14 May 2018 is significant, not only because it marks the start of the exam season for our Year 11, 12 and 13 students, it is also the first day of Mental Health Awareness Week. This year, the focus or theme is Stress. In this article, our Head Girl, Claudia reflects on a recent session that Sixth Form were invited to as part of the Enrichment and Personal Development Programme.

Sixth Form had our second Stress Management session with a GP and Educational psychologist, and it was genuinely fascinating to see how similar many of us are in what we stress about, why we stress and how we cope.

Firstly we tried to come up with definitions for Stress and for Challenge, and compared the two, and whether or not they are linked. We concluded that they weren’t, because challenge is something we can overcome, and we know can be delayed to an extent, whereas stress can’t be.

Following from this we linked our coping mechanisms for stress, and it was interesting to observe the similarities and differences in how we all dealt with stress, and what we could learn from others and apply to ourselves. After we’d shared our ways to cope with stress, they were broadly categorised, into Emotion-focused coping, commonly involving distractions: running, sleeping, baking, reading and gaming. Problem-focused coping, which involved writing our problems down, making to do lists and breaking up our stress and potential solutions into smaller, more manageable chunks, this I would definitely recommend. There was also Relation-focused coping, speaking about problems with friends, going out and socialising. We were recommended the 3 minute meditations which can be found online, and lots of stress coping apps like Fast Calm, Smiling Mind and Head Space.

After realising how similar our problems and stresses were, the groups linked together feelings, behaviour, stress and actions, which was a great way to analyse the chain of thoughts behind stress, and realising that more action needs to be taken when feeling stressed, even if it’s something small like going for a walk or writing down a rant, just get the feelings off your chest to remove the burden, and try to make much more manageable and realistic aims for yourself, and know that exam results aren’t the be all and end all, put your mental health first.

Contributor: Claudia, Head Girl

If you have any concerns or want to talk, you should seek help by asking a GP or the school counselling service for advice. You could also book an appointment with Beth, our Sixth Form Chaplain.

The King Edward VI School have also produced a booklet for parents: Mental Health and Well Being in Teenagers – a Parent Guide. This can be accessed via this link.

Other Support::

Talking Matters accept self referrals if you feel as though you need some external support or therapy. You can contact them via 0300 30 30 700 or www.tmnorthumberland.org.uk/talking-matters-northumberland-e-referral-form/