Deciding on whether or not to talk with children about your mental health issues is a personal choice. We all want the best for our children, and you might worry about the impact this conversation could have on your child. The truth is, being real about mental health issues and showing your children a range of emotions can have benefits for both you and your child.

Mania involves unusually happy or irritable mood, racing thoughts, and intense energy, causing difficulty in a person's life. It can be really distressing for the person experiencing it as well as the people supporting them.

If you are supporting someone who is having symptoms of mania or hypomania here are some ways to assist them (and yourself).

Returning to the office has been a hot topic for the last number of weeks and is something that’s been met with a mixture of excitement and anxiety. For those of us who have worked from home for the best part of a year, we should be jumping for joy that we can finally get back to a routine right? Not necessarily.

Since March 2020, we’ve made our own ‘new’ routines, new rituals, new ways of working. We’ve become comfortable and accustomed to our makeshift home offices and we may have yet to meet some new colleagues off a screen and in 3D!

If you experience anxiety, know that you’re not alone. It’s human to feel anxious at times, and especially during times of change and uncertainty. Whether you’re dealing with more anxiety than usual, or are managing an anxiety disorder, let’s talk about some simple tools and strategies to help you cope. 

Life can feel pretty wonky right now. The world was already somewhat unpredictable and chaotic, without the presence of a global pandemic. Now in 2020, our day to day lives resemble a cringey episode of a poorly written teen series, possibly called “The Virus”, starring …well you.

You’ve probably heard the phrase “be kind to yourself.” Perhaps when you were going through a tough time or someone heard you being especially hard on yourself. But what does it actually mean? Having a bubble bath? Gagging that self-critical voice? For those who find this concept a bit mysterious, we’ll talk through how to put self-compassion into practice. 

As we face a global pandemic, an imminent winter, and the jarring realisation that Jacinda Ardern will never be our prime minister (😢) it can be hard to figure out which of our emotions are circumstantial, and which are symptoms of something more concerning.

The dumpster fire that is the COVID-19 lockdowns has been hard on all of us – for so many reasons. But after the initial shock of being ‘locked down’ becomes our ‘new normal’, some of us might find that the easing restrictions feel like a whole new thing to be afraid of.

Sometimes the people in our lives managing complex mental health challenges go through some really tough stuff.

This blog article is provided by the team at Arafmi Ltd. Arafmi are a not-for-profit community organisation that has been providing quality services to people with mental illness, their families, carers and volunteers in Queensland for over 40 years. During COVID-19 they’re right there alongside family, friends and carers of people with complex mental health issues and today they’re sharing their insights from the front line.