Did you know that 1 in 4 of us will experience mental health issues this year?

Despite how common mental health issues are, people still feel stigmatised, alone, or unsure of what to do to help. Our understanding, attitude, and willingness to have a conversation around mental health could quite literally change someone’s life. We all need to know that there is hope and there is help.

We must talk about mental health.

This will Increase support and understanding, improve relationships, aid recovery, stop the stigma surrounding mental health and breakdown the stereotypes.

Types of Mental Health Problems

There are various mental health problems, with different symptoms and diagnosis. These include amongst others:

• Anxiety and depression
• Depression
• Eating Disorders
• Phobias & Fears

 

I want to talk about depression

Depression is becoming more prevalent, especially in our busy, stressful, modern lives.  We may be more digitally connected than ever before, but more disconnected from the things that matter most being connected to ourselves and to others.

When we feel disconnected it’s like there is an empty void inside, a feeling like something’s missing. People often look for things to try to fill this emptiness with food, alcohol, drugs, or addictive behaviour. However, the only thing which can really fill the emptiness is a greater sense of meaningful connection.

It’s likely that either yourself or someone you know and care about will struggle with depression at some point in their lives. The good news is that with increased understanding and awareness, more people are opening up about their challenges and more importantly we are reaching out to help others.  No up needs to suffer in silence, help is always available.

When I went from employed to small business owner, I felt disconnected.  Going from a large corporate company to setting up my own accountancy practice, I felt lonely and that I had no one to turn to. I thought to myself what have I done? I had a great job as a Management Accountant for a fantastic company and I went from a good salary to minus overnight. But I knew running my own business was the only way for me, I had outgrown the restrictions of corporate life. My biggest fear was how will I sell my services, this caused me much anxiety and I knew I had to face my fear and do it anyway. I got out in the local area and connected with business owners. I found it became easier to build a great network around me and the feeling of being connected to owners made all the difference to how I felt. My self-esteem and confidence soared, and I was really enjoying helping my clients to make their businesses the best that they could be. 

My practice went from to strength to strength and after six years and 150 clients, I decided to sell the practice and to travel the world. I was having the gap year I had never had. During my travels I became very interested in the mind and how it works, during my google searches Marisa Peer would keep popping up, after research into Marisa’s work of 35 years I was hooked. Her work freeing people in one – three sessions from limiting beliefs, guilt they carry around from childhood, depression, anxiety, and addictions. In 2019 I started my training in Rapid Transformational Therapy and it has truly changed my life. I knew this was my true passion becoming a RTT therapist and putting a life changing therapy into the hands of as many people as possible. I topped my learning off training with Marisa Peer at London Live, an amazing experience. I love what I do, and I now have a great life full of meaning, purpose, and connection, helping others achieve the same. We can show others how to be connected, by connecting ourselves.

 

Rapid Transformational Therapy

I have helped clients to gain freedom from depression and mental health problems with Rapid Transformational Therapy, which gets to the root cause of emotional, physical, or cognitive issues. I believe that when it comes to depression, we need to change our thinking, beliefs, and behaviour to achieve lasting change in our life.

A few words from my last client Anne who came to me and had been suffering with anxiety for most of her adult life.

“I had my session over a month ago now and I am still amazed at the results. I went for anxiety-related issues and with only one session my whole world and outlook has shifted positively. I didn’t even realise that it was possible to feel this way! Marie is a very warm, calm, and professional person. She put me at ease before the session with a free 20 minute discovery call and on the day I felt totally at ease with her.  I noticed the change and how light I felt after the session the guilt I had carried around from childhood was lifted and gone.  I highly recommend her.”

Here are Marisa’s top tips when living with anxiety and depression.

• Exercise even though you really may not want to. Exercise releases endorphins which promote wellbeing and benefit our physical and mental health. You don’t have to go the gym every day, even going for a walk helps, and taking up yoga is particularly helpful. Another effective cure for depression is movement through dance or tai chi. Playing your music and singing along can also have a very powerful effect on our mood. No matter how brief, any kind of movement and exercise will help, play your favourite motivational song everyday and singalong. My song is I will Survive by Gloria Gaynor, a couple of choruses of this does the trick for me.
• Touch is very important in healing depression. Touch releases endorphins and the oxytocin so don’t become touch deprived.  Stroke pets, hug friends and family, resume sex with your partner or have a massage. Sometimes you must do the opposite of what you feel like doing to help you feel significantly better.

• Diet can play a huge part in helping alleviate depression. Avoiding caffeine and sugar are particularly important as caffeine and sugar feed anxiety. Make sure you eat well and regularly, even if you have no appetite eat small snacks Avoid all sweeteners as they can affect the brain and our moods in a very negative way. It is essential for our mental health that we eat good fats on a regular basis. Many people only eat bad fats like trans fats or saturated fats or try to avoid fat altogether. Make sure your diet has plenty of nuts and seeds, good oils like avocado, olives and oily fish or fish oil supplements.
• A different perspective can help. Talk nicely to yourself your mind responds to the words and pictures you give it. Look into the future and know that it won’t last, it is not permanent, even though that may not seem possible at the time. Talk to other people who have felt so low and felt there was no way out only to have found that they fully recovered.  Read positive examples of how people have overcome mental health issues and know it is possible for you too.

 

• Smile and change your posture to change how you feel. When you regularly take on the physiology of a happy person, even though you may have to force yourself to do it, you will begin to feel happier. The more you practice being confident and happy, the more it will become your natural and automatic state. When you smile you make serotonin, which is known as the happy hormone, and this can dramatically change how you feel.

 

• Supplement your vitamins to increase serotonin and happy hormones. A lack of vitamin B6 has been linked to depression, inertia, insomnia, and irritability. A lack of vitamin B3 and vitamin D, which is made in the skin by sunlight, has also been linked to depression. These can easily be increased by taking fish oils. B12 deficiency and low levels of Omega 3 may also be an underlying factor in depression, so make sure you eat oily fish two or three times a week and take B6, B3, B12 and Omega 3 supplements.

 

• Make sure you get outside every day as daylight and sunlight increase serotonin and is needed for vitamin D. Many night workers and shift workers can become depressed because of the lack of natural light.
• Laughter is an important antidote to depression.  Laughter releases endorphins and decreases stress hormones in the bloodstream, having a positive effect on our bodies.  Many studies have shown if you consistently watch funny films, you make different chemicals to the ones you make when you feel depressed.  In his book ‘Anatomy of an illness’, Norman Cousins detailed how he rented funny films when he was very ill with cancer and watched them frequently, crediting laughter therapy as playing an essential part in his recovery.

 

• Visualise your perfect outcome. Your mind is the most powerful tool you own. You can boost your immune system and make feel-good hormones just by changing the way you think.  Use your imagination to communicate to your body what you want it to do. At the Rainbow Children’s Hospital in Cleveland USA an experiment was done whereby children watched a puppet show of a virus puppet fighting a policeman puppet who defeated the virus. After watching the puppet show the children closed their eyes and imagined lots of policeman puppets in their own bodies fighting their own viruses. Saliva samples were taken that showed that the children’s immune systems had reacted as if they really were fighting an infection and had made proteins to defeat the infection.

 

• Do what you love. Evidence has shown that when people don’t follow their inner yearnings or do what they love, this can create depression.  When people don’t take up the career, they have a calling for, or a deep need to be involved in, this can lead to sadness, apathy, and actual illness. So much depression is down to people not doing what they want to with their lives and suffering because of it.

I worked with a client who was deeply depressed and had been for years because she had always wanted to be a lawyer but could never afford to attend law school.  When she took early retirement, she felt she had wasted her whole life. She could not get past the fact that she had missed out on working in the law. Eventually we decided that she could still do something about it and after volunteering in a legal aid centre, she did some training and became a magistrate. Finally, she was working in a court doing what she loved and loving what she did - free of depression.

Another client had always wanted to be a vet but failed his veterinary exams and was asked to leave veterinary school. Since he only wanted to work with animals, he felt lost. His depression closed in on him, so he did not see any other options.  Eventually, he trained to become an animal behaviour therapist and opened his own practice, he also worked on sets training dogs for commercials and television work and had a wonderful life that he enjoyed even more than if he had become a vet.

It's never too late

If you are depressed because you have not followed your heart’s desire it is never too late to do something about it.  Even if you can’t make it your career, you can still make it a hobby. One of my clients had never had children and was full of regret and deep sadness, but eventually she decided to sponsor two children in Africa who she visited and wrote to regularly. While this was not the same as having her own child, it did help her feel that she had children in her life and that she was making a difference to them and to herself. Don’t live a life full of regrets about what you did not do, instead do something about it.

• Therapy with the right therapist is incredibly helpful and you don’t need to spend years on a therapist’s coach.  Rapid Transformational Therapy provides dramatic life-changing results and frees clients from their issues in 1 - 3 sessions.

One of the ways in which.  Rapid Transformational Therapy gets fast and permanent results, is that it addresses the root cause and then looks at the role, function and purpose of the issue playing out.  We learn to get our minds and bodies working for us, not against us. Our mind’s primary purpose is to try to protect us and keep us safe, to prevent us being at risk or in danger. Our symptoms are usually our body’s way of communicating with that something needs addressing. I always say that understanding is power, and the understanding gained through Rapid Transformational Therapy can have the most liberating transformative power to improve lives quickly and permanently.

• Change your behaviour as well as your beliefs and thoughts.

Changing your thinking changes your feelings, but with depression it is essential that you also do some activities, because doing something that requires activity, no matter how small, can also change the depression. The way you think, act and the actions you take will change the way you feel.

 

Feelings follow behaviour, not vice versa.  Therefore, you must do what you don’t want to do to help with depression. Don’t wait until you feel better to take some action - do it now. Don’t wait for motivation or an improvement in mood before you act, take action and you will become more motivated and get an improvement in mood.

Medication has its place but doesn’t change the thought process that may have caused the depression in the first place.  I believe that to change depression you must change your thinking as well as your actions.

Learning more about mental health problems may help you understand and feel more confident in talking to others. If you yourself are feeling like you may have a mental health problem, reach out and talk to someone. You are not alone, and you do not have to suffer in silence. Knowing what you can do to help yourself, and when to seek and accept help from others, is the most empowering thing you can do.

If you would like a free informal chat please WhatsApp me on 00447789936130 or email me mariespeakman@icloud.com. My mission is to free as many people as I can. Thank you for reading.

 

It starts with you.

I am enough

Live your best life

 

Blog by: Marie Speakman

Mental Health Partner