World Mental Health Day - 10 October 2024

As well as physical wellness, it is important to look after your mental wellbeing. There are lots of different life events that can affect your mental wellbeing such as bereavement, loneliness and money worries. Mental Health can affect anyone, for no apparent reason. It is important to know how to support yourself and who to turn to for additional help.

1 in 4 people in the UK will experience a mental health illness each year. The relentless work ethic of many who undertake career paths in the outdoors often shows demonstrations of great silence where mental health is involved. This is often due to embarrassment or the sheer fact that the person does not feel they can afford to take some time to deal with the way they are feeling.

Employment can bring its own pressures to your mental health that other aspects of your life may not. Being in employment can bring structure to our lives, get us out the house and meeting new groups of people as well as giving us satisfaction of achievement and the opportunity to meet goals. Employment, however, can bring about its own pressures as well as positives. Many people experience mental health problems they believe to be caused by work, with stress being the largest cause of work-related illness.

Tackling mental health in the workplace is a priority for The Health and Safety Executive with their ‘Working Minds’ campaign, which advises 5 simple steps:

• Reach out and have conversations
• Recognise the signs and causes of stress
• Respond by agreeing relevant action points between employer and worker
• Reflect on the actions taken – have things improved?
• Make it Routine to check back in on how things are going

Having good mental wellbeing is not just about being ‘happy’, but a whole range of emotions: contentment, enjoyment, confidence, self-esteem, as well engagement with the world. What affects someone else’s mental wellbeing might not necessarily affect yours in the same way, so you need to find for yourself what works.

What are the signs of stress?

Physical                                             

1. Tiredness
2. A tight chest
3. Headaches
4. Indigestion
5. Appetite and weight changes

Behavioural

6. Mood changes
7. Lateness
8. Difficulty concentrating
9. Loss of motivation
10. Feeling low
11. Tearfulness

What causes stress at work?

Stress can manifest for a number of different reasons but to ensure stress factors are kept to a minimum in the workplace we fully support having open discussion and to make changes to help manage stress causes on a company wide basis. The following are elements to consider:

1. Having too much or too little to do
2. The pressure of deadlines
3. Shift work
4. Physically demanding work
5. Poor working conditions, e.g. high noise levels; bad lighting, furniture or equipment
6. Poor communication about changes
7. Lack of managerial or colleague support
8. Working in isolation, e.g. at home
9. Bullying

You can take control

1. Talk to someone you trust, at work or outside, about what upsets you or makes you feel stressed
2. Say if you need help
3. Be assertive – say no if you can’t take on extra demands
4. Be realistic – you don’t have to be perfect all the time
5. Make a list of what needs to be done. This will help to prioritise and also feel satisfying when items are ticked off
6. If you start to feel overwhelmed, stop and take a deep breath
7. Try to get away from your desk or situation for a few minutes
8. Try to get some fresh air during your day at work. Exercise and daylight are good for both your mental and physical health.
9. Make sure you drink enough water and that you eat during the day to maintain your energy.

If you just need to talk, any time of day or night

Free listening services

These services offer confidential support from trained volunteers. You can talk about anything that's troubling you, no matter how difficult:

1. Call 116 123 to talk to Samaritans, or email: jo@samaritans.org for a reply within 24 hours
2. Text "SHOUT" to 85258 to contact the Shout Crisis Text Line,

Coping during a crisis

The mental health charity Mind has information on ways to help yourself cope during a crisis.

This includes calming exercises and a tool to get you through the next few hours.