Protecting our mental health, avoiding the Askholes

The fathers day emails are ramping up and the anniversaries are creeping closer so I'm a little wobbly at the minute. Grief is unusual in that it creeps up on you, when you think that your doing well and you have your shit together and rhinestone cowboy leaves you bawling in a supermarket aisle. Time has seemed to both speed up and slow down in equal measures in the past year, its so long since I last heard their voices but I can picture those last days like they were yesterday. Journaling has helped me hugely lately to focus on the things that have been weighing on my mind, bringing forward to the positives and what is important to me. It puts some space between the thoughts in my head and makes me process my reaction to them.

I have some positive things planned over the next few weeks - Our Kinder Scout mindfulness walk which is hugely exciting to me and incredibly nerve wracking as its so far out of my comfort zone! I'm meeting my Personal Trainer and his awesome girlfriend in person after 5 months of training with him online and talking and the rest of our PT group who I speak to online. I'm hoping that my wonky brain plays ball and I manage to stay upright :D

A few weeks after that we are away for the week of the anniversaries, with two teenage boys we are heading into the Welsh mountains for some much needed peace and quiet, scenery, walks and outings. The hot tub and lots of reading too catch up on from my TBR list along with the teenagers list of places to visit should keep my mind occupied. I know that the anniversaries cause us to reminisce and humans are excellent at ruminating and wallowing - me in particular but I also have learnt that being outdoors helps me hugely.

I've thought a little bit this week after some disappointing news about protecting our mental health and inner peace and how different people go about it. Its something that I have never given that much thought too before I started training and learning more about my mental health, I've previously not been the best at protecting my own mental health preferring to be the helper instead but I've learnt that we cant be that without taking care of ourselves, You cant pour from an empty cup. Believe it or not, and trust me those that know me personally will have a hard time believing it, I struggle to say no to people. I will go out of my way to do favours even if they are inconvenient so one of the things I now do is take some time to answer a request, think it through. It doesn't mean I value that person any less, just that I value myself.

Protecting ourselves isn't just relevant to our time though and social media is another example of how we can take on others peoples moods and problems. We are always reachable now, always doom scrolling. If we find a social media presence draining and it has a negative effect on us it isn't our duty to keep following or interacting with that person - they may not necessarily have done anything wrong towards us but are a "mood hoover" constantly bringing our own mood, motivation and productivity down. I am by no means saying that we should bin off our friends for one bad day, or a difficult time, we all have those but a consistent pattern of damaging interactions is enough to make me pull back now and realise that protecting myself and my own inner peace is my priority.

Have you got a friend or acquaintance who comes to you with the same problem, you leave each conversation feeling drained and frustrated. They aren't around when you are at your lowest ebb and in a few weeks time they want to meet up and you are discussing the same problems you gave advice on in the previous weeks. Advice they ignored usually, ask yourself this: Is your friend an Askhole?