 Today is the start of Mental Health Week here on DCU and Helina would you mind going through what does mental health week mean here on DCU and what are some of the things that happen? Oh well I suppose mental health week gives us a time just to step back and focus on how we're doing as students as well as staff I think on how we're doing from the point of view of our well-being and how we're dealing with challenges and difficulties that we would normally be encountering especially at this time of year where you know a lot of work is beginning to present itself and we're kind of right into the heart of social activities and if challenges were to arise they'd normally be starting to arise now and so mental health week is an opportunity to step back and there's various activities including this conversation that we're having today just to reflect on how we're doing is there a few things that could help us to do a little bit better and how can we support each other? Super and as you said there are a lot of things coming up people are coming to exam time Christmas is often a stressful period for some people and the most important thing we'll probably do today is promote the various resources and services we have here on DCU for students so if you would mind telling us just a few of the resources and supports that are available here on DCU. So we have a number of resources Shane so for some people they would like to go online and we have the counseling and personal development service in DCU has partnered with an international global community called Together All and all DCU students undergrad and post grad can access Together All at any time so it's available 24 seven three six five days a year and what is good about that is that it's anonymous so a press and it's moderated properly it's linked in with the counseling service so we have a communication with people so it's safe and people can access courses for example how am I doing on my sleep how am I doing on assertiveness how am I doing on anxiety they've also got a small group conversations that people can opt in and out of and it's really a peer-supported group online so for some students that can be really helpful we've also talking about resources Shane have a mental health tile on loop called develop and if you go into the mental health tile we have a number of online CBT which is cognitive behavioral therapy programs on a range of well-being and mental health issues such as for example feeling low feeling panic feeling gosh I'm not really doing as well as I might so you can have a wee look in there and that's free to all students so these are things that are available on on loop there's also mindfulness podcast etc now that's you have to give a range of supports for people because how would suit with one person might ensues another and other people of course will access the counseling and personal development service if they want face-to-face or online counseling support or indeed with the health center to come and talk with Gertrude here or to talk with a GP within the health service so they're a range of some of the activities and then also we also have a few events on my events hope like you'd said that kind of help students deal with the stress and have some skills to kind of work with it in that moment as well yes that's very good the the workshops are excellent to Gertrude yeah so and they're available every week so people can pop in and pop out so to speak accordingly no it's great to hear about all those events going on across campus and especially having it still available to post grads is amazing I didn't know about that beforehand and so as we said there's so many so much support available across DCU but to people who think maybe going in for a face-to-face counting service might be a step too far and or just not right for them at the moment what sort of coping mechanisms can they use by themselves to get over these feelings of stress or anxiety at the moment so I work as I mentioned in those workshops that I would hold weekly and on Glass-Levin campus and St. Patrick's campus and they're kind of the base of them is from the CBT which is the cognitive behavior therapy they looked at 20 skills to kind of help people who are struggling just with their emotions with the stresses of life and some skills to kind of manage that distress right so a few of the skills that maybe I would bring up quite a bit and kind of encourage everybody to kind of use at different points in their day in their lives would be one the stop skill which kind of looks at stopping taking a breath ask yourself a series of questions of what's going on for you what's coming up how are you feeling this moment and then the next one would be to just observe if you took like a wide-eyed view on it what would have been like what what is going on what are you thinking about it what somebody else say even and then it looks at like pulling back and giving some perspective saying okay if this was to happen in a few months would I how would I feel about it and kind of giving it a bit of some context and then it's just practicing that skill so that's one of the skills called the stop skills very good in that in the moment when you're having that distress when things are just feeling a bit too much you just need a moment to just process what's going on for me right now so I always encourage people to use that in the moment especially when things are just feeling quite overwhelming in that moment and another skill I would always use is sued and it looks at having like a bit of a self-care box for yourself and whether that is taking a bath going for a walk meeting your friends listening to music or even just doing your favorite thing again it could be a lovely movie from when you're younger anything like that so it kind of would kind of work together to kind of create your own little self-care box to be like okay what usually works when things go wrong and people find that really helpful especially when they're very hard on themselves so yeah that's a really nice one to have and sometimes students might not be aware of the support that's available to them or simply aren't ready to take that first step or feel like they're not able why do you think asking for support is so difficult oh that's a great question yeah I think a lot of us at times can feel a little shy about asking for support and sometimes it can be just embarrassing because we feel sometimes we should be just getting on with it and what's the problem everybody else seems to be getting on with it and sometimes I can make it even worse but actually none of us are islands human beings we can't leave as an island so it's quite normal to ask for help and support is actually a healthy thing it's not a sign of weakness it's the opposite actually but sometimes because we can identify with being oh we should be kind of super independent shoulders back march forward which is great but it's not the whole story and sometimes just helping hand by somebody that you can trust that will have your back and that could be a friend a trusted friend or it could be a wise person in your family or extended family or in your community or it could be a professional service here in DCU be at the health center be at the disability service be at the counseling and personal development center being the student advice center depending on what the issue is and Gertrude working in the health center you get a chance to talk to some of these students and help them in what they're going through what are some of the more common issues that you see time and time again so I think the biggest one would probably be low mood anxiety stress with the exams which probably hits most people but maybe for some people it's a lot more difficult um yeah those would be the biggest ones yeah absolutely and what are some of the usual tips you do for that you would give out for people who just have a low mood they might not be at serious levels yet of anxiety but just any sort of low mood how would you help them again I think I always go back to these decided skills I think they're just fabulous to just help people kind of manage extreme distress or lower forms of distress so I think you'll come back again to again like Helena said reaching out to your supports again they might not always be able to fix the problem but they can at least be there for you at that time again watch movies together go for a meal build some positive experiences I think those ones would be the biggest ones to kind of care for yourself as well that's great I really agree with what Gertrude is saying and it's supposed to add to that too would be sometimes we feel low when we come into a challenge or a difficulty and when we come into that difficulty sometimes a little what's called an edge figure in us can come up and they'll give you all the reasons why you can't negotiate this new unknown terrain so it could be that CA or it could be talking to that girl or it could be dealing with a conflict that happened whatever the case may be but if we actually back off from it while in the short run it can make us feel relief in the long run we don't feel very well and if we do that a few times we actually are not satisfied with ourselves so the thing is when it comes to the challenge situations or the difficulty it is wiser to try to support ourselves to lean into the difficulty that could be like breaking it down into small steps it could be doing it with a friend it could be getting advice but the more you lean into it and take steps over and build a bridge over into that unknown uncomfortable place ironically your self-esteem our self-esteem improves and though even though we might feel a certain level of anxiety about it and we definitely will because that's normal a certain level of stress and anxiety is normal and you're going to feel it at the edge and we all as human beings have many edges but that's the place of potential growth for all of us so when we come to low mood the more you kind of flee away from it if you do that too often you're going to not feel well and the person is going to feel deflated and they will actually feel low in themselves so the trick is is to recognize even those those edge uncomfortable places would be God why would anybody want to go near anything so difficult it actually has the diamond in the gold in the in the bucket if you can lean into it as opposed to avoid it yeah that's very important for everyone who's listening i'm sure most people watching this right now are students and that advice of trying not to ignore these feelings that you are feeling and will be very important coming up to these more stressful times don't try and run away from it and i guess talking specifically about counseling actually Helena and for people who don't know anything about the counseling service could you describe for students who aren't aware how do you go about availing of that or how do you go about booking a session okay okay so first of all you can come on to our website which is dcu.ie forward slash counseling and you'll get a fairly good idea there on how the service operates but it's fairly straightforward if you'd like to make an appointment you email counseling at dcu.ie or you email um spd dot counseling at dcu.ie for synpats so we have rooms in glasnevin and we've room in synpats and then uh nina or kathryn are two service administrators for the counseling service and they will help the student to register with us and then you and organize the first appointment i suppose the most fundamental thing to say is that the counseling service is confidential so that's really important in that anything that is discussed between a student and a counselor is confidential and stays that way and the only time where we would discuss that with a student if somebody was seriously at risk and that would make sense and then it is informal it is a conversation it's trying to you know get to know the person and they to get to know us because we're obviously new to a student even though any given year we have people who return to us you know so you could have in a given year you could have somebody who came to us when they were in first year and now they've just gone into their first year phd program and they come back you know which is lovely to see um so it's it's rolling in that way and then we're trying to figure out okay what's the problem how can we unfold and unravel that and what would best support the person and that's basically the aim of it but it's very collaborative and it's non-judgmental in its approach it's not saying something is good or something is bad it's just something is not going as well as the person might like it to be and let's see what we can do about it and Gertrude I know as students particularly people who have moved up here they can be feeling kind of lonely and kind of separated from home how do you deal with those feelings of kind of being somewhere new particularly talking to the first years now at the moment how did they deal with that kind of feeling of being separated from being home it's a really difficult emotion to have isn't it you go from having your support having your family having all the people you know to joining this whole new environment that you don't know anybody like you said very isolated I think the biggest thing you can do is be kind to yourself that you know this is difficult that this is hard again it's very difficult don't want to take away from that all it is hard but like Kenina said step into that a little bit try and reach out for supports join society talk to your to a girl or anybody right beside you and just say how are you try and make those connections little by little and be patient with yourself to make those connections because I think it's quite hard sometimes to not make instant friendships straight away but that overturn that it will and just to keep trying and another question I wanted to ask you particularly again for those students who have found themselves away from home for the first time that connection between physical health and mental health I know myself I found myself scrolling through link and just eat and uber eats way too often how important is your physical health to your mental health oh that's a big one everything's connected right if you're not eating while sleeping well looking after yourself even you've seen us going for a little walk as well if you're not doing all those little things it's going to make you feel low you're gonna if you're feeling isolated and you're kind of cooped up in your room thinking about it over and over again feeling a bit more overwhelmed it becomes so much more narrow right but when you kind of get out go for a walk your perspective part of that stop skill is give some perspective when you go for a walk you're kind of getting a bit more of like a wider view of like okay you see people laughing talking okay you can bring up some sad feelings as well but they can also bring up some hope of like okay well maybe this will happen for me soon and again that's really great and following what Gertrude is saying is that we have what's called a window of tolerance inside us and it's a margin of ability or space and when we don't exercise eat or look after some of the basic physical aspects for ourselves that window gets very narrow and if that window gets very narrow we're more inclined to get overwhelmed so one of the best things is to try to keep that window as wide as possible even when you're feeling low because the last thing you'll want to do is move when you're feeling low but even if you can just walk around the block in small steps and build that little bit not too much because that will feel like too much and a person will close down sharp and not want to do anything so the thing is doing a little and that will start to improve and build and widen that window of tolerance inside super and we've talked today a lot about the different supports and facilities different tips for people but if you could Helena and say one final thing to anyone watching right now that is a need of some help what would you say wow that's a big one what would I say well that's going to vary from moment to moment but one thing I will say right at this moment is when we were out for a walk just a short walk a few you know a half an hour ago myself and Gertrude were having a giggle about something and we passed to staff members and they were saying oh laughing here laughing because you're not serious and I just thought it was sweet and we just said oh yeah this is us we're having another laugh so I'm not trying to belittle anybody's feeling of feeling overwhelmed but there is a lot of wisdom in having a bit of a giggle and a bit of a laugh now and again of course your question you know you have many answers at different times but right now that's true for me super and I guess to finish off how do people get in contact with yourself at the health center so if you look up a DCU health center or come up underneath that you can book an appointment as well so if you book through the health center and you just say mental health nurse it'll come up and I'll see it and I'll get in contact to make an appointment and yourself Alina yeah so you can call in either to the counseling and personal development service which is on the Glasnevin campus in the Henry Gratton building on the ground floor just opposite the student advice center or you can email counseling at dcu.ie and in St. Pat's it's in the a block it's just near the church and it's also in the health center or it's spd.cancelingatdcu.ie Super thanks everybody thanks for joining me today thanks everybody for watching I would strongly recommend looking up all the different health week services and events that are going on you can check them out on loop you can also check them out over on the DCU student union Instagram page and if anyone feels like getting in contact with the two emails there and also the DCU media production society Instagram page send us a text we can refer you on and thank you all very much for watching