Tree of Life Counselling
Men
Amy Bambury
Male Counselling Specialist
Men, welcome.
I wanted to dedicate a whole page of my website to you. You see, not only is there still a stigma around mental health and talking about it, there is also a difficulty for men to acknowledge it's ok to talk about not coping.
Do you feel you are supposed to be strong, capable, dependable, a provider, a protector, rescuer? And if you don't feel you are these things, it can wrongfully make you feel like a failure. Seemingly it's ok to hear a woman talk about how she feels and express her feelings, but when a man does it, many see him as weak.
So instead, as a man, you may choose to display your pain in other ways like, anger, infidelity, hostility or you may hide from it using work, alcohol, food or drugs. You are a human being and you feel pain. That's ok. Talking about how you feel and expressing feelings can, and does help men across the world every day.
How you hide from or display your pent up emotions can affect a lot of things, your relationships maybe aren't quite what they could be, your tolerance may be stretched or you might feel anxious or depressed, and all that can make you feel even more of a failure.
Maybe you are tired of keeping something secret, maybe you feel like you are carrying something heavy and that can be tiring too. Talking can help you find a way to be free from it. You can't change what happened but you can change how you feel about it.
I really want to be able to provide for you a safe space to be honest about how you feel and what you would really like to feel.
Maybe you are carrying things around from the past like:
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Bullying (in or out of school)
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Emotional Abuse
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Physical Abuse
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Sexual Abuse
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Rejection
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Overly Critical parents
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Trauma
These are all very big things to 'carry around' and they take up space, mental space, making it difficult for you to process other things that happen in life, making you short tempered, angry or tearful.
Imagine your mental space is like a bucket and as bad things happen in life they go into the bucket and it becomes full. When it's full you become tired from carrying it and it starts to overflow which means you lose control. Talking helps empty the bucket a bit, little by little and you then feel more able to carry it and have a bit of space which helps you feel in more control.
Maybe you think talking about it won't help? Thats a natural assumption to make. You would be surprised at the amount of men that I have worked with who have found relief through talking and after deciding they had nothing to lose, they have benefited enormously.
I do hope to hear from you and to help you find the healing, strength, clarity and peace you deserve.