I realized a little while ago (after struggling with mental illness for almost 30 years) that my approach needs to be positive, not negative.
I don’t mean positive thinking or any of that shit. I mean, if you’re mentally ill, you often frame management as “an absence of symptoms.” Which is great, if you’re talking about acne or a torn ACL or chicken pox. But if your mental illness is as pervasive as mine (anxiety with obsessional features), striving to eliminate every single symptom so that you can be “normal” is a fool’s errand. And I used to get worked up about it. One of my future in-laws likes to comment on my knee bouncing, and it wrecked my self-confidence whenever we were over at their house. “Nervous tic?” she’d ask, in front of everyone.
My current therapist is great. When I talk to her about eliminating a certain habit or tic that I have, she asks me if that tic is interfering with me living the life I want. If the answer is “yes,” then we work on eliminating it. If the answer is “no,” then we leave it be. My anxiety makes it impossible for me to go to Disneyworld. But I don’t want to go to Disneyworld, so there’s no reason for me to worry about it. I could spend all of my time trying to control all of my rituals and tics. I could exert all of my energy into social situations and “pushing my limits,” but all that is going to do is make me miserable.
Let’s reframe health as “capable of living the best life you can.”
Tag: ocd
opulentes:
ABUSE
Information
- Love Is Respect (Digital Abuse)
- Love Is Respect (Emotional/Verbal Abuse)
- Love Is Respect (Financial Abuse)
- Love Is Respect (Physical Abuse)
- Love Is Respect (Sexual Abuse)
- Love Is Respect (Stalking)
- Help Guide
Coping
- Caring for yourself
- Domestic abuse
Chat Rooms
- Survivors Chat
- Fort Refuge
- Pandy’s
ADD/ADHD
Information
- Help Guide
- Attention Span Test
- Attention Quiz
- Concentration Quiz
Coping
- Coping Tips for Attention Deficit Disorder
- 12 Best Tips for Coping with ADHD
- 50 Tips On The Management of Adult Attention Deficit
Medication
- ADHD Medication Chart: Compare Drugs for ADD and ADHD
- Drugs Used to Treat ADHD/ADD
- ADD/ADHD Medications: Are ADHD Drugs Right for You
- ADHD Medication Side Effects, Drug Types, Precautions
ADDICTION
Information
- Help Guide (Alcohol & Drugs)
- Half of Us (Alcohol & Drugs)
Coping and Recovery
- Tools of Recovery: Addiction Coping Skills
- 5 Ways to Deal With Urges and Cravings
- After Rehab: 5 Ways for Addicts to Cope
- Addiction Recovery
- Coping With Urges
- Dealing With Cravings
ANGER
Coping
- strategies to keep anger at bay
- Anger management: 10 tips to tame your temper
- Anger Management: Tips and Techniques
- Feeling Angry
- Controlling Anger — Before It Controls You
- Dealing With Anger
- How To Cope With Anger
- Anger management: What works and what doesn’t
- Ten Commandments of Anger Regulation
ANXIETY
Information
- Anxiety Quiz
- Social Anxiety Test
- What are your stress triggers?
- Coping Skills Quiz
- Anxiety disorders explained
- Help Guide (Anxiety Attacks & Anxiety Disorder)
- Understanding and managing anxiety
- learn more about anxiety
- Anxiety Self-Assessment
- Help Guide (General Anxiety Disorder)
- Help Guide (Social Anxiety Disorder & Social Phobia)
- Explanation of anxiety and self help tips
Coping
- a list of stress relievers
- Identifying and Managing Anxiety
- 11 Assorted Anxiety Tips for Anxiety Sufferers
- How to work through feelings of isolation
- Tips and tricks for dealing with anxiety
- Anti-stress breathing tips
- How to stay under control with severe social anxiety
- Coping with social anxiety
- Managing Stress
- how to help a friend with anxiety
- Help Guide (Therapy)
- Half of Us
- Job interviews and social anxiety
- Dealing with anxiety
- Coping with test anxiety
- Tips for flying anxiety
- Grounding techniques
- More grounding techniques
- Even more grounding techniques
- Mindfulness
- Belly breathing
- Living with anxiety
- Social anxiety disorder self help tips.
- Coping with flashbacks
- What anxious racing thoughts are like for me
- Using a thought diary
Panic Attacks
- How to handle panic attacks
- Exploring and coping with panic attacks
- 10 Rules for Coping with Anxiety and Panic
- Tips to cope with panic attacks
- Rules for coping with anxiety and panic
- Understanding and coping with panic attacks
- Understanding and helping panic attacks and panic disorders
- Help Guide (Panic Attacks & Panic Disorder)
- Coping with panic attacks workbook
- Rules for coping with panic
- Panic attack workbook 2
Interactives
- Emotional baggage check
- The Dawn Room
- The quiet place
- The thoughts room
- Stress Analyst
- cloudflowing
- imagination
- planetarium
- weavesilk
- calm
- make sand art online
- lifeinneon
- dolldivine
- barcinski-jeanjean
- rainymood
- do nothing for 2 minutes
- stars
- Muscle Relaxation
- Mood chart
Medication
- Help Guide (Anxiety Medicine)
- Common Medications for Anxiety Disorders
- Guidelines for Medication Use
Chat Rooms
- HealthfulChat
- Phobics Awareness
- Healing Well
- Anxiety Space
BIPOLAR DISORDER
Information
- Help Guide (Signs and Symptoms)
- Half of Us
- Bipolar Depression Quiz
- hypomania
Coping
- Bipolar disorder and self-help
- Living with bipolar disorder
- How to deal with bipolar disorder without medication
- 10 ways to cope with bipolar disorder
- Coping skills
- Help Guide (Self Help)
- Bipolar Support tumblr
Medication
- Help Guide (Bipolar Disorder Medication Guide)
- Help Guide (Treatment)
Chat Rooms
- HealthfulChat
- Bipolar World
- Healing Well
DEPRESSION
Information
- depression information
- Depression Infographic
- Help Guide (Depression: Signs, Symptoms, Causes & Help)
- Help Guide (Teenage Depression: A Guide for Parents)
- Half of Us
- Depression Quiz
Coping
- How to cope with depression
- How to cope with depression 1
- Natural depression treatments
- Ways to deal with depression/stress
- Tips to help overcome loneliness
- 10 Tips on How to Work Through Feelings of Social Isolation
- 8 Tips to Overcome Loneliness
- Ways to deal with depression/stress
- having a bad day?
- Make a comfort box
- 10 Things to Do When You Feel Like Crap
- how to find a new normal in the middle of depression
- you are not alone in the way you think you are
- reasons to stay alive
- how to stop trying to think yourself into happiness and actually arrive there
- cheer me up
- Help Guide (Dealing with Depression)
- Help Guide (Helping Someone with Depression)
Medication
- What to expect with antidepressants
- Finding the right anti-depressant
Chat Room
- HealthfulChat
- Healing Well
EATING DISORDERS
Recovery
- 281 Reasons to Recover
- Eating Disorders and Emotional Eating Test
- Relapse Prevention
- Bloating, Indigestion, & Feeling too full
- Why You Must Eat
- Learning to Love Your Body
- Tips to Stop Restricting
- Dealing With Weight Gain
- 10 Steps to Bulimia Recovery Workbook
- Coping with Exercise Addiction
- Tips to help with bulimia recovery
- Help Guide (Emotional Eating)
- Help Guide (Binge Eating)
- Help Guide (Bulimia)
- Help Guide (Helping Someone With an Eating Disorder)
- Help Guide (Treatment and Recovery)
- Stop Hating Your Body
- Body Positive Zone
- Self Care 101
- self esteem
- 30 day self esteem challenge
- developing positive self esteem
- learning-to-love-yourself
- Something Fishy
- Ways of coping with eating disordered behaviors
- The addiction help center
FRIENDS WITH ILLNESS
- How to deal/talk with bipolar and depressed people
- What to do when your friend is talking about suicide
- What to do if someone you know is overdosing
- What to do if your friend is hurting themselves
- How to help someone who is suicidal
- here’s what you tell someone who wants to commit suicide
- tips for looking after someone with depression
- Friends with metal illness?
- What to do when someone is suicidal
- Help Guide (Helping Someone with Depression)
GENERAL RESOURCES
- Feelings Wheel
- PsychForums
- Psych Central
- Lets Recover Together
- How to find a Support Group
- DailyStrength
GRIEF AND LOSS
- Help Guide (Coping with a Breakup or Divorce)
- Help Guide (Coping with Grief & Loss)
- Help Guide (Coping with Pet Loss)
- Help Guide (Supporting a Grieving Person)
- Help Guide (The Five Stages of Grief)
HOTLINES
- Crisis Text Line: Text “SUPPORT” to 741741
- Crisis Call Center Call 1-800-273-8255 (24/7) Text ANSWER to 839863 (24/7)
- Thursday’s Child Call 1-800-872-5437 (24/7)
- The Trevor Project Call 866-488-7386 (24/7)
- National Safe Place Text SAFE and your current location to the number 69866
- National Runaway Safeline Call 1-800-786-2929 (24/7)
- National Domestic Violence Hotline Call 1-800-799-7233 (24/7)
MEDITATION
- Tips to Start Meditating
- 8 Ways to Make Meditation Easy and Fun
- 18 Minute Guided Meditation: Blissful Deep Relaxation
- 1 Hour Universal Mind Meditation
- Guided Meditation for Sleep and Good Dreams
- Guided Meditation and Progressive Muscle Relaxation
- Progressive Muscle Relaxation
- Guided Relaxation
- Foundations in Flow Yoga Class
- Heart Opening 30min Yoga Class
- 10min Shoulder Yoga Routine
- 9min Yoga Breathing Exercise (Pranayama)
- Kundalini Yoga Breathing Exercises (3 min)
- Yoga Poses
OCD
Information
- Specific Symptoms of OCD
- Distinguishing OCD From Other Conditions
- The Course of Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder
- How do Obsessive Compulsive People Think?
Coping and Treatment
- Natural Treatment Options
- Treatments for Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD)
- Additional Treatment Options for OCD
- Residential Treatment for OCD
- Medications for Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD)
- A New Relationship to Your Obsessions
- How to Find Help for OCD
- OCD: Exposure Therapy Versus Medication
- Cognitive Therapy for OCD
Chat Rooms
- HealthfulChat
- OCD-UK
PERFECTIONISM
Information
- Perfectionism Resources
- Perfectionism – a double-edged sword
- Type-A Personality Quiz
- Perfectionism Test
- Procrastination Test
- Perfectionism: the road to failure
- perfectionism and procrastination
Coping
- How to Overcome Perfectionism
- LEARN TO MANAGE PERFECTIONISM
- How to Overcome Perfectionism & Procrastination
- Perfectionism – Stress Management
- 10 Steps To Conquer Perfectionism
- perfectionists coping with failure
PTSD
Information
- Help Guide (Traumatic Stress)
- Help Guide (PTSD)
- Help Guide (Emotional & Psychological Trauma)
- Mental Help
- PTSD Infographic
- Understanding PTSD
- What is PTSD?
Coping
- Coping with flashbacks
- Self Help Strategies for PTSD
- Coping with Traumatic Stress Reactions
- Post-Traumatic Stress – Self-help Guide
- Understanding and Coping with PTSD
- Coping with PTSD
SCHIZOPHRENIA
Information
- Schizophrenia: What’s in my head?
- Help Guide
- schizophrenia
- Symptoms of Schizophrenia
- Types of Schizophrenia
- Causes of Schizophrenia
Coping
- Living with Schizophrenia
- Coping With Schizophrenia
- Schizophrenia Coping and Recovery
- Schizophrenia: Coping with Delusions and Hallucinations
- Paranoid schizophrenia Coping and support
Treatment
- An Introduction to the Treatment of Schizophrenia
- Treatment of Schizophrenia
- Drugs to Treat Schizophrenia
- Common Drugs and Medications to Treat Schizophrenia
- Treating Schizophrenia Successfully
SELF-HARM
- Cut something that’s not real skin
- Half of Us
- Help Guide
- Recover Your Life
- Self-Injury Outreach & Support
- How to care for cuts
- Resisting cutting
- 25 ways to avoid self injury and prevent self harm
- Tips to help stop cutting
- 99 Coping Skills: Things to do Instead of Cutting
- What to do when someone sees
- How to fade/cover scars
- Alternatives For Cutting 1
- Alternatives For Cutting 2
- Alternatives For Cutting 3
- Alternatives For Cutting 4
- Alternatives For Cutting 5
SELF-LOVE
- how to stop putting yourself down
- Self confidence
- how to improve your self-esteem
- How to be ok with yourself
- tips on self-love
- Confidence
- Learn to love yourself
- when told you are not pretty
- emergency compliment
- lessons for self-love
SUICIDE
- Coping with Suicidal Thought
- What to do when someone is suicidal
- How to help someone who is suicidal
- here’s what you tell someone who wants to commit suicide
- Help Guide (Suicide Prevention)
- Help Guide (Dealing with Suicidal Thoughts & Feelings)
THERAPY
- how to get free therapy
- Getting a Therapist – a brief step-by-step
- Psychiatrist, Psychologist, Therapist or Counsellor?
- 50 Signs of Good Therapy
- 50 Warning Signs of Questionable Therapy
Anxiety is not rude. Depression is not selfish. Schizophrenia is not wrong. Eating disorders are not a choice. Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder is not crazy. Mental illness isn’t self-centred, anymore than cancer is self-centred. It’s a medical illness.
(via bewilderedapprehension)
Holding the Bowl 