Wellness Wednesdays

This week marks International Women's Day on Monday and International Women's Week at UoS. This year's theme is  Women in Leadership: Achieving an equal future in a COVID-19 world , to celebrate the efforts of women and girls around the world in shaping a more equal future and recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic and to highlight the gaps that remain. Globally, women have been at the forefront of the battle against COVID-19, as front-line and health sector workers, as scientists, doctors and caregivers, yet they get paid 11 per cent less than their male counterparts. Women in the UK have experienced the pandemic in diverse ways. As a working mum and academic, I am interested in mothers' experiences of juggling childcare responsibilities and employment in lockdown. Recent research has shown a stark impact on mother's mental wellbeing, particular for women from racially minoritised groups. As a society we need to understand the disproportionate impact of COVID on women

Wellness Wednesday Happy Wednesday all! One positive thing I am focusing on this week is that January is officially over and Spring is on its way 🌤 🌿 🌸 This week I am sharing this fabulous poster with some great tips for maintaining wellbeing when working from home. The poster was designed by Occupational Therapy students Chantelle Buchanan, Rebecca Richardson and Sabah Bedekar from the University of Salford.

Race Equality Week   This week marks the UK’s first Race Equality Week and I want to take this opportunity to acknowledge what 'wellness' means to our BAME* staff and students who are disproportionately affected by COVID, as they are by many other illnesses and diseases including mental health problems. As well as systemic health inequalities, our BAME colleagues and peers will face frequent bias, discrimination, and racism which undoubtably contributes to their overall wellbeing. Certain groups within the BAME population are much more likely to experience a mental health problem than the white population, yet more white people receive treatment for mental health issues than BAME people. Some of the barriers preventing access to mental health support in the BAME population include cultural barriers; fear of Mental Health Services where Black males in particular, are more likely to be imprisoned than treated; language barriers; white professionals not being able to fully underst

This week I am sharing a post by my good friend and relationship coach  Angharad Owen . I think her words are really important as we move through this challenging lockdown situation - it's okay to be feeling down and frustrated at the same as being grateful for what you do have. Angharad writes: "When I am asking people how are they right now, many are responding with: 👉"I’m ok, you know I have a job, I should be grateful’’. 👉 "People are worse off than me, I shouldn’t complain’’. 👉 "I feel bad saying I’m down, I should be happy really’’. I look at their face…..and they are in this stiff, stuck, expressionless mode. And I say..... ‘’You know it’s ok,  you can be grateful and annoyed or angry. You can be happy with how life is right now as well as frustrated. You can be grieving your old life and be happy coming to terms with this new one.‘’ . ..And there is this HUGE relief that comes over their face and then they tell me how they really are. The majority

Happy New Year Everyone! I hope that you managed to get some rest over the festive period and that if you celebrate Christmas, you had a nice time. As we start this new year in a less than ideal situation, it is so important that we keep the conversation about wellness going, even if we don't feel very motivated to. This week I want to share this post by  Kirsty Gallagher  with you:   The new year has started off with yet more restrictions but please remember that we are still in hibernation mode at the moment. Our true new year begins in March with the Spring Equinox. We shouldn’t necessarily be out there in the world ‘doing’ at the moment and so try and see the blessing in that we are being given this opportunity to not blindly rush headlong into the year and either burn ourselves out too soon or go in the wrong direction as we have not given ourselves time to feel and flow gently into the year and settle into her energies first. For too long we have lived out of alignment with n

Positive affirmations     In previous posts, I have talked about the power of thought in triggering emotional and stress responses.  Mindfulness  approaches teach us that we have the power to control our thoughts, through first of all bringing our attention to them, secondly acknowledging that unhelpful thoughts are not reality, and thirdly through meditation, learning to let go of unhelpful thoughts and focusing on the reality of what is happening in the present moment.      Positive affirmations are another tool that we can use to benefit our mental health. A positive affirmation is a powerful, positive statement or judgment believed to be true. We make unconscious affirmations constantly throughout the day, and they will not always be positive. These can become limiting beliefs and these thoughts are exactly what we are trying to address through a mindfulness approach.     Positive affirmations are a powerful way to begin to shift these limiting beliefs and move in the direction of