Mental Health Awareness Beyond One Week:

How Creativity Became Part of My Mental Health Journey

A personal reflection on mental health, creativity, grief, boundaries and the small everyday things that help me feel more like myself again.

The small everyday things that help me.

This week it’s Mental Health Awareness Week and I haven’t really mentioned it on any of my socials because, honestly, I feel that every week should include mental health awareness.

If I were still in a school, we’d be talking about this with pupils and looking at ways to improve and support our mental health, and I’ve seen lots of businesses and companies sharing posts to raise awareness too. I’d be interested to see how much of this awareness continues throughout the rest of the year.

Because mental health isn’t just about when someone is at their lowest or struggling. We sometimes forget that everyone has mental health, just like physical health, and it’s important to acknowledge when we have good mental health too.

Recognising those good periods matters because when our mental health dips, we can look back at the things that made us feel more like ourselves. How were we feeling? What were we doing? What helped? Sometimes those things help lift us out of the dip and sometimes it takes a bit more support, and that’s OK too. Everyone’s journey with their mental health is different and no one should feel as though they need to hide or shy away from doing what feels right for them at the time.

Learning to Recognise the Signs

Looking back, my own mental health has been up and down since I was a teenager. Learning how to deal with relationship break-ups, trying to cope on my own without talking to anyone, dealing with grief and loss… I can now see those were all triggers, even when I convinced myself at the time that I was coping perfectly well. Underneath, I really wasn’t.

Recognising those triggers has been really important for me.

I used to let things build up and build up until it all became too much and then something tiny would tip me over the edge.

A box of cereal would get launched across the kitchen and I’d end up slumped in a corner sobbing uncontrollably.

After a while, usually once someone had found me and seen the mess, I’d realise what had happened and laugh because the thing that made me hurl the cereal was usually something completely trivial. But afterwards, I’d feel so much lighter for finally letting it all out.

Now I’ve learned to recognise those build-up signs earlier, both physically and mentally, and I haven’t launched a box of cereal in quite a while.

When Everything Caught Up with Me

Ten years ago, my father-in-law died and within the same week we also lost my uncle. It was huge for both sides of the family. There was the heartbreak of having to explain loss to my daughter, who was only five at the time, alongside all the practical logistics that come with losing someone. My uncle especially left such a huge hole in our family.

I carried on as normal for around four months before everything really hit me. I started having panic attacks and one day I physically couldn’t walk any further to get the train to work.

Work itself wasn’t the problem. I just couldn’t deal with everything else around it anymore.

I needed time to grieve and look after myself properly.

This was when a beautiful friend reminded me that I needed to create something again. I realised it had been a very long time since I’d done anything creative purely for myself.

Finding a way back to a creative outlet

I started making picture frames using Scrabble tiles with people’s names, phonetic pronunciations and researched meanings and origins. It brought together two things I loved — language and creativity — and slowly I started to feel more like myself again.

Eventually I was able to return to work and having that creative outlet made me feel like I could cope again.

Discovering Creativity Through Macramé

Four years later, the same friend asked if I could make her a macramé wall hanging. At the time, I had absolutely no idea what macramé even was, but always being up for a challenge, I said yes anyway.

And that’s how my love of knotting started.

I found that I could completely immerse myself in projects and stop thinking about everything else for a while. I could just be present with the cord and the rhythm of my hands creating something.

I soon realised there are only so many plant hangers and wall hangings one house can hold, so I started experimenting with other things to make. But eventually I realised something really important.

It wasn’t actually the macramé itself that was helping me.

It was the act of making something with no end goal. Creating simply for the sake of creating. Doing something that allowed my mind to quieten for a while and let me just be.

Finding macramé and calming my mind

Learning What Helps Me

Once I’d started recognising the signs that my mental health was dipping, I also started understanding what helped me through those periods.

There have still been times when I’ve needed extra support and more time away from work, but I approached things differently. I stopped trying to push through everything and focused instead on what I genuinely needed.

I baked. 

I tried to eat better. 

I made myself get outside more. 

I stopped creating macramé pieces based on what I thought other people would want and started making things just for me. 

I cried. 

I spent days on the sofa binge-watching TV series. 

And throughout all of that, I slowly learned what was actually important to me and what helped me feel like myself again.

At the time, some of it probably seemed selfish from the outside. I learned to say no to things, even family things. I started to choose which of my daughter's football matches I would go to and sometimes stayed home to do something for myself instead.

But in doing that, I realised there were lots of other ways to spend quality time with my daughter too. She understands now that it’s OK to say no to things she doesn’t enjoy and that protecting your own wellbeing matters.

Small Things That Help My Mental Health

I'm often sat in the garden just looking and noticing.

There are so many different things you can do to support your mental health and they don’t have to be huge life-changing actions. Often, it’s the small things that help us reconnect with ourselves again.

One thing I try to do is notice and remember the things that make me feel good when my mental health is in a good place. Sometimes I even write them down.

At the end of the day, try noting three things that made you happy or went well. They don’t have to be big achievements. Maybe you managed to go food shopping and remembered to buy vegetables. Maybe you crossed one thing off your to-do list at work. It all counts.

Some other things that genuinely help me are:

• Not picking up my phone as soon as I wake up. See how long you can go without looking at it.

• Drinking a pint of water with lemon while staring out into the garden. What can you notice?

• Taking my morning cuppa outside now the weather is improving. Sitting barefoot on the grass somehow makes me feel calmer.

• Listening to the birds and noticing the different songs.

• Doing something purely for fun. (My other blog, It Doesn’t Have to Look Like Mine (and that's the point), has some ideas for this.)

• Saying no to something. Once you realise you didn’t get struck by lightning for setting a boundary, it becomes much easier to do it again.

• Meditation or simply sitting in silence for five minutes. And remember, if you’re not doom scrolling first thing in the morning, you’ve probably already found those five minutes.

Final Thoughts

I really hope some of these things help you, or at least encourage you to recognise the moments when your mental health is in a good place so that, if it ever dips, you already have a bank of things that might help lift you again.

And if you need extra support too, in whatever form that looks like, that’s OK.

Whatever helps you feel a little more like yourself again is worth making space for. 💛