Mental Health Awareness Week 17 – Acknowledging My Own Feelings From A Past Experience

If you don’t already know, this week is also Mental Health Awareness Week 17. Inspired by the many articles, personal stories and endless sharing about the topic via social media I have decided to speak up about my own feelings of a past experience.

Now without going into great detail about my own situation (it’s not something I’ve shared with many people at all) I finally recognised that I perhaps needed to speak to my GP regarding the possibility of having counselling in order to come to terms with a situation that happened over a decade ago.

You see the feelings of anger, being let down and the strong resentment I hold that has purposely been pushed to the very back of my mind in a failed attempt to ‘deal with what happened‘ has, in all honesty been building up like a pressure cooker over the years.

Those same feeling has slowly began to resurface since the arrival of my Son 14.5 months ago and again after a recent fallout with my younger sibling.

Becoming a Mother has, without a doubt made me a better person BUT in order to be the BEST Mother I can be to little Eco, I finally recognise that I have to confront that experience head on by giving myself the option to openly speak about it via counselling sessions, to a complete stranger where there is no conflict of interest about the situation, together managing the feelings of anger and rage that has been manifesting inside of me.

The past experience I reference to has in short caused me to be estranged from my family and whilst I am ok and at peace with with that, it is the feelings that I feel from time to time that I need help in managing.

I recognise that it is not healthy to keep such negative feelings inside and for once in my my life I am going to focus on me and try to overcome that experience as opposed to trying to be there for everyone else.

I have already had my appointment with the GP who agreed that counselling is the best option for me as opposed to putting me on anti depressants.

I have also had my initial consultation with my local counselling service and am currently on the waiting list for my first session.

I acknowledge that talking about it in depth won’t be easy, in fact it will be the hardest thing I have ever had to do!

I’ll admit to being somewhat anxious about the sessions as I will no doubt have to relive some things I’d rather not talk about at all BUT in order to finally be FREE of the massive weight on my shoulders that I have been carrying around by myself over the years, by doing having a safe place to talk about my problems will be the first steps towards the healing process and for me to no longer carry these feelings around with me.

Whilst I refuse to publicly discuss my experience (it’s really none of anyone’s business), I honestly hope that I have, in some small way via this very raw article, displayed that it is indeed OK to ask for help, to admit that you may be struggling and to acknowledge my feelings before they have the chance of spiralling out of control. Remember…

Mental Health Affects Us All!!!

With that said I would ask you beautiful readers and followers to do just one thing this week…

CHECK IN on that friend or family member that has strangely disappeared from your circle.

TALK to someone (anyone!) if you’re feeling low or depressed and never assume someone is OK because they appear fine on the surface.

Lastly. Let’s keep talking about this subject long after Mental Health Awareness Week 17 so we can collectively help break the stigma’s often associated with people who are suffering with Metal Health issues!