Negative thoughts

OceanDreaming

Hi, I’ve just started uni after taking a gap year for my mental health - it was a really good year with lots of relaxing! Obviously there’s a lot more going on now I’m at uni and more stress with studying etc. There’s also a lot less time for fun (I used to do a lot of colouring and drawing and walking and play games, often with my family when I could). My mood overall is still okay though, I’m definitely not depressed and am staying positive most of the time!! Sometimes my thoughts get quite negative however, perhaps even intrusive thoughts, and they can be about harming myself. As soon as I get these thoughts I try to stop and ground myself and I quickly realise that I don’t actually want to hurt myself or cause myself pain, which I think is a very good thing, but I do realise that maybe these thoughts are stemming from me being kinda bored??? I used to get them at school, both when I was depressed (and thus more likely to act on these thoughts) and when I was started to get better and I think they were partly caused my the same thing then because I didn’t have them at all during the last year, when I was having fun and doing things I wanted to do rather than the studying that I had to do/have to do now. I’m not sure exactly how to stop this vague feeling of being bored, because I don’t want to just stop doing uni work! I’m also not sure whether it’s worth talking to the uni well-being team for support - I don’t want my thoughts to be misconstrued as active suicidal ideation or anything like that because it would just spiral into something that it isn’t and cause me distress. Any thoughts or advice??

Aoife

You're doing so well in processing how you're feeling @OceanDreaming. It takes so much strength to catch those difficult thoughts and work through grounding yourself, and that's something to be really proud of. Is there a particular grounding exercise you find most helpful? How have you been managing the transition to uni? Big changes like that can feel overwhelming at times for some people, I hope you're doing okay

It might be really helpful to reach out to your uni's wellbeing team for some extra support, it's great you've got a team there at your uni. Even just popping in to see what types of services they offer could make a difference. You're already showing such great self-awareness in recognising your emotions and identifying that this isn't suicidal ideation. If they ask any questions around that, you're in a strong place to explain how you’re feeling.

There are also some great organisations out there that offer support when it comes to self-harm urges, so you’re never alone in this. Reaching out to them could give you even more tools to help manage during these moments where you're having these thoughts to self-harm. I've shared a couple below that you may wish to look into

*Crisis Messenger (24/7) | text THEMIX to 85258
*Samaritans (24/7) | call 116 123 | email jo@samaritans.org
*CALM | Call on 0800 58 58 58 (5pm–midnight every day) or use their webchat service.
*Self-injury support - self-harm & self-injury charity offering direct support via email, text, phone and webchat.
*Calm Harm - is an NHS approved app designed to prevent people from urges to self-harm.

Keep us updated with how you're feeling