We should start off by normalising the fact that everyone in their lifetime is going to experience periods of sadness, stress or anxiety. This can actually be a good thing, because it tells us that our limbic system is doing exactly what it’s designed to do, which is manage our behavioural and emotional responses.
Despite knowing this, we often find it hard to determine when these emotions and feelings are at a point where it would be ‘worthwhile’ seeing a psychologist. This challenge in discernment is a huge barrier, which unfortunately results in most people doing nothing.
Some of us choose to just get on with it; Convincing ourselves it’s not that bad and I can manage. Whilst others may be fearful of the stigma surrounding seeing a psychologist; That it’s a sign of weakness to go and seek help.
The truth is most times when our intuition or ‘gut-feel’ is raising alarms for concern, it’s probably right.
Here are five tell-tale signs you should speak to a psychologist.
- Your symptoms are impacting your day to day life
When the feelings are interfering with our ability to do your normal day to do activities; it’s a good idea to speak with a psychologist. Here a few things to reflect on:
- Do I find it difficult to attend social gatherings or even go to the shops?
- Do I find myself spending most of the day worrying about things within or out of my control?
- Do I find it difficult to do activities that I would normally enjoy doing?
- Do I find it difficult to build meaningful relationships due to past experiences?
- Do I lack motivation and hope for the future?
- Do I find myself having intrusive thoughts about inflicting self harm to yourself or others?
- You have developed some unhealthy coping mechanisms
When any of us are faced with stress, trauma or any other unpleasant experience, we naturally develop some form of coping mechanism to help us deal with the stressor or trigger whilst maintaining our mental wellbeing.
And this is not to judge or put any labels such as one coping strategy is ‘bad’ and the other ‘good’. It’s important to know that at the end of day you’re doing the best you can with the tools you have in your arsenal.
However there may be some coping mechanisms you may have identified that if done through an extended period of time will create new problems in your life. For example, you may notice you’re overeating when you’re stressed or consuming more alcohol to help you unwind.
Speaking with a psychologist can help you find healthier ways to cope that won’t create new problems in your life and provide the same relief as your current strategy.
- Experienced a significant life event
This is commonly referred to as an ‘adjustment disorder’, where you may experience more stress than you normally would due to a significant or unexpected life event.
Starting a new job, moving out the house, divorce, being diagnosed with an illness, to the death of a loved one are all events that can cause a high amount of stress.
Talking with a psychologist during this time can be helpful in providing emotional support and guidance to adapt with these changes in your life.
- There have been changes to your sleep and eating patterns
Sleeplessness and mood disorders are closely linked. Your mood can affect how much sleep you get one night and your sleep can affect how you feel the next morning.
Similarly with our eating patterns. When experiencing bouts of stress, anxiety or depression some people may overeat, whilst others won’t eat at all.
It’s super important that if you notice these changes in your behaviour that you quickly act on it. A psychologist may be able to help identify the root causes for these changes and provide strategies to help improve your sleep and eating patterns.
- You’re struggling to regulate your emotions
We know that it’s normal to experience sadness, anger or anxiety at some point within our lives. However, it’s important to pay attention to the intensity and the frequency of how often you feel these emotions in your day to day life.
The way we experience emotions as adults is often related to the way we taught when we were children. For example if your father was prone to having angry outbursts you might learn that this is the way to express your anger or you might go the other way and grow up feeling that anger is a scary emotion that is not ok to feel or show.
The truth is that all emotions are important and play a massive role in our lives. Speaking with a psychologist will be able to provide useful tools to help you manage your emotions.
