Today those polite folk from up north have been talking about mental health and how it affects them and those around them. Mental health is one of those issues that we too rarely talk about. I think it’s partly because you can’t see the problem and unless you have experienced it yourself it can be very difficult to understand. There has always been a stigma attached as if for some reason having something wrong with your mind is much worse than having any other kind of medical issue.

Whether you know it or not you’ve known people with mental health problems. Maybe chronic conditions that they will have to learn to live with for the rest of their lives, maybe just short term problems that time and therapy can help with. I’ve always been very impressed at how brave some of my friends have been to come out, as it were, to me or their community about the difficulties they face. Today it felt like it should be my turn.

For most of my adult life I’ve suffered from social anxiety. It’s never been too much of a problem but being in public spaces and interacting with people I don’t know well has been hard. In particular this affects me with phone calls and video conferences which I try to avoid wherever possible. Mostly I can push myself past this, particularly if there are a few drinks to be had to calm my nerves, but it still affects the things I will consider doing meaning I just stay at home a lot.

Some years ago though things got a little harder. Since then I’ve been suffering from IBS, a simple name for a condition that isn’t really understood and is mostly the diagnosis you get if you have chronic stomach problems and no-one can identify why. As you might expect from that there isn’t really a cure or anything that will help symptoms for everyone. For some people one thing works, for others something else will work. For some it only lasts a while, for others it lasts a lifetime. One thing that is true for many people with IBS is that it causes anxiety and depression and that has been true for me for about four years now.

Going to places I’m not familiar with, long journeys, anything where I’m expecting to be stuck somewhere and unable to go to a bathroom at short notice all trigger my anxiety. Add in the social anxiety which makes me feel pressured to not act out of the ordinary when I’m around other people when this is going on and you’ve got a great combination for me never wanting to leave the house. Add in other normally manageable life stresses and you’ve got the perfect recipe for panic attacks when I do. Oh and did I mention that stress and anxiety make IBS worse?

Thankfully I’m in the position that no one of my problems are debilitating, it is just the combination of them and other normal sources of stress and how they feed each other that makes me go through periods of extreme anxiety often with short periods of depression. Alleviating one of them helps to alleviate the others automatically. Shortly before Chloë was born my IBS was largely gone. The anxiety remained but I went into therapy and for a time things were mostly normal. Unfortunately things have taken a downturn lately.

One thing’s for sure, adding a baby to your family sure increases your stress levels and along with some medical issues with family members I’ve got caught back in the viscous cycle. And so now I’m taking anti-depressants to help stop the panic attacks and get my anxiety under control again. Medication is not something I take lightly, but it is necessary right now while I get back into therapy.I’m very proud of the family I have who have supported me since opening up about this. It’s made the difference between feeling like someone who has to hide themselves and someone who can actually be themselves, which is very important for someone with social anxiety. If someone opens up to you about something like this, please accept and support them. You may not be able to understand exactly what they’re going through but taking the pressure off by letting them know that you’ll help in any way you can means a lot.