bit.ly/TOSKItunes and listen to our latest podcast episode!