Lynsey, from our children and young peoples team, shares how she is spending her time at home and adjusting to our new “normal”. Remember, you are not alone and we are here for you. If you need support or guidance around mental health check out our resources section. Do you have a story you’d like to share? If so, get on touch – Share your story
Here’s Lynsey’s blog post:
I love spending time at home and usually I’d be very happy being at home all weekend. Working from home all the time can be quite challenging. Mixing up my day by adding in time to read work-related books, watch online learning and looking for innovation in mental health, rather than sitting at my laptop typing all day, all helps. I love working with young people and a big part of that is meeting them face to face. We are still working with young people through remote contact like messaging and video chats. I really miss the face to face contact. Having a video chat with a young person makes a big difference in how I feel during the day. We keep sharing our ideas of self-care. They’ve suggested books, Netflix programs, funny video clips etc. My TV suggestion has been Race Across the World on BBC 2 for a whole family watch.
Self-care
For me, my self-care is often doing something, as I’m not very good at relaxing and my go-to is baking. But we have also been out in the garden, which is not my thing… or I didn’t think it was. When I was little I would spend a lot of time with my Grandad in his garden. It was more about being with him than the gardening. However, I have really enjoyed being in my garden. It has definitely helped me to switch off from overthinking, the sunny weather has helped too. I am a bit of an overthinker so using the technique below really helps me:
I ask myself – What can I control now?
We can’t control the bigger picture of Corona but I can control my plan for the day. This helps me set mini tasks for that day.
As someone who doesn’t really value technology, it has made me more grateful for helping us all to keep connected. My daughter doesn’t live in the UK at the moment. Cathing up with her each day on a video call is always nice. We mainly talk about the important stuff like…what we are making for tea, or what she would make out of the ingredient she has in the cupboard!
My top tip:
If you are having a bad day I would be asking yourself (or someone else) how can I make today 10% better. Look for a little win to build on. I always remind the young people I work with that as much as we’d like to, we can’t always look immediately for a 100% fix.
