"You have changed my life"

I have always suffered with poor mental health from a child, going through peaks and troughs but it was always rocky with experiences of self harm, panic attacks, an eating disorder and various addictions and dysfunctional behaviours. I lost my job at the end of 2020. I was struggling greatly in that position before losing my job. Everything just went downhill no matter what I tried, my thoughts were just garbage and I couldn't make sense of anything.

This culminated in me experiencing a period of severely unstable moods, drinking heavily and sadly self harming. Something I had not done in five years. I started to formulate a plan, having days on my own to ruminate, beat myself up and isolate myself further into my poor habits. My husband finally got me to call NHS24 mental health crisis support thing. A very nice nurse took me through lots of various questions about my mental state and the severity of my self harm injuries. I was referred to an online CBT service which didn't work out as it was not suited to me at that time. The poor man who I was paired with listened to two or three weeks of my suicidal thoughts and plans, not being able to engage at all with the materials laid out in the course. He very sensitively and kindly explained this to me and informed his manager about the crisis I was in and they referred me back to the crisis team where Adult Psychology at Stirling Community Hospital Care Village contacting me with an appointment. 

I had been referred to this service before when I had my last episode in 2016 and they were very good. This time was just life changing. I was assigned a wonderful psychologist called Taylor who for over a year and a half listened to me, reassured me and comforted me. My appointments were always via the near me video service the NHS use which was great, there were a couple of tech issues sometimes but nothing major and she would call me if  the interruption was particularly bad. The video appointments were so important to my recovery as one thing that develops when I'm bad is agoraphobia so leaving home is nigh on impossible. There was one day in particular I was in a total state, panic, tears, wobbles and was still able to attend therapy in this state, sit under a blanket in the comfort of my home, with my cat and with Taylor and have company while I worked through, in real time, what was going on. I have never ever had that as I have always to a degree tried to save face in therapy and not show up in a complete state. I just wouldn't have gone to a face to face appointment that day and made up some stupid excuse, I would have just felt guilty and useless about. What a turning point.

She provided me with many invaluable resources I still use. She gave me such incredible insights, gently introducing new perspectives and techniques which led me to have very profound shifts in my psychology which have stuck fast after a year of concluding my treatment with her. She accompanied me when I ventured to explore my scarier more horrible thoughts and experiences, always meeting with understanding, patience and compassion. She even consistently challenged my more difficult thoughts also, helping me gain more insight into what was going on in my head. She always celebrated with me when I challenged myself and told her my achievements as our sessions progressed and I progressed.

I find it difficult to express just how profoundly this experience has change me and my life. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for helping me build my life back better and stronger than I could ever imagine. I'm in full time employ which I love, my marriage is stronger than it ever has been and I get so much genuine joy from life now. I hope you and all your dogs are doing well, I will always appreciate the time we worked together, you have changed my life.