Mental health

[Guest elise]

If you were struggling with any kind of mental illness such as anxiety, depression, BPD ect. What sorts of things do you feel you would struggle to do the most?

What kind of help do you feel would be beneficial? Would you want some help to keep up with your hygiene? Self care? Would you feel you would need help with housework ect? 

I am wanting to help out in my local community but need ideas of things I can do to ensure I am benefitting others 

[hemogoblin]

The best things you could do would be:

A) Self-education. Read the multitude of resources out there by folks who suffer from these sorts of issues. These are disabled-specific and not just neurodivergent-specific, but I'll suggest Year of the Tiger, Disability Visibility, and Being Heumann. Learning more can't hurt, many disabled folk have comorbidity of issues like anxiety and depression, and these will give you a broad perspective to help pull and learn from. Because of the variety of neurodiversities, I don't know any books that really capture all, many, or multiple of them. Most of what I know is focused on a specific ND, and most of the resources are about autism, and most are written for people with that ND rather than for people who want to learn more or be an ally. ND acceptance is still very much working to find its footing in the world and build a platform for itself.

B) Get involved in a local (or as local as possible) community initiative/project/group for mental health rather than trying to build your own charity base without knowing what is most needed in the community. Get involved with people who know more, have experience, are already doing the work, and can guide you where appropriate. I suggest avoiding big national chain type charities because these often get too big and forget their purpose and become about making money rather than helping the community. But a local org is often working directly for and with the people of the community, as well as being run by the community. You could try asking around on local 411 groups or asking friends who might know if you're unable to find such an initiative. Your local library might even be a good place to ask for help finding someplace to volunteer, as may local mental health hospitals or even rehab/sobriety groups (but considering the problems that psychiatric health hospitals perpetuate, this will be hit or miss). Try searching for "[city] mental health community initiative" or "[city] mental health volunteer" for some options. If you're in the US, even though it's larger, NAMI isn't a bad place to start.

C) If you're asking because there's a specific person in your life you're worried about, then speak directly to them. Neurodivergencies are VAST. They can impact us in different ways with different intensities. We have so many different symptoms and struggles. There's no one size fits all answer of the different sort of supports or help we might need. And that's not even taking into account different personalities and what people might be willing to or want to accept for help.

[KoconutBounty]

my mental health is getting better but around this time last year, My mental health was not the greatest. (ie. 7-8 emotional breakdowns in 3 days)

17 hours ago, Guest elise said:

If you were struggling with any kind of mental illness such as anxiety, depression, BPD ect. What sorts of things do you feel you would struggle to do the most?

What kind of help do you feel would be beneficial? Would you want some help to keep up with your hygiene? Self care? Would you feel you would need help with housework ect? 

I am wanting to help out in my local community but need ideas of things I can do to ensure I am benefitting others 

my stupid emotional regulation. I'm horrible at it, and hope to get better. i feel like people watching their tone when talking would be helpful because I'm a major ADHD overthinker, and if I think that their mad at me i will mostly shut down and shut out. even when they mean well. sometimes i like for things to be repeated to me but only when I ask/ or genuinely forget otherwise its annoying.