Pulling yourself together regularly tops the polls as the most unhelpful thing that clients with a mental health issue such as depression can have said to them. Indeed the very premise is that they are choosing to be ill by not ‘pulling themselves together’ Often it is said by those who through ignorance or lack of empathy have not suffered or seen the devastating collapse in mood that comes with mental illness such as depression and other problems. So what’s the alternative what is the way back to health?
Perhaps, the most obvious given what has just been said is to find the right support. It is important when you are getting back to health that you have support that you can rely on. Support that is not going to judge you, support that is going to value the person that you are not someone who is going to criticize and highlight your faults.
A second practice that you should try to engage in is that of trying to engage in activities, by this I am not suggesting that you need join a club or make a huge commitment, perhaps you could commit to getting a paper each morning or going to the library once per week. The what doesn’t matter just something that you feel that you can achieve that gives that sense of success so that you get used to seeing that you can take small steps back to health.
The third practice is taking time for you; it seems in the 21st century we are bombarded by demands on our time. Children have busy social diaries, the house needs run, we need to work, if we have a partner then the relationship needs work and a myriad of other issues that seem to demand our attention on a daily basis. Yet our brain was designed for a much simpler time and despite myths about multi-tasking finds it difficult to keeping multiple things going and can become overloaded. The answer: a little downtime a little like occasionally going through your email and clearing out the junk or the non-urgent so you can concentrate on the important things.
Four, is to celebrate your successes, for we all have them. It might be something as simple as getting dressed today, it might be going for a walk despite how we feel. The big problem is that if you have a low mood you tend to have a bias towards the negative you tend to see your faults not your success, to look for them and celebrate them.
Finally, five, don’t be hard on yourself understand that you will take time to recover, you would give yourself time to recover from a broken leg so why not feeling down. You need time to change your thinking and time to work through the issues that are making you unwell. So have some compassion for yourself, ask for the help you need (professional or otherwise) and get well without the judgement of “pull yourself together”