Just outside my window, I can see a beautiful yellow rose. It wasn’t there last week, well actually it was, but it was just tightly bound up under its green calyx. A lot can happen in a week, in a day, in a moment. I can see the beauty but to deeply […]
Getting Well Staying Well
201 posts
Around the hillside of the sheep farm where I was raised were grooves worn into the soil by hundreds of sheep following each other. It was the easiest route. I also have routes in my thinking patterns that have become ruts. Familiar paths that have been worn deep into my thinking. A thought gets […]
If you were to open my mother’s Bible the first thing you would notice would be the handwritten verses and quotes that helped her mental health. Bible verses that can truly bring help. Dig a little further and you would come across underlined verses, cut out sections from the church […]
You don’t know what you don’t know, and if you’re mentally unwell, this unawareness can be huge. Well, that is kind of obvious, but actually, there are times when you look back over your life and wish that you knew then what you know now. Now I’m not talking about […]
I’ve been allergic to egg all my life. At times I have even ended up in a hospital when I have inadvertently eaten egg. One time as a child I went to a camp and the cooks thought that I was just being fussy. They didn’t tell that what I […]
You have an Unbearable Feeling, let’s gets some help and find out what it is. I was in one of those novelty gift stores the other day, and there it was. A button that needed to be pushed. It was a big red rubber button that when pushed it said […]
It was off to the races, and my thoughts and feelings were racing around in my head. Out in front was ‘This and that’ followed firmly behind by ‘Panic’ and ‘Fear.’ Neck and neck were ‘Hopelessness’ and ‘Despair’ while ‘Stuck in the Mud’ was stuck in the mud and sinking. […]
We’ve been robbed in more ways than we know. It wasn’t the usual snatch and grab. This was more a subtle insidious taking of life. In the early stages of their depressive illness, they had been put on the new wonder drug Valium. With strong tranquillizing effects, life was muted. Then […]
Life can be hard, and maybe even harsh at times, but in the end, something beautiful and good can emerge from the struggle. Love is like that. It was an old climbing rose that hadn’t been well cared for. When I started to do some gardening work on an old […]
When going through Mental Health struggles, you have to give yourself permission to receive, especially from God. Every Tuesday morning, I travel to a garden in a small rural area called Clevedon. I leave early to beat rush hour traffic but also to get a few moments on the top […]
The grind is real. Life for many can be just one continual experience of being ground out by the daily grind. Every now and then, someone sends me an email. I read them all, and always my heart is touched. I send some prayers and ask God to help me write […]
To heal, we need to humbly accept the truth of our human fragility. Medication can help us heal. There is a soap opera here in New Zealand called Shortland Street. In the very first episode, a nurse tells a doctor a simple sentence that has become, believe it or not, part […]
There are times that my thoughts and feelings seem to swing like monkeys in a tree. My mind just seems to go everywhere. It swings into depression, anxiety and then back into depression. My mind seems to have a mind of its own.
This was never going to be a typical funeral. This was the celebration of a life well lived by a mother to 11 children. A strong farmers wife who not only milked the cows, preserved the fruit but also cared with deep love for each of her children. One of the […]
I always thought sheep were pretty dumb. But with the habits they I now realise that actually they aren’t totally woolly in their thinking. (sorry had to say it) As I child, on a New Zealand sheep farm, I remember asking my father a very simple question. What is this line […]
What is it like to feel alone with your struggle? You are having a hard time in your life. There is pain, frustration, a desperateness and you feel completely alone with it. You may have people around you who care. They may even be professionals such as doctors, nurses, support workers, […]
We all have an identity, a name we have been given, and can identify with. The connection deepens when we learn each other’s name. Each morning I start my day in a comfortable chair, listen to the Bible, thinking about the day ahead, and making a list of tasks. Often […]
Days and weeks roll into each other and tiredness slowly seeps into your soul. When each day feels like one horrendous day upon another and the treadmill is jammed on marathon setting then you need to retreat to an oasis. Do you have an Oasis? Can you give yourself […]
Dirt, spit, and mud. What a combination that brought medicine to a blind man’s eyes. Jesus works healing in ways we couldn’t imagine. It was just a typical sort of day. I was out on the street listening to everyone passing by. Right from birth, I had been blind, but […]
As a person who has experienced mental illness and as someone who is seen by many as unable to provide any kind of valuable input to society, as somebody who is generally seen as more of a burden than a contributor I have often felt like a burden to others. […]