self care – COURAGE COACHING

High functioning depression

Happy Monday dear friends & followers!

After a wonderful 10 days off work, celebrating my birthday with friends and exploring new places with my husband, I am feeling grateful and refreshed.

Today’s topic is especially important to me, as someone I care about deeply is currently suffering with this type of depression.

Although high functioning depression is a milder form of depression, it is equally as important as other types of depression.

When it comes to depression, many of us envision a person caught in the depths of despair and hopelessness, who wants nothing more than to stay in bed and avoid people and work completely. We envision someone who has lost all interest in the things they love, who may be feeling suicidal and is barely holding it together.

Although the above isn’t inaccurate, it doesn’t portray life as a high functioning depressive.

When someone suffers with mild or high functioning depression, the typical joy and laughter they once felt, is usually replaced by an absence of emotion and a very deep feeling of emptiness.
This is known as anhedonia and it is the loss of interest in previously rewarding or enjoyable activities.

To the outside world they seem like they are coping fine. They are still able to go to work every day and communicate effectively. They are still able to reach goals and get out of bed in the morning.

The most unfortunate part of those with this milder form of depression is that when they talk about their feelings to loved ones and even doctors, they aren’t taken seriously enough.

Unless someone is literally unable to function, they seem to be dismissed as not having anything to worry about. This isn’t good!

When life circumstances change, those experiencing mild depression may be at greater risk for moderate to severe depression if treatment isn’t sought early enough.

This is also discussed in my youtube video, so feel free to share if you think it may help someone you know.

Love Athina ♥

The aftermath of a traumatic incident

As much as I dislike watching the news and tend to limit what I take in, it is increasingly difficult to not be affected by the constant bombardment of war footage, terrorist attacks, murder and suffering.

When you are a highly sensitive & empathetic person, it is easy to get overwhelmed by the sadness of others. I am very much aware of the cruel injustice in our world and it hurts me deeply to see so many suffering. It is even tougher when this is repeated in your own country. Due to the fact that I know what it feels like to have your life threatened, I decided to make the following video on the aftermath of trauma. This is my small contribution towards all those affected.

Despite my traumatic childhood, I was also once caught up in armed robbery, where a gunshot went off right next to me and a woman was lying on the floor with blood on her leg. The disbelief of what I had witnessed was indescribable. The terror I felt shook me to the core. I couldn’t comprehend how someone could shoot a gun, when everyone at the cashier was cooperating and the robbers had managed to get their money.

This armed robbery happened at a time where I was very vulnerable already as my CPTSD was really bad. All I could think of after this robbery was ‘not again, not another trauma to add to my list’. Life felt so unfair and scary on that day and my mind was telling me that there was more damage done and that I would not recover this time.

If it wasn’t for my kind therapist at the time, to ground me and tell me that I wasn’t going to let this swallow me, I don’t know how I would have coped in the long term.

So this video is for those of you who are new to trauma. It is helpful in understanding yourself after a traumatic experience and it gives you the tools you need to ride the emotional waves that may at times feel like they are taking over.

Although I am not a qualified psychotherapist, I do have a lot of insight into trauma through my own journey and I know the many things that helped me, as well as others. If you are someone who is in deep distress, then please call a qualified mental health professional.

Thank you so much for reading & watching! ♥

Please share this post if you think it will help others.

Check out my patreon page below, if you would like to support the creation of more videos, documents and fact sheets.

https://www.patreon.com/AthinaEhlen

Love Athina ♥

Finding a balance between self-soothing and running away from emotional pain is tough..

Inspired by a comment made by a friend on her facebook page, I wanted to address the difficulty of finding a balance between self-soothing and running away from emotional pain. I also wanted to write about what it actually means to self-soothe.

Self-soothing is about allowing yourself to experience any uncomfortable emotions by using healthy techniques to comfort and restore balance. Successful self-soothing doesn’t mean that you make the feelings more intense. It means that you will eventually enable the emotions to pass. Self-soothing is about tolerating an uncomfortable experience, without acting in ways that are not helpful in the long run. This is when running away from emotional pain comes in. If you choose to block your emotions or run from them, this will then make the emotions grow in intensity or come out in ways you didn’t intend in the future.

Running away from emotional pain looks like the following:

Compulsively drinking, smoking or self-medicating
Using meaningless sexual encounters to numb emotional pain or fear of abandonment
Compulsively working or keeping busy to avoid feeling
Sleeping too much to avoid feeling
Comfort or emotional eating – Eating too much sugar or fatty foods whenever you feel low
Compulsively exercising
Gambling
Compulsively shopping

Do you see a pattern here? The more addictively or compulsively you do something, the more it means you are running away from what needs to be dealt with. It’s like an ostrich burying its head in the sand — just because you are hiding from everything and pretending everything is okay, does not mean that it will be okay.

We are all guilty of running away from our emotions. Sometimes they are just too painful to deal with and nobody wants to feel pain of any sort.

My biggest vice seems to still be comfort eating. I love my cakes & biscuits unfortunately, although apart from those, I generally eat a very balanced diet. Chain smoking used to be my biggest coping mechanism from the ages of 15-22 but I am so glad that I was able to quit.

Luckily, I have become better at self-soothing. I have realised that the more I deal with my emotions, the better I feel in the long term.

When feelings are dealt with head on, you talk about them, you cry, you blog about them, you ask a friend for support and you do something in that moment that will help you feel a little better, safer or comforted.

Self-soothing means that you wrap yourself in a blanket and play your favourite music. It means that you take yourself for a walk in nature. It means you find a quiet space in your home and you focus on breathing slowly and deeply and calming yourself down. It means that when you are feeling especially low, you read out some positive affirmations to help empower you. It means that you run a bath with your favourite oil or bath foam.It means that you engage in something creative. It means that you listen to your body.It means that you practice self-compassion and kindness to yourself. Self-soothing can be done using all 5 senses.

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There are so many ways to self-soothe and everyone has different ways of doing so.

What is your experience?

Do you feel you are somewhere in the middle of self-soothing and running away from your problems or not?

Please share your experiences.

Thanks for reading

Love Athina♥♥

The loss of what should have been

When you don’t get certain basic needs met in your childhood, there will come a time in your future where you will eventually become awakened to these unmet needs. Although this isn’t the same for everyone, there is usually one feeling which is most prevalent for most: ”The feeling of being ripped off”

This feeling of being ripped off, because you didn’t have a healthy family or because you no longer have a family to turn to, starts a very real and painful journey of mourning.

A lot of people who grew up with abusive parents, or in one parent families, or in families where their parents were chronically ill, learned to ‘live on autopilot’. They either had to push down their feelings to keep the peace, be a confidant or carer to the sick parent or learned that they had to solely rely on themselves. Even when they were scared and had no one to turn to as children, they had to keep going. As early adulthood approached, they may have found many ways to cope with this underlying feeling of sadness or anger, by drinking too much, working too much and generally trying to find ways to numb out any uncomfortable feelings that would creep up.

When an adult child is first awakened to the reality of what really was and what now is, they somehow know that things will never feel the same again. It might be that a certain event in their adult life uncovered feelings that had been buried deep inside them and suddenly the strength that they thought would always keep the safe, slowly starts to crumble. New anxieties, fears & losses start to unfold and the world suddenly starts to feel like a scary & unsafe place.

At this early stage of realisation, when adult children come to terms with the fact that they needed so much more than what they were given emotionally, the grief can feel overwhelming. Grief for adult children is a complex emotion because so much of the loss has been built up over time and they have long learned to adapt to the constant loss of an ideal childhood. Looking into the future feels bleak and they feel as if things are only going to get worse rather than better.

Through my own journey of grief, I learned that it isn’t a straightforward process and that it doesn’t have a certain time limit. When the grief was so overwhelming at times that I couldn’t imagine a better future, I reminded myself that it was necessary for me to truly feel the sadness. When your heart feels broken you have to let it heal and healing requires compassion & patience with yourself.

Pete Walker is a truly Inspirational Psychologist and survivor of childhood abuse. His words below really resonate:

“…the broken heart that has been healed through grieving is stronger and more loving than the one that has never been injured. Every heartbreak of my life, including the brokenheartedness of my childhood, has left me a stronger, wiser and more loving person than the one I was before I grieved”

The last thing that is worth mentioning, is that a lot of people don’t start their journey of recovery & grief from childhood trauma, unless it is emotionally safe for them to do so. It might be that they are in a supportive relationship and a stable environment and this enables them to ‘let go’ and just be vulnerable. It might be that they have found a therapist which they feel comfortable enough to be themselves.

Recovery from the losses of one’s childhood is necessary in order to restore balance & new found hope in the future.

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What is your experience?

Love Athina ♥

You are not a failure

Nobody told you when you were a child that life could feel so tough sometimes.

Nobody told you that life could drain the joy right out of you, just when you thought things were getting better.

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Life is a crazy rollercoaster and you have to ride it out, no matter what it throws at you.

It might be that your boss criticizes you, no matter how much extra work you put in.

It might be that your partner who once made you smile, now only seems to point out all your flaws.

Your family might be hopeless at supporting you and instead always tells you when you have let them down.

Your looks fall short of what is considered beautiful, your body has piled on the pounds and your health is deteriorating.

Your money problems never seem to end and you are surrounded by angry, hateful and impatient people.

Everywhere you seem to look, there are people pointing out what is wrong with you.

Your career isn’t where it is supposed to be. You still aren’t married and people think there is something wrong with you for not wanting to have kids.

Even people with the best self-esteem, can end up feeling horrible.

Everywhere you look, people are pointing out that you are a failure..

Outer criticism ends up becoming inner criticism. That inner criticism ends up taking hold of your daily life and you can’t seem to silence that nasty little voice inside you that tells you, you have failed.

You might have once been a reasonably confident person and now you are nowhere near that.

Do you find yourself being haunted by this inner voice of failure? Do you find yourself needing to apologise for things that are out of your control?

Are you sorry that you couldn’t do better at work? Then you failed

Are you sorry that you couldn’t lose weight? Then you failed

Are you sorry that your partner left you? Then you failed

Are you sorry that you are too sick to support your family? Then you failed

Are you sorry that you are struggling with the housework? Then you failed

Are you sorry that everything is too stressful? Then you failed

These negative thoughts are very harmful, even though you may not think so. When you internalise self-doubt your body absorbs it. Your muscles tense and you can actually become physically ill from it. If you allow others negativity to affect how you see yourself, then this might become a vicious cycle.

Have you ever noticed that when an abusive spouse, parent or boss criticizes you, you get nervous and are more likely to make more mistakes? The more difficult the people around you, the more on edge you feel and the more clumsy you may become. This was definetely the case with me for many years…

It is crucial to be aware of how destructive it can be to give your control away to others. If you constantly accept that you are a failure, because you judge yourself through others’ eyes, then you will eventually freeze. You will stop trying, you will stop living..

So how do you change this? How do you manage to keep the negativity that surrounds you away?

First of all, remember this! You are NOT A FAILURE!

You are not a failure because you failed your driving test.

You are not a failure because your relationship ended.

You are not a failure because you lost your job.

You are not a failure because you don’t want kids.

You are not a failure because others think you are.

Making mistakes in life is NORMAL. Making mistakes in life doesn’t mean that you are a failure. A mistake is just a mistake! This doesn’t make you anything less than wonderful.

Mistakes help you learn and at least you were brave enough to take on new opportunities.

Every time you catch yourself telling yourself that you are a failure, then say the word ‘STOP’. You are not a failure..

Remind yourself of all the good things you have done and that you are proud of. Even the tiniest things can mean so much! Don’t let others define you. Nothing matters more than the opinion YOU HAVE of yourself.

Never apologise for not being good enough because you are a valuable and worthy person. No matter how much others judge you, don’t let their voice drown out your own.

YOU ARE NOT A FAILURE!

Love Athina ♥

4 tips before going ‘No contact’ with a narcissistic parent

If you are currently considering ‘No contact’ with a narcissistic parent, then this video might be helpful.

Love Athina ♥

Being selfish the right way

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‘Selfish’ means that you care enough about yourself to get your needs met; selfishness is a choice.

On the other hand, when you think about being ‘needy’, this means that your unmet/unknown needs motivate you — there’s no choice. This is when you become a people-pleaser and you lack the assertiveness to say no.

This isn’t where you want to be in this journey called life.

Selfish does not mean to focus exclusively on yourself — it just means that you easily can when you need to.

Selfish does not mean you become an irresponsible 4 year old, who does whatever he/she wants and ignores the needs of their family or their work.

Selfish means that you learn to love, value, accept, forgive, be true to, and care for yourself fully and wholeheartedly.

Healthy selfishness feels like taking a risk because you might have been brought up to believe that being selfish is a bad thing. However, healthy selfishness simply means you do not disregard yourself to please others or to support others at your own expense. Healthy selfishness means that you practice self-love and self-care.

How do you see yourself? Do you practice healthy selfishness?

I’d love to hear your experiences..

Love Athina ♥♥

© All blog posts and images are owned by me and Courage Coaching. Please don’t use without consent and only re-blog if you would like to use the information on here.

YouTube video:Is it possible to completely cure Complex PTSD?Tips for a better chance at healing.

I hope you are all enjoying your weekend to the best of your ability.To those of you struggling at the moment, I hope you are doing ok and reaching out for support. The blogging community is filled with wonderful, caring people and it is important to keep this community positive and encouraging. To those of you who need it, I am sending you a big hug! ♥ Take it one step at a time ♥

As some of my regural readers know, I am off to London tomorrow until Thursday to visit family and friends, while my husband is away for work.My Youtube videos are usually posted every Monday, however due to the fact I am off to London tomorrow, I decided to do this one a little earlier.

I talk about Complex PTSD once again, as there are so many of you who suffer with it and I am pretty sure that you need some hope, to keep fighting it and keep moving forward. Through lots of research and from my own personal experience, I talk about the most helpful things you can do to support your healing.

Much love Athina ♥

Grief

Although grief is a huge part of life, it is something that none of us want to experience.

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We can grieve over the loss of a loved one or beloved pet.

We can grieve over the loss of a job or home.

We can grieve whenever a new change happens in our lives, such as the loss of personal freedom when we have children or the loss of certain abilities when we become physically or mentally ill.

Sometimes the reasons we grieve are very subtle.

In general though, the journey through grief is a long one and it is important to give oneself time to grieve and to endure the overwhelming emotions that often accompany grief. Everyone moves at his or her own pace and along this path there will be circumstances which hinder one’s progress and circumstances which assist one’s progress. It may even take a lifetime to reach the desired goals of acceptance and inner peace.

If you are someone who grew up in an abusive & invalidating home, you will experience a more complicated type of grief. You will go through a grieving process which can take several years and will sometimes never completely go away. To not have had a nurturing & safe childhood means that you never experienced yourself as feeling nurtured & unconditionally loved. You will never, ever know what it is like to have healthy parents because this only happens once in your lifetime.You might only get glimpses of healthy families from friends that are lucky enough to have this and this will deeply hurt in its’ own way. If you were fostered, you might have finally managed to experience unconditional love later in your childhood but this still doesn’t completely undo the damage you have already experienced.

There are many ways to deal with grief. Ways that most of us have experienced to be healthy, such as allowing ourselves to cry and deeply feel our emotions of despair & unfairness.Crying doesn’t make us weak, it can actually strengthen us emotionally and physically. Crying stimulates production of endorphins which are the “feel good” hormones in our body.

Other ways are to turn to friends for support, write a journal or blog online. Exercise is also a great antidote to grief, no matter how hard it feels to actually do any.

The thing about grief that is important to remember is that it can feel mentally and physically exhausting. Practicing self-care during periods of grief is crucially important.

Rest & healthy eating are paramount during times of grief and reducing things like alcohol & drugs is also very important, as although you might feel like numbing yourself, this will only prolong the process of grieving.

If you are spiritual or have another faith, then this will also help you when you are feeling at your lowest.

It is also very important to try and avoid other stressful situations, especially at the early stages of grief.

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What are your experiences with grief?

If you are currently grieving, then please feel free to use this page as an outlet for your painful emotions at the moment and for support.

Comments are always welcome..

Much love,

Athina ♥

Recovery from abuse- 3 basic stages & how to identify whether you have reached the acceptance stage of recovery

Happy Monday fellow bloggers. This is quite a late post, so I hope it reaches some of you.

I have just done another video on YouTube, where I talk about the 3 main stages of recovery that someone goes through, in particular concerning the recovery from childhood narcissistic abuse. I also talk a little bit about the acceptance stage of recovery, which I personally found the toughest in my own recovery.

Acceptance that you parents weren’t able to love you unconditionally, is a painful, rejecting reality. It is easier to spend most of your adult life being in denial of this, as it is such an incomprehensible reality to accept.

Once you are able to reach this stage of acceptance however, you feel like a huge burden has been lifted off you.

I wish all of you who struggle with this sort of realisation, to be able to finally reach this stage one day.

Love Athina ♥