 Hello and welcome back. The focus for today's video is people who are a parent, a carer, partner of someone who is struggling with their mental health. So you may well have come looking for how you can help someone but actually today's video is about looking after you. When you have someone in your life, a loved one of some kind who is struggling with their mental health it's really really hard and we do all that we can to support but sometimes we need to stop and we need to recognise that sometimes the best way of supporting the person we care about is to stop and think first about how to support ourselves. So it's a really trite and overused analogy about putting on our own oxygen mask first but you know when you get on a plane they always say put your own oxygen mask on before helping others and it is so true in life as well as on a plane. Do do it on the plane. So we can't continue to help the person that we care for if we allow our own physical and mental health to be kind of worn down and down and down by the toll of caring. Putting our own health first doesn't mean that we don't care about the person whether it's our child, our partner, a friend. It doesn't mean we don't care about them. Actually it can be a really kind of good way of thinking that we do care about them long term and we're in this for the long haul because we can kind of keep on running on empty for so long but that can't happen over the longer term but if we're going to make a commitment to really doing the best that we can to support this other person then we need to think about how to keep ourselves well in that kind of medium to long term too. So yeah it's important to put our own health first partly because then you're in a good position to support and care for the other person. Partly because actually you matter as well. Sometimes when we're caring for someone else then we can completely lose sight of the fact that we are an individual ourselves too and yeah we lose who we are, we kind of lose a lot of our identity and this can be true whether you're caring for someone because of a mental health need or a physical health need actually as well and we kind of yeah we become a carer and that becomes the thing by which we identify. It can happen too if parents of young children like your whole identity becomes so-and-so's mom or dad and it's important that we kind of retain our sense of self and the other thing finally there is that when we look after our own kind of physical and mental well-being then actually we're also role-modelling really positive behaviors that the person that we care for would in the longer term hopefully learn from and reflect back to us as well. Also really good role-modelling for other if you've got other children for example if they're siblings it's good role modeling for them too. So yeah just a reminder really that it's okay to look after yourself it's important that you do that you should be thinking about you know your basics have your basics in place try and be getting adequate and good sleep try and be eating healthily and try and be getting some exercise and and just also be getting some downtime time that's just for you. It is okay to take time out from being a carer it's okay to have fun it's okay to laugh it's okay to smile it's okay to want time away from the person that you're caring for even if things are really desperate and you feel like you know things are really really difficult for them you being there 24-7 or even if you can't be there 24-7 but they're on your mind 24-7 it's not really helping them actually you being able to switch off and being able to take some time out can help them more gives you energy refills your batteries so yeah you're allowed to take out time you're allowed to laugh have fun even if the person you care for is you know they might be really poorly in hospital for example but it's okay go have fun it's also okay to feel angry upset disenchanted thinking this is not what I signed up for if you find yourself in this situation maybe you are the partner of someone so you might be like my poor long-suffering husband who for the record has been amazing who you know thinks that they are marrying someone who's relatively you know sound and then over the years things change and you find yourself you know at some point kind of back and forth to hospital with someone who is at death's door with anorexia probably not what you thought you were signing up for you know that whole till death to us park laws didn't really think we test that out in our 30s but yeah it's okay to feel disenchanted about that it's okay to feel angry about it it's okay to feel upset either because of the role that you're playing or because of what you're seeing happening to the person you care about it's also okay to feel those things as a parent as a friend as a you know colleague and it's okay to have all these difficult feelings and it's a lot more healthy to allow yourself to kind of let those feelings kind of pass through and if you need to to really kind of talk about them explore them if you know you might find that it's helpful to find like-minded others so for example if you have a significant other in your life who is suffering from a particular issue and then you might find that things like parents forums or carers forums that you'll find online or actual face-to-face groups can be really helpful finding other people who are going through similar things can really help and again that's not just true for mental health issues also true for things like if you're caring if you've a loved one who has cancer for example there are groups that if you've got a child that has a particular special need it can really help to find others who have already walked this path or who are walking it at the same time you'll find that you might identify with them it feels less lonely and you can troubleshoot together and then think if there is a need for you to have any professional input or support so it's not uncommon for our own mental health to take a hit if we are doing lots and lots of caring and supporting for someone else particularly if that's over a long period of time so if you are you know you've got sort of symptoms or concerns that are happening over a long period so these are in yourself then you know think about whether you need to visit the GP think about whether it might be helpful to have some counseling for example or if you just need to identify time to kind of sit down and have a really good friend chat with a friend or a partner or someone else who kind of really gets you it can really really help to talk whether you do that with someone that you know or you do it with a paid for professional or through the National Health Service or similar and it can really help to talk and you shouldn't feel any guilt about investing that time and money if it takes money into yourself again you are putting yourself in the best possible position to support the person you care for a final thing is that if you have a significant other in your life who you're caring for try and just have a think about how that might be impacting on other significant others in your life too and whether you need to or can take time out to be with them in an uncomplicated way to so a classic example here is if there is if you're a parent and you have a child who has a particular issue and that's taking up a lot of your time think about the siblings can you go and have a really fun day out with them can you spend one on one time with them or time without the sibling who is getting a lot of the attention here think about the needs of your other children too ditto you might find that you neglect your partner at these kind of times so yeah just have a think about have a think about the other significant others in your life and what you might do to support them that might make you feel a bit guilty if you're just listening to this now and thinking oh gosh have I neglected my other children or partner for example and it's not meant to make you feel guilt actually it's more of a permission to say look you might have this significant thing going on in your life and it's really absorbing a lot of your time effort and energy and actually it's okay to take time out and have some fun times with other people it's really important to have that downtime and really nice to connect with others too and also taking that take kind of step back and remembering things that we enjoy outside of this kind of tunnel that we might be in can really help to give a bit of a sense of perspective and can again also really help us to stay motivated and supportive and calm and focused and all those things that can be so helpful if you are someone who is caring for someone who has a mental or physical health issue thank you as someone who's had a lot of care bestowed upon me over many years now from lots of significant others in my life and yeah some special friends and in particular my husband then yeah thank you it's a really big deal what you do matters you probably feel like you don't get it right all the time you probably don't get it right all the time that's okay just do the best you can and make sure that you look after you because you matter okay I hope that's helpful do like if you have ideas or you've got good forums you'd like to refer other people to or anything like that leave them in a comment down below if you found it helpful give it a thumbs up and if you'd like to see my other videos in future then hit subscribe yeah and hopefully see you again thank you bye