Mental Health Awareness Week – Thinking Ahead

My name is David, I work as a Team Leader at Thinking Ahead. My role involves supporting our therapists to help them be able to do their job to the best of their ability.

What is Mental Health and Wellbeing?

It is said that on average 1 in every 4 people are impacted by mental health difficulties in any given year. I have always believed that number to be higher as most of us experience stress or pressures on a regular basis whether that be demands at work, difficulties in our home life or financial concerns.

During this time of the COVID-19 pandemic it is likely that a greater number of people are experiencing an impact to their wellbeing as we are less able to do the routine things we used to do which may have helped, such a seeing family and friends, going to the gym or going to the cinema.

What can mental health and wellbeing difficulties look like?

Mental health difficulties can manifest in many ways. We may experience low mood and depression, with isolating ourselves and experiencing self-critical thoughts. It may display more in terms of anxiety with feeling on edge, worrying about different things like our health or worrying about all kinds of things. We may notice is more with how it impacts physical health, you may find that your sleep is deeply affected or that your energy levels are very low or that you are having panic attacks. You could experience any mix of these symptoms.

Support at Thinking Ahead

Thinking Ahead can support people experiencing mild to moderate difficulties around their mental health. We offer a range of treatments such as practical support around accessing housing, debt and benefits advise through our Getting Help part of the pathway.

We offer therapy support through Counselling, CBT, Low intensity CBT therapy, EMDR and Psychology.

We would usually start by offering you an assessment appointment, this allows us to develop an understanding of what is happening for you and for us to jointly consider what type of treatment is most likely to help you at this time.

Accessing Self Help

Northumberland Self Help
https://web.ntw.nhs.uk/selfhelp/

These are CBT-based self help guides on a variety of topics, such as; Depression, Panic, OCD, Bereavement.

Mental Health Foundation
https://www.mentalhealth.org.uk/coronavirus

This website offers some great advice around looking after your Mental Health during the Coronavirus pandemic.

To find out more about Thinking Ahead, visit www.thebiglifegroup.com/thinkingahead.