Why Now

Some people have asked me why I've started to write this blog. Is it because I'm feeling unwell? The truth is this has been something I've been considering doing for a number of months (possibly even in the form of the video blog). I often hear about the people who take leadership in reducing stigma around mental health, and increase understanding, and I've often wanted to take some leadership myself to share my experiences more.

 So far, I've not been able to communicate my experiences of mental health verbally to people, and it's not for want of trying (the words don't come out, I'd just usually say OK). I have therefore decided to try recording them on this anomalous blog, to share my experiences so that people have a better understanding of who I am and what I experience. I'm happy for people to ask me questions based on what I say within this blog.

I understand that I fall within the group don't talk about their feelings, men of working age. The only way we can change that is if people are prepared to take leadership in sharing their experiences. That's what I'm doing.

I therefore want to enforce that this isn't an knee-jerk reaction to feeling distressed, this is something I've wanted to do for a while and I'm now starting the process of communicating about how I feel further.

I'm thankful for the feedback I've received from people, from family members and people afar. I want to reassure my closes family members that they can ask me about the contents of the blog. I also want to reassure people that this isn't a call for help. I know that I need to carry out some more counselling and do plan to arrange that shortly (I will go private because whilst I know we have a very good Mind association that provides counselling locally) the counselling service provided as part of IAPT service wouldn't meet my needs.

This is something I want to do. I hope you can learn something about me through me writing this blog and maybe I can develop the confidence to speak about my feelings verbally.

Thanks for the feedback so far it's been greatly appreciated.