Can people PLEASE stop saying that mental health doesn't matter?

[Pishposhpashy]

It does fucking matter. It absolutely does.

I am following ALL the government guidelines. I am isolating with my household. My DH and I are both WFH and our DS is not in nursery. I am going out for one walk a day. If I have to go out for food, that counts as my daily exercise. I keep my 2 metres distance from others. I am washing my hands frequently. If I become symptomatic, my entire household with self isolate for 14 days.

I am also 30 with no underlying health conditions. So my risk of serious illness or death if I contract Covid-19 is, statistically, low. Yes, I know that young people with no underlying health conditions have died of this. Yes, I know how serious it is. And yes, I will absolutely do exactly as I am told to do. But I have 3 suicide attempts behind me, from when my OCD was at its peak. Don't you dare tell me my mental health doesn't matter and I just have to suck it up and my physical health is more important, just because I have decided that I do not wish to sterilise all my groceries. I would rather accept the low risk of covid-19 transferring from the packaging than risk my OCD becoming that severe again.

I have seen several people on MN in recent days utterly dismiss mental health, and it just is not fucking on.

pishposh that makes perfect sense. I'm not convinced we really need to do it tbh (or that its even effective, unless you are ridiculously thorough and use a new wipe for each product, which we didn't) but DH wanted to so I just went with it. Also if you wipe the shopping but then don't wipe, I dunno, the cupboard handles for example, would that be just something else to worry about, and so on and so on until you were trying to wipe down the hamster? I started along that line of thinking yesterday and had to tell myself to stop it.

It's a slippery slope to go down so I can totally see why you wouldn't want to go there. I hope today is a good day for you

Mental Health always matters because you can't self isolate away from yourself, you are always with you

Nail on the head. If anyone feels they need to increase their meds and doesn't want to bother their GP - I decided after too many panic attacks this week i need to step up my anti depressants so i called the doctors at half 3, and i had the meds in my hand at 5. Call them. They'll help you.

I'm trying to downplay the viruses living on surfaces thing as school, well intentioned as they were, really hammered it home and one of the kids is getting very anxious about it to the point I fear OCD in the future if we don't keep the perspective on it. My other child will lecture you about germs with her finger up her nose so I'm less concerned there!

The kids are what's keeping me going during the day - very much a yes, this is tough, I'm missing going out too and it's ok to feel sad about it, let's have a hug... But first thing in the morning and last thing at night it really hits like a brick wall to have to punch through and keep going.

I've deferred a lot of my uni exams on mental health grounds now which has knocked my panic attacks down to a much more tolerable level.

Kokeshi123

Your post is everything I've been wanting to say but struggled to articulate. I think the world war comparison is also stupid because it forgets that whilst many are conscripted to fight in a war a great many also choose to fight, or to volunteer in some way. It's human nature to want to be involved, to help, to be useful at a time of crisis. Just look at how many people have signed up to the NHS volunteer service...clearly it is intolerable for many, if not most people, to be doing absolutely nothing, with no distractions.

I'm terribly worried about my own MH during this. I have really only just started to come out of my truly awful PND. My DS is 2 and a half and I've only just started to feel like I can enjoy the world again. I've worked so so hard to keep myself going and almost all of that is down to making sure we both get lots of fresh air and physical exercise. I can feel myself sliding back into a state of despair. I'd only just managed to get help and counselling and now that's on hold.
Even at his age I can see that DS is quite an anxious child (what a gift from DH and I) and even just a few days of weirdness and he's really quite teary and not sleeping too well and I can't deal with the guilt.

Anyway, hope you're feeling ok today OP.

🌸🌼🌺 for each and every one of us on the edge, in the depths, or generally trying desperately to hold ourselves up when any scaffolding has been abruptly ripped away....

I have cancer, and other health issues before that, and medical ptsd, so my anxiety and ptsd triggers have just melded into a continuous blur of frozen terror.
Which is a serious impediment as I need to scramble to organise ‘treatment in the community’. It’s not just mental health services that are being pulled overnight. Cancer services are being shut down & greatly reduced too... supposed to be sacrificing ourselves for the greater good ya know?

Personally although I like the flowers, I’m into the toadstools more (!), 🍄, toadstools please me for some reason ... but it’s very weird to say, ‘here have a potentially poisonous relative of the mushroom to cheer yourself up!’.

But I’m going to stare at that toadstool for a minute or two, really seeing it’s bright colours and tracing it’s pleasing shape with my eyes.

Being present in the Little slice of the moment.

Breathing. and trying not to escalate up to thinking about the horrors of everything else. Because I cannot do anything about the big stuff, so it won’t matter if I stop thinking about it. I’m doing all I can to sensibly avoid the scary stuff but then that’s it. Back to the mushroom. ..... 🍄

Agreed, OP. Xx

I found this interesting regarding mental health

www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/28/lockdown-living-europe-activities-coronavirus-isolation

Call them. They'll help you.

My GPs won't do a damn thing for me even though I have diagnosises of pstd, gad and attachment issues because I'm under a mental health team. I wasn't on any medication prior to this because I'd just got everything "under control". My psychiatrist has been re-deployed (ex-military and I imagine he has useful experience) and the mental health team won't do anything without his say so and neither will the GP. Unfortunately, no one is willing to track him down to get his say so. So I'm living my worst nightmare due to the cause of my ptsd (being trapped in the house) with 2 young children who are driving me insane because I can't get away from them and I'm terrified I'm becoming my own emotionally abusive parents because I can't think straight. I bounce from rage to guilt and back again. I screamed at the kids yesterday, it took every last bit of my self control to walk away before I said something unforgivable to ds who is 5. All my youngest wants to do is sit on me but I can't stand physical contact right now. It is the physical version of nails down the blackboard.

I can not live like this. Dh has hidden all the pills and the really sharp knives having discovered me contemplating washing them down with wine but we're a 2 minute walk from the sea or a 10 minute to the top of some fairly big cliffs. I have no help, no hope and I'm probably doing untold damage to my kids.

I agree with you OP. MN has long made me realise that an awful lot of people just aren't able to understand that other people have different lives and experiences from them, and experience the outwardly same situation in very different ways.

Thank you for posting this though. I have found the posters on this thread really helpful. People able to talk about the real difficulties they are facing without being screamed down.

I absolutely agree with you, OP. I am also glad to see there has been plenty of support on this thread, as there have been too many twats posting ridiculous shit on other threads.

I have a DD who has suffered severe mental health issues throughout her teenage years, which has most recently manifested itself as anorexia nervosa. She is in recovery at the moment, but I really fear for what this could do to people like her and as a result of this I am extremely on edge and tearful myself.

Of course Covid19 is a massive issue. Of course we all need to do what we can to minimise it's impact. Nobody is saying otherwise.

However, I think at this moment many people seem to think that Covid 19 is the only thing happening and the only issue that matters. Not true. Other emergencies are still happening and having to be dealt with. Mental health problems are amongst those and should not be dismissed as a non-issue.

Some people have never dealt with mental illness, either in themselves or in any of their close family. A couple of years ago I saw my then 16 year old DD on the verge of wanting to take her own life. It was only urgent clinic appointments, face to face, with a lovely counsellor which got her through.

She is now 18 and still taking ADs. At the moment her clinic appointments are being conducted over the phone. Better than nothing I suppose, and we understand why it is necessary. I do still worry though.

Mental health issues haven't simply gone away because Covid 19 is upon us.

We can all be here in support of each other.

I thought I was going to go batshit today.

I haven’t seen anyone saying that? I have seen some people complaining that services aren’t available currently.

Cherrysoup

People on here have said it to me.

no-one is saying it doesn't matter - or no-one worth bothering about.

but there's nothing else to be done except lockdown if we are not to have an apocalyptic level of deaths. Horrible but true.

mencken

And yet frequently people are belittled, bullied and scolded on here for doing things that are completely within the guidelines prescribed by the government, in order to keep their mental health strong.

@mencken you’ve just done it yourself

@Dowser I’ve gone...!! It’s been a fucking awful week

And also there is absolutely no respect or understanding for those with OCD or health anxiety, berating people for having takeaways or not bleaching their shopping, when neither of those things have been specified as high risk. I swear to god half the militant posters on MN are literally making up rules.

I think it's worse than that, OP. Not only have I seen people being berated on here for going out for a walk (as per guidelines), people are being shitty about anyone expressing that they're struggling with the lockdown. It's as if saying you're having a hard time isn't allowed, even if you're not planning on breaking the rules but just want to vent about it.

There was a thread the other day where someone who was clearly having problems, and expressed suicidal ideation, was torn apart for saying that she thought single people were having an especially hard time. She was accused of being hysterical and selfish and told to get a grip. There was a lot of competitive misery going on, people were falling over themselves to claim that they were suffering just as much but they just had to get on with it. It was truly horrible to read.

I'm having an awful time with the lockdown - every morning it feels like punching through a brick wall with a tooth pick to get up and start the day. I cope by focusing on the kids (and dh does the initial morning stuff so I can get my head together a bit better). I am normally a very well functioning person who hides their mental health issues well and I had just got into a really hopeful place with how I was feeling - to the point I was hopeful of getting off medication, sleeping well and feeling calm for the first time in years... Now I'm back to masses of panic attacks and suicidal thoughts (I wouldn't act on these - they're my brain playing with escape strategy ideas if that makes sense - but still not at all pleasant).

I have ocd too, and have been suicidal in the last fortnight.
It’s so, so hard.
My partner doesn’t quite ‘get’ it, we have been on the verge of separating a few times, it’s a lot of pressure on a relationship.

Btw, I read a lawyer on Twitter say that mental health is covered under the health clause, meaning it is a permissible reason to leave the house.

You are not allowed to feel sorry for yourself, or have to much fun.

This is all policed carefully by various MN members

For the greater good of the nation , obviously . Not because some people thrive on putting others down....

This is all policed carefully by various MN members

Yep always the same ones too.

Today has been worse for me than the working week was actually, as at least then I had the structure of work (albeit with a young child in tow) to keep me occupied.

Here’s what I’ve been doing:
Rang GP to up citalopram dose and also got v small amount of diazepam as was literally having panic attacks every 15 mins.

Now doing Paul McKenna relaxation things on YouTube every night, he’s made all his tracks free.

Was able to get a phone appt with my (private) psychologist.

Getting out for walks, though not very fast because of ds....still helps.

Have de cluttered the tiny lounge, which was doing my head in.

In reality life’ I’m a gym regular, but I haven’t felt up to exercising at home yet, it’s almost like it’s too much for my mind to handle, too much change at the moment...hoping to get something sorted and do it next week.