Recovery seems to frequently be thwarted by the ‘do it tomorrow’s. It’s easy to get into a rut of thinking that you can put off the challenge and making changes for another day. I guess it’s like a lot of things in life where we just allow ourselves one last day of perhaps doing the wrong thing with the ideals of making new change in the near future. The problem with putting it off until tomorrow, especially when it comes to mental health recovery, is that tomorrow may well never come. Often, the longer you leave it, the more challenging it can be to actually make the changes you need to move on from your illness. Of course it’s not as simple as ‘just getting on with it’ and this type of thi

I started planning moving away to university months before it happened. After sixth form, I took a gap year, so by the spring before I went to uni, I knew for certain which university I would be going to and what I would be studying. My birthday is in March and I'd asked for 'bits for uni'. Mum and I spent the day in York shopping for bedding, pans, and decorative bits and bobs. I remember it as such a lovely day; proper mum-and-daughter time. It was filled with excitement of new adventures to come. She'd just been given the cancer 'all-clear', and things were really looking up. When the time come to move to uni, my whole family came (it was a bit of an event). Mum had bought me a big tub of

When Naomi was in her second year at uni, her Mum was diagnosed with terminal cancer. Before long, her uni life went on hold and becoming a young carer took over. I remember the day Mum stopped being able to walk. I had to help her from her bed to her chair and wheel her to the bathroom. She could still wash herself at that point and once she’d finished I wheeled her back, found her medication and fixed her some lunch. I remember it so clearly because it was the last time I had some quality time alone with her. I didn’t know that I was a carer until I’d been caring for over a year. Mum was diagnosed with terminal cancer during my second term of university. She died at the start of my fina

Hello my name is Amy, I am 24 years old and live in Scotland. I have Developmental Dyspraxia. I lost my mum in 2000 when I was 8 years old and my dad in 2010 when I was nearly 19. I work in my local Tesco store. I am also an Open University student currently on my fourth course of my degree. I am the Chair of Board of Directors of The Usual Place, a community café giving young people with additional support needs the opportunity to get training and work experience in the hospitality and retail industry. As well as being on the Board of Directors of DG Voice. My Bullying Experience... I first remember being bullied when I was in Primary Four, aged 8 and not long after my mum had died. At tha

If I could share some wisdom with my younger self, I think it would be the following: Times will get hard, but you will get through them One day you will find a place where you feel truly accepted for who you are One day you will begin to learn to love yourself and accept all that real acceptance encompasses I was a fairly average teenager, with average problems... but growing up has taught me a lot which would have made my awkward teenage years a lot more manageable! One in ten suicides in the UK are by young people aged 15-25 and research completed by LSE in 2012 found that 59% of young people interviewed had researched suicide online. The statistics are worrying but they only touch the su

2015 – A year which was full of up and downs, I put my school life behind me and it was all about college and getting the relevant results I needed to go on to do whatever I wanted to do when I am older. I feel that 2015 has treated me well, with all of the things I had the opportunity to do, it created memories which I hope to never forget. Last year, I was at the front of one of the UK’s largest festivals, I saw my favourite band perform live in front of me, and I touched the main singer which I went crazy over. I was on TV when they done a broadcast for the headlining act, I saw myself on the videos just temporarily forgetting about the world around me and just enjoying myself, singing an

I was recently tagged on Instagram to post twenty facts about me that highlight me as a whole holistic being rather than just a mental illness. It really struck me as something important that perhaps we could all benefit from. Day to day, we all fit in with the lives we ought to be leading… the roles we have; which isn’t a bad thing of course! But how often do we stop and take stock of the whole person we are and really give ourselves a bit of a pat on the back for some of our achievements. Mental illness can shut you off within a bubble of appointments, working to recover, speaking to others who are unwell or even just fulfilling a role of a sick person or a recovering person. No wonder it’