Advice and tips on living with mental illness

These blogs offer advice and tips on how to talk about mental health to friends, colleagues and family as well as more general tips on dealing with mental illness.

They are written by people with personal experiences of mental health problems who, through talking about mental health openly, aim to break down stereotypes and take the taboo out of something that affects people across the country.

For instance, Shea wrote about the experiences of her and her husband and offers 5 top tips for dealing with mental health in a relationship.

Read other people’s stories below or pledge to share your experience of mental health today >>

Dealing with postnatal depression: blogging helped

Submitted by __Rachel__ on Wed, 20/03/2013 - 9:15am

Rachel, a Time to Change blogger Six weeks after giving birth to my second child, eighteen months ago, I was diagnosed with Post Natal Depression (PND).

I don't remember a great deal about this dark time to be honest. I had half worried that my GP would tell me to pull myself together and send me on my way. Luckily, he was (and still is) incredibly supportive.

Billie Myers on her experience of depression

Submitted by Billie_Myers on Tue, 12/03/2013 - 3:58pm

Billie Myers talks about her experience of depression When I said, “Yes, sure I'll write a blog” about my personal experience with depression I didn't realise how scared and nervous I would be when I sat down to put pen to paper.

Really, what on earth could I say on this topic, that hasn’t been expressed or experienced by millions of people before me, right here on this site?

Guidance for blogging about self-harm, suicide, and eating disorders

Submitted by Time to Change on Mon, 03/12/2012 - 6:24pm

Time to Change encourages people with lived experience of mental health problems to write openly and honestly about their story. We want everyone to feel that they can discuss their experience of stigma and discrimination on all sorts of issues, including self harm, suicide, and eating disorders.

We have just a few guidelines to help keep the content safe and non-triggering for readers.

Five top tips for writing blogs

Submitted by Time to Change on Mon, 03/12/2012 - 6:13pm

Blogs are a great way to spread the Time to Change message and share the experiences of a range of different people.

It can be pretty scary putting your story out for the world to see, particularly if your self esteem and confidence has taken a bit of a battering throughout the course of your mental health problem. But actually, the whole act of writing a blog and releasing it into the internet wilderness can be so liberating, empowering, and most of all therapeutic.