Guest Lists come to me in all sorts of ways, but this is the first time I have been recommended one by someone on behalf of their friend.

Sarah got in touch to tell me about her buddy Gemma who she described as: “having a knack for using sarcasm & honesty as a way of dealing with difficult things in life and so she talks openly about mental health, suicide & death in a funny, sometimes ‘on a knife edge’ kinda way. I love her for it & it’s certainly helped me when dealing with loss through suicide.”

Gemma sounded exactly like the kind of person I like and admire. I am honoured to share this brave piece about losing her Dad to suicide:

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In the early morning of 9 June 2014, two police officers came to my flat to tell me that my father had taken his own life. This is a list highlighting my thoughts and experiences, and what I think we could all do to help our fellow human beings.

• My dad was 46 years old when he died.

• He had been diagnosed with depression 5 months earlier.

• He had walked me down the aisle at my wedding 7 months earlier.

• At my wedding, I had no idea of how he was already suffering.

• His depression manifested itself in a few ways, one of them being severe hypochondria, which he also projected onto my mother. He was convinced she was going to die from sleep apnoea (she has never had sleep apnoea).

• Before having depression, my dad was the kind of guy who would brush mental health off as a non-issue. Like many of us, he didn’t understand it.

• Ironic really.

• He was a funny guy before he got poorly. But I suppose there were always signs that he wasn’t as laid-back as first impressions might have suggested.

• I try to be funny too. In fact, I use [often inappropriate] humour as a coping mechanism. I have to work hard to rein this in and limit it to my closest friends, or I risk coming across as horribly tasteless.

• My dad liked taking the piss out of his mates, having a few drinks, and going on holiday.

• But when he got poorly, my mum found it difficult to encourage him to even go to the local pub.

• I can’t remember the last time I saw my dad but I know it was approximately 3 months before he died (he lived in Yorkshire, me in London).

• I used to call my parents every Sunday night.

• My dad killed himself on a Sunday night, and I hadn’t called that evening as I was going out.

• I regret that choice a lot. Maybe it wouldn’t have made a different but I’ll never know.

• There is no single word to describe how I felt when the police officers told me what had happened.

• Well, “numb” is as good a word as any.

• I was so numb I couldn’t even tell you what the police officers looked like or even what gender they both were.

• I do remember feeling relieved too – because when the police officers first started talking I assumed both my parents were dead. Why else would the police come round instead of my family calling me?

• (Because my phone was off).

• I now have an irrational fear of my doorbell going after a certain time of night. I know most people probably feel a worried jolt when this happens, but whenever anyone mistakenly rings the bell to our flat (a common occurrence) my heart rate takes a LONG time to go back to normal.

• When my dad died, I distinctly remember not crying, or at least not properly, for a while.

• I’m still not sure I’ve really truly cried properly. Even writing this, I’m not feeling emotional. It’s only when I stop to think that I will literally never see him again that I get a buzzing in my head and I have to stop thinking.

• I’m not great at talking about my feelings around my dad’s suicide which is why I started my blog.

• Losing my dad made me wish I wasn’t an only child.

• There are considerable administrative jobs you have to do when someone dies.

• When someone takes their own life, there are even more. The police will get involved as it is a death from unnatural causes. We had to wait for the police to release my dad before we could plan his funeral. There has to be an inquest before you can even get a proper death certificate.

• My dad’s death certificate made it really obvious that he’d took his own life, and how he’d done it. I had to send it to so many people and companies (service providers, solicitors, etc. Even my college wanted it as I had to ask for a deadline extension). Every time I sent it I wondered if they would read the details.

• If someone asks how my dad died, I tell them the truth. It took me a while to work out how best to say it. There are semantic connotations with the phrase “he committed suicide” that a lot of people have problems with, so I stick with “he took his own life”. “He killed himself” is just that little bit too abrupt.

• Although, often when I tell people, they have a similar story to share.

• Losing a parent is horrific. Losing a parent when they’re still young is even more so. And losing a parent to suicide is unimaginable.

• No matter how much you understand that it’s an illness that has made a person choose to end their life, you will always, always question what you could have done differently.

• I will always wonder if my dad knew how much I loved him, how much I doted on him. Because if he did, surely he wouldn’t have taken his own life?

• (That’s a rhetorical question. I just have to hope he did know.)

• My grandparents both outlived their son. My mum lost her husband of 27 years.

• Since my dad died I have become a mother, and it breaks my heart that my dad will never know his grandson.

• The year my dad died, he was one of 6,109 others in the UK who also took their own lives. 76% of those people were men.

• Talking to others bereaved by suicide, it’s clear that it affects EVERYONE. Even if the person who died wasn’t your best friend or family member, you are left wondering how death became the only decision left to make.

• I’m no expert on mental health. This is the closest experience I’ve had with it. I want to join the fight to address it but it is overwhelming thinking about what needs to be done when I couldn’t save one person who was so dear to me.

• I have noticed a recent surge in efforts to raise awareness – particularly due to the Duke & Duchess of Cambridge and Prince Harry, who are “spearheading the Heads Together campaign to end stigma around mental health”.

• One of their partners, and one of my favourite charities, CALM, focuses specifically on preventing male suicide. They suggest that there are “social and cultural barriers that prevent men from speaking out”.

• My dad was a tough-looking, big-muscled burly guy. And I do think he felt expectations to be a ‘manly man’ not someone who discusses their feelings or takes action to address their mental health wellbeing.

• This is the attitude that needs to change. I may not be a mental health expert but the voices speaking out at the moment make it clear that more conversations need to happen to reduce the stigma around mental health wellbeing and mental health illness.

• We live in a nation which has a reputation for a “stiff upper lip” and, arguably, emotional repression.

• OK, so you probably shouldn’t outpour your deepest darkest emotions in your next job interview, but I cannot fathom why our mental health isn’t given the same focus as other aspects of our health.

• We understand that diseases like heart disease, cancer, stomach ulcers, ruptured appendices, etc. create physical damage so why is it so hard to accept that our mental health can become damaged in a similar way?

• After having my son, I did notice a focus on my mental health as a new mother – health visitors would always address my own feelings in addition to my son’s fluctuating weight. Information on warning signs of postnatal depression was readily available. Wonderful mum and dad bloggers are out there, helping you understand that your feelings are normal.

• We need more of this. Conversations around mental health wellbeing – and not just aimed at people who are already experiencing mental health issues but EVERYONE. Because my dad is proof that mental illness can affect ANYONE – like cancer, it is non-discriminatory.

• Charities like Heads Together, CALM, Mind, etc. are addressing the big conversations; tackling fear, prejudice and stigma.

• But we can help them. Little steps can make big differences.

• Something we can all do is be kinder to one another. Yeah OK, it is easier said than done, but sometimes (and I’m guilty of this too) we humans are totally unreasonable even to total strangers.

• I’ll use myself as an example (and I’m by no means the worst) – I’ve been passive-aggressive and unnecessarily rude to fellow commuters, call centre staff, professionals who happen to work for a company that has wronged me in some way, etc.

• What if one of these people had been feeling like my dad was towards the end of his life? A jumped-up commuter / customer/ general dick isn’t going to help the situation.

• So let’s be kinder to our fellow humans. I’m not saying be a push over but since losing my dad I try thinking twice before muttering that passive-aggressive comment. And if I don’t think twice in time, I apologise.

• And talk to each other. When my dad was ill, I found it so hard to talk to him because he didn’t want to talk about how he was feeling. How can we help someone get better from an illness we often can’t begin to understand?

• But we can only try.

• Small actions from everyone could change the world.

Continuing the the theme of ‘lists from people I went to school with’ this one is from May Lagan AKA @therellbedayslikethis.

May is Mum to four. And sister to ten. That’s right her parents had ELEVEN kids. Growing up I was SO intrigued by her family.  Now, having had kids I find it mindboggling that a household could possibly function with so many people in it. Not mention the HUGE respect I have for her Mum and Dad for a) getting through it b) making humans as lovely as May.

Here, she tells us what it’s like to grow up being ‘One of Eleven Kids’:

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• It is a truth universally acknowledged that if you decide to have more than three children you are utterly insane.

• After you have your first child, people ask when you would like another. After your second, people ask if you would like another. After that, people ask why the holy heck you would like another.

• I’ve officially reached the number of children where people have stopped saying, “Congratulations” and switched instead to, “Good luck”.

• The NHS should prescribe TV licenses as contraception given the number of people who find it hilarious to question if we have one.  (Actually, our TV was broken at the time but that’s by the by, alright?)

• Perhaps I am naïve but, as the third eldest of eleven children, four doesn’t really faze me. I’ve had a really good experience of growing up being surrounded by ten clothes-stealing-raucous-snitches with the same big teeth and eyebrows as me.

• Yes, there are downsides. You have to sacrifice important things like space and privacy. Luckily we grew up on a farm so there were plenty of escape routes – the field, the hay barn, the aptly named isolation unit (for sick pigs and errant siblings.)

• There are other sacrifices too. Take holidays for example, which were often a 2 hour car journey to Birmingham to visit our grandparents with a sibling kicking your shin whole way and never a Thomas Cook all inclusive with pool.    

• We were lucky to go on some good holidays to Center Parcs though. Not a cheap option for a big crowd and I therefore acquired the ability to curl into a small enough ball to slot into a car footwell alongside a four year old with a coat over us and still manage to find breathing space for us both.

• ‘Squeezing in’ also meant that if you drew the short straw you had to sleep on the (surprisingly comfortable) sofa.

• The downside to this being that the living room is in the middle of all bedrooms so snoring and flatulence was in surround sound.

• It also meant you were awake as soon as the earliest riser was.

• However it did guarantee you breakfast in bed each morning. Plus you had the authority to demote your siblings off the sofa and on to the floor for the entire duration of the holiday.

• We’ve had to make similar sacrifices with our children when it comes to holidays. Think less Hotel Du Vin and more Hotel Du CamperVan.

• It’s not all about missing out though. Being in a big family means there’s always lots to celebrate. So much so that my 2 year old, whenever handed a phone, automatically breaks into singing ‘Happy Birthday’.

• Growing up in a crowd, you develop a (life-long) complete inability to see something you would like to eat and save it for later. It won’t be there later so you must eat it now, all of it, even if it is an entire sherry trifle at 6.45am. And quickly, because if somebody catches you they will fight you for it. It’s a survival skill.

• The kitchen was truly the hub of the home, with the table at any one time being resting place for any strange combination of belongings – a collection of Play Doh creatures (always brown – keeping the colours separate with so many contributors was impossible), some Food Technology GCSE coursework, Just17, the Sunday Times crossword…

• I don’t remember a Sunday at home that didn’t involve a roast dinner. Dad always took pride in cooking and carving the meat, while mum nailed the roast potatoes and always had a way of making the vegetables interesting. The perfect team.

• Mum was always up early and coming down for breakfast was like walking onto the factory floor at Ginsters with a production line of packed lunches on the go. There was always one of us standing over her on quality control, making dissatisfied noises over today’s sandwich filling. I remember complaining that we never got to have Um Bongo or Iced Gems like my school friend, Lorna. If only I could go back to my then self – what my mum did to keep us all fed and happy was nothing short of incredible.  

• Ah, my mum. People used to ask me how she did it and I would laugh it off as if that is some sort of silly question. She had us older ones to help out, of course! Only now do I realise that managing tears and tantrums from toddlers and teenagers in tandem is no mean feat, and that me occasionally cleaning a bathroom/younger sibling’s behind was merely a small drop in a very large, poo-filled ocean.     

• I can’t downplay my dad’s role though. I’m not sure if it was a skill he acquired through raising lots of children but he was always good at staying calm and finding a solution, on whatever scale. I remember one occasion when he was getting us ready for school as my mother was away (presumably in hospital after giving birth to one of my siblings) and the hairbrush was nowhere to be seen. He acted with determination and quick wit, selecting an appropriate Stickle Brick for the job – we were good to go.  

• Dad was also best at budgeting so he was often appointed the role of chief food shopper. During the BSE scare we ate like kings, dining on T-Bone steak pretty much every night! Dad also liked to stock up on box loads of crisps that none of us really liked because they lasted for ages.

• History has a way of repeating itself. My husband stops at M&S on his way home from work most nights as he’s calculated the perfect time to pick up yellow stickered food. It’s reached the stage where the staff know him and point him in direction of good deals. I have to ban him sometimes while we make our way through the reduced price Dim Sum, Aberdeen Angus Beef Burgers and Harissa Peperonata Focaccia that’s jamming up the freezer. He’s got so good at it, I think he could scale up and roll it out as a business – HelloNotSoFresh.    

  

• The car was always full (somebody always needed taking somewhere and siblings would volunteer as willing passengers to escape the chaos).

• As were the bathrooms (also a good place to escape the chaos).

• And the washing machine.

• But never the fridge. The food shopping literally got unpacked straight into our mouths.

• Christmases were and are amazing – the excitement is contagious. So too, sadly, is the norovirus, which is why Christmas 2007 will not go down as the best.

• When you are living with lots of people, sickness bugs can tear through you like wildfire. This is not the time you can appreciate close living quarters, sharing bathrooms (if you were lucky to get there first) or buckets. There is always one person in the household acting smug that they managed to escape the illness, only to catch it two weeks later than everyone else. This is normally my brother, Eddie, who does everything two weeks later than everyone else.     

• We may share the same teeth and eyebrows but there is an end to our similarities. We have all chosen different career paths. I have lucked out as among them include a midwife, a physiotherapist and a (nearly) dentist. I just need some of the younger ones to take up plumbing and beauty therapy and that is all my maintenance issues taken care of.  

• Keeping in touch with so many siblings can be tricky – until Whatsapp came along. Much like the kitchen table, the group messages are a strange concoction of kid’s artwork (this time belonging to the grandchildren), photos of nights out, something weird that somebody wants diagnosing, exam results and the like.     

• Sometimes I wonder where my day has gone then I realise I must have spent at least 2hrs replying to the 186 messages that came through in the past 24 hours.

• When I say 24 hours, I mean 24 hours. The younger siblings always message late, while watching something inspiring on television or feeling ‘conversational’ after a few drinks, my mum (still incapable of switching off or lying in) normally checks in at 4am after letting the dogs out while the peak time for us older siblings is around 6.50am while spooning Rice Krispies into a toddler. Plus there is normally one of us (never me) out of the country in another time zone, smugly posting sunset selfies for the rest of us to wake up to. Git.    

• My parents made raising a large brood look easy. Perhaps they are the masters of deception. Perhaps I was too caught up in my own growing up haze to notice the hard work they were putting in. Perhaps it is only through becoming a parent myself that I have been able to appreciate the challenges they must have dealt with.

• However my parents did it, there is no denying it is a big job. So, why have we not stopped at three?

• My husband asked the other day if there is any chance I could give birth to an adult! I’m sure most nurseries employ a more favourable adult:child ratio, and we’re talking people who have qualifications in looking after children. So really, why have we not stopped at three?

• Well, I don’t have any qualifications in looking after children. I’m not going to pretend I find parenting a walk in the park (although there are lots of those). I’m not making life easy for myself, but what kind of life do you end up having led if you always select the easy option?

• Growing up in a large family has set me up well for parenthood. It’s given me this ability to zone out in chaos – the mayhem, madness, melee – it often just washes over me. And re that quick eating practise, it’s useful when I only have 5 minutes in between picking Babybel skin out of the carpet and racing out for the school run. Plus the lack of privacy I have become accustomed to means I’m not bothered when my 4 year old wants to tattoo my leg in biro while I’m on the toilet. Welcome one and all.

• I haven’t yet found another use for my ability to curl into a footwell sized ball, but I am sure it will come in handy again one day.

• Being one of eleven has also given me an irrational fear of being lonely. I’ve learnt to enjoy the chaos of a busy household so much so that, on the rare occasion I am home alone, I feel uneasy. My siblings have provided a constant source of company, and now my children do too. I seem to have this urge to fill my life with people who mean something to me. Having kids seems a fun way to do that.

• Love is a funny thing, you would think it had a limit, that you would somehow have to divide it around, but it doesn’t work like that. The more you give, the more you get back, then the more there is to divvy out. It’s kind of addictive – I think that’s my problem! If only I could say the same for time.

• That newborn head smell is pretty addictive too.

• The idea of a large family might seem nuts, but it’s my normal. Through it, I’ve learnt there is no such thing as a perfect family – no perfect age to start having children, even if you decide never to, no perfect number of children, no perfect age gap between children. If there is love there you can build something special, whether there are two of you or twenty.

• All that and, of course, I am utterly insane.

  

Belle and I were at Secondary School together. She was in the ‘cool girl gang’, the sort I hung out with a bit but was also in awe of. My overriding memory of her was doing an amazing performance of the Fugees cover of ‘Killing Me Softly’ in the school talent contest. Funny the things that stay in your mind all these years?

Life has changed a lot since leaving school in 2000.  Particularly for Belle who now finds herself in a wheelchair. This time I’m in awe of her for how she’s dealt with this challenging journey and proud to be able share her list ‘Living Life on Wheels’:

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I went from being a fully able-bodied, fully functioning, sporty, independent woman, to a blind and wheelchair-bound woman overnight in 2007, being struck down by a rare illness called Neuro Myelitis Optica. My life changed dramatically and I physically changed dramatically, but mentally I am still the same person who wants to take on the world, now it is in a slightly different way:

• Each day has to be taken as it comes. I try not to let things stress me, as that is when everything starts to go wrong. I will have bad transfers, my pain will increase, and I will become tired more quickly. I try to start each day with meditation and positive thoughts (even when I want to tell the world to do one).

• I work on a food plan for each week, being overweight and on wheels is hard. When I initially fell ill and was on a load of steroids and went up to 18stone life was extremely difficult, transfers were more difficult, getting up and dressed seemed to take hours and with help from other. Now a good 7+ stone lighter, I am able to be up and out of the house in 30minutes, that’s even with a hair wash. The food we eat is so important and weight management is key to ensure making life on wheels a lighter and better place to be.

• Everything in moderation. If I want cake I eat cake, but I now try to make my own in a healthier way than buying something processed and full of additives. I try to be mindful of what I am putting into my body.

• Don’t beat yourself up for not being able to do something or do something like you used to. Take a step back from the situation and look at how you can do it, just differently.

• Tasks in life might take longer and have to be done in a different way, but they can be done.

  

• Exercise is important but so are rest days. I try to work out about 5 times a week, boxing, using resistance bands, weights and good old pushing around taking the dog for a wheel in the countryside to get the heart pumping.

• Research and more research, the doctors are only so knowledgeable, and my favourite saying from them and the nurses is ‘everyone with spinal cord injury is different’. This is true, just a much-overused phrase. It is good to build up your own toolbox of knowledge about your injury and what can help support

  being

  the best you, you can be through foods, alternative medicines and therapies, sports you enjoy and anything else you find fulfilling in life. Don’t stop the things that you used to do, just look at how they can be done on wheels.

• Mind those knees!! If you do not have any or limited feeling in your legs, you have to be so careful of your knees. It is so easy to be putting the washing onto a radiator with your knees up against it, as you don’t feel anything, you won’t feel them slowly burning. This is the same with the oven, if the oven is at leg level and your hob is on top, then you will need to be mindful of where your legs are. Hot things burn and can cause serious damage.

• If you feel tired sleep, if you need to rest, rest, if you need to eat, eat, your body is a marvellous thing start to listen to it and it will make life so much easier.

• Pressure relief is soooo important. Your Therapists at the Hospital should show you how to do this, but the aim is to get off  the pressure points in your bum each hour for 2 minutes each side by leaning GET OFF THOSE CHEEKS!

• The lovely thing with spinal cord injury is how much I get to speak about my toilet habits! Seriously everyone (nurses, doctors, specialists etc) all want to know about this exciting part of life. I find its best to be open, understand how my body feels when I start to get a urine infection or when I start to feel like I am getting constipated. It is vital for us wheelies to understand these bodily functions to minimise discomfort, pain and most importantly infection.

• Catheters will become a daily part of life. There are 3 main ways of having/using a catheter. These are Indwelling (a surgical procedure to have a catheter come out of your bladder), Urethra (goes in near your bits, I like these  on a weekend so I can go out as I please without worrying about where a loo  might be), and intermittent (these are used by people without the other 2 kinds of catheters into use after going to the loo to ensure your bladder is empty). Make sure you make your own choices on how you want to use catheters and don’t be forced into something you are not comfortable with, make sure you speak to people and do research to make the appropriate decision for you.

• Understand benefits and what you are entitled too, speak to your support worker and reach out to the local council to discuss.

  

• Minimising stress levels is key and so important for people with spinal cord injury; I have tried all sorts of alternative therapies, some which have worked well such as meditation, reiki, reflexology, massage. Some that have not worked so well, a lady standing over me and banging a drum while chanting for an hour was not my idea of calm!

• Don’t be afraid to ask for help, but don’t be forced to accept help if you can do it.

• I am lucky enough to have a fantastic family and great friends around me, but I know that others with spinal cord injury can get lonely. Make sure you reach out to your local council for help and support, speak to the Occupational Therapists, they can help find local groups to get involved with and support with transport to get you there. You are never alone.

• Get on social media, this way you can find groups of like-minded people, have discussions about coping, issues and generally living life. Facebook is great for this.

• Wheels don’t stop you from doing things; they just mean things are done in a slightly different way.

• Take the Dis out of Disability and you have the ability!

My amazing hen-do. Where I suffered an epic panic attack.

I published a version of this list some time ago. For the last couple of years, I’ve largely had my anxiety under control. Or rather it hasn’t managed to control me. But this week it came back with a vengeance. Probably something to do with a national paper slagging off the way I bring up my children. Here’s the thing, logically I wasn’t offended or concerned about the Daily Mail’s opinion of me. I am a confident parent. But mental health doesn’t work like that, it doesn’t adhere to logic.

Here’s everything I have learned about anxiety:

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• Anxiety is a very broad term.

• For me, it comes in a few guises:

• Spiralling negative thought processes,

• A general feeling of being removed and unable to connect.

• An overriding feeling of doom deep in the pit of stomach belly.

• All of which leads to broken sleep.

• Oh and panic attacks.

• Great combo!

• I have suffered from anxiety for a most of my life. I vividly remember having a panic attack in my early teens. I was sitting on my bedroom flow, doing my homework whilst listening to the charts when the world began to warp.

• I was ok in my twenties, which is surprising given how much  I partied. 

• But my lowest point was 7 years ago. Suddenly from nowhere getting on the tube became a challenge. 2 minutes stuck at a signal and I was a quivering mess.

• Then trains begun to make me a bit wobbly. Oh and planes obviously… because they are basically trains, suspended thousands of feet up in the air.

• Soon I was so obsessed with how I would get to/from somewhere that it dominated the experience of actually being there.

• Why? Why was I feel this way? Very good question. 

• I can’t be certain, these things are often irrational. Though I suspect it was something to do with being stuck and feeling out of control.

• Which sounds bonkers.

• But I now know, via lots of research (AKA talking about Anxiety to anyone who’ll listen) that feeling anxious or depressed does not make you weird.

• It is SO much more common than you think.

• And the people that suffer from anxiety are often the people you’d least expect.

• They are the ones putting on a great front of appearing confident and having their shit together.

• You see anxiety doesn’t make you a scaredy cat.

• Just the opposite.

• In my case, I’d done tonnes of ‘brave’ stuff. Thrown myself down black runs Given big-presentations. GIVEN BIRTH. These are not things that wimps do.

• It also doesn’t mean you are loony. It means you need help.

• Don’t fight it. Anxiety can spiral if you start being anxious about the fact that you are anxious (SIDE NOTE: THIS TOTALLY HAPPENED TO ME THIS WEEK, I WAS CONVINCED I WAS HEADED BACK TO THE DARK PLACE I WAS IN THE YEAR AFTER OUR MARRIAGE).

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• Think how you’d treat it if it were a physical illness rather than a mental one. If you had a grazed knee, doesn’t mean you need your leg amputated. Experiencing a phase of anxiety doesn’t mean you are a loon.

• Also a bit of anxiety is OK.

• Sometimes it’s excitement: ‘school disco nerves’, before a night out.

• Sometimes it’s actual nerves. Don’t take every raised heartbeat as something to freak out about.

• Remember when the adrenaline begins to course around the vein it’s your body preparing you to do something epic and bring your A-game. Which is great if, for example, you about a speech or meet a room full of new people.

• What advice?

• My go-to self-medications is Rescue Remedy. That stuff is the bomb. Obviously, I swig it straight from the bottle. Fuck the pipet.

• Run. Run. Run. Not away from your problems. That’d be terrible advice. But exercise. Running is free (apart from trainers and a reinforced sports bra). A hit of endorphins is a great step towards keeping you sane.

• Go to the quack. Don’t be embarrassed. GP will probably already dealt with a mental health issue that day. Plus its better than having to stick their fingers up someone’s bum.

• Be kind to yourself. Being a grown-up is a tough gig. It’s why you spend 21 years (nearer 32) practising before you actually become an adult.

• Get some kip. Not easy with kids. Go to bed earlier. Get off your phone. Tag-team with your partners in the mornings. Or do as I do and leave any event at 10.30.

• Caffeine is vital. But handle with caution. I’ve recently swapped coffee for tea. It’s not as fun or satisfying, but my mind is calmer. 

• Find the release. Children compromise your ability to blow off steam or build in self-care But these things are not a luxury. A night gossiping with the girls over a bottle of bubbles is SO good for the soul.

• CBT is a game changer.  It gave me so many strategies to control my thought processes. Actual therapy is great too. It’s less a means of finding a coping strategy, more as means to understand yourself a bit better.

• But talking to anyone is good. It doesn’t always come easily to us Brits. But if you can try and let those around you know that you are struggling it will help.

  

  A beautiful lunch accompanied by horrible sense of dread in the pit of my stomach.

• I love a motivational quote too. These are my fave:

• “There’s a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in.” Yes, Leonard Cohen! Being flawed is not a bad thing. It makes us human and makes us have great empathy for other humans.

• “No rain, no flowers.” When you are in the middle of a shitty anxious patch it can feel like things are such a struggle, but instead, see it as a chance try and embrace the good days as a thing of joy. Much like the feeling on the first day of spring.

• “Everything is going to be ok.” The wisest of words from @theyesmummum. She’s right you know. It really will. 

• You WILL get back to being you. You won’t even realise when it happens. But one day you’ll find yourself worrying about the ‘why the hell there are socks everywhere apart from the sock draw’. Rather than worrying about worrying.

• You won’t be cured. That’s not a thing. But you’ll know that you’ve made peace with the fact that anxiety is part of your life, but that doesn’t mean it needs to define you or even limit you. And what hasn’t sent you potty has made you stronger than you thought possible.

  

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  Yesmum Cards come in a variety of ranges including Mum, Fertility & Mini. They are brilliant and available to buy  here. 

There is no easy way to intro this, other than to say how unbelievably grateful I am to the woman (who wishes to remain anonymous) who felt brave enough to share this list about her recovery from rape. 1 in 5 women have been a victim of Sexual Assault, which means this horrendous experience is something more people go through than we perhaps realise.

I’ve banged on about the huge impact giving birth has had on me. There’s entire list about it  here. Until receiving this list I’d never considered how witnessing hundreds of births would affect you. Here Anthonissa AKA @onestrongmother shares what she has learned from being a midwife:

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• I trained to be a midwife after I experienced a homebirth with my daughter in 2008.

• The training and job itself has definitely not always been the rose tinted dream that I imagined as a young mother of 25.

• But I have gained so much from the job that being a midwife is an integral part of who I am, and I not being one. This is what I’ve learnt from supporting a couple of hundred Mothers,

• This is what I’ve learnt from supporting a couple of hundred Mothers, Fathers and Birth Partners bring their baby earthside.

• A good birth can be the making of a new mother.

• Supporting a birthing woman, being next to her as her body stretches, pulls and opens up, does something strange to your insides. It can create a strong deep feeling inside of your womb. As though the gravity is pulling stronger there. Many midwives and doulas I know have experienced this strange feeling too. You could call it sympathy pains, or the deep connection of women supporting women. Whatever you call it, it can feel intense.

• Being a midwife is physically and emotionally exhausting. To sustain a career, you have to really love it.

• You can’t control everything when it comes to birth, there are no 100% guarantees and it is healthy to acknowledge that. But with the right preparation, you can definitely stack the odds in your favour, and this means both mental and physical preparation. I

• I see that labour and birth are comparable to running a marathon. It is physically draining, as you use the muscles of your womb intensely to push open your cervix and bring the baby down. 

• It is equally mentally draining too, as you enter into the unknown and need the mental conviction that you can do it, to get you through.

  

• Being present and part of a birth remains deeply moving no matter how many you have attended. From time to time I still cry.

• The smell of birth is unlike anything else, it has its own unique mark. And it changes during birth so that you can smell when the baby is drawing near. I never thought about this before

• I started my midwifery training. But bodily functions create smell, and birth is no different.

• When I first started training I used to find the smell really potent, but now I understand it is just part of the process and can be a very positive sign!When you watch a baby being born, you are also seeing the birth of a mother. And both can

• When you watch a baby being born, you are also seeing the birth of a mother. And both can be equally moving. I’ve watched young girls stare down at their tiny infants, as they begin to

• I’ve watched young girls stare down at their tiny infants, as they begin to sink into that moment when motherhood takes hold of them. Touching their face and holding their baby close and protectively into their breast. No longer the child. No longer swaying freely in the breeze without responsibility. Grounded by that little person hard and strong to the earth. And that is a beautiful thing to see.

• The mindset that you go into labour with, has a profound effect on how you experience your birth.

• If a woman is really well supported by her birth partner and midwife, she feels safe and cared for, you might mistake the noises she makes during birth for good sex. Birth is such a primal experience. When you turn off your thinking mind and go into your body deeply, birth becomes an incredible hormonal dance. My favourite birth noises are mooing like a cow and

• My favourite birth noises are mooing like a cow and roaring like a lion.

• Women are so much stronger than society tells us.

• Having a vaginal birth is not the definition of a good birth. I’ve been with many women who birthed by Caesarean or with assistance by forceps and ventouse, and who enjoyed their birth. I’ve also spoken to mothers who had ‘normal’ vaginal births which felt out of control and frightening. The key to a positive birth is good communication, choices being genuinely

• The key to a positive birth is good communication, choices being genuinely made by the mother and her birth partner, calmness and feeling cared for in those seminal moments.

• When you look at a woman and fear that she has nothing left, no more to give and it is all too much to bear, she can always surprise you.

  

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  Nissa works as a midwife at a busy central London hospital, teaches hypnobirthing and is a mum to one. You can enjoy her free relaxation MP3 here.

  ‘One Strong Mother’ pins are available here