World Bipolar Day: How can we help ourselves?

Friday March 30th is WORLD BIPOLAR DAY, raise awareness and eliminate the social stigma surrounding Bipolar Disorder. 

Jana Dowling, founder of The 888 Collective and co-developer of a brand new Mental Health Development Course, was diagnosed with bipolar last year after taking time off work for a severe depressive episode. Today she shares some of her story and a top tip to stay #BipolarStrong straight from the specially developed 888 Collective Course (spoiler alert - it's simpler than you might think!)

In order to stay #BipolarStrong...

Accepting responsibility and taking control of your personal mental health is key to creating a stable mental well-being. Those with issues, like myself, will always feel symptoms but I believe that with the right tools and support we can reduce the amount of times we experience our more severe symptoms.

Some of my main tips to achieve this is to monitor your sleep, whether you eat regularly and your alcohol and caffeine consumption. Just doing that for a couple of weeks and reflecting on it will give you an insight to your patters and potential connections between them and your symptoms.

“I won’t feed myself or sleep for three days, and then I will drop into a depressive episode. That happens if I have ONE cup of coffee!”

Personally, I know from doing this for a year and a half  that if I drink one cup of real coffee (I call it that, because I drink decaf), it pushes me into a manic phase. I won’t eat, I won’t sleep, I’ll do the same for a few days. I’ll be working too quickly and then I will drop into a depressive episode. That all happens just from one little cup of coffee.

That’s just my personal bipolar and my body and how it functions. We should know all the things we do to our body and the effect it has on our mental health.

Mood tracking is one of many skills people with bipolar can use to maintain mental wellness. What tips do you use to live with mental health issues? 

The next 888 Course runs from the 23rd to the 26th of April in East London. To learn more, enquire, and book, email bookings@the888collective.com