The thing about Lonely - a poem.

This week is Mental Health Awareness Week and the theme this year is loneliness.

Yesterday, while driving with Leo to our favourite woodland group - one that’s been really beneficial for my own mental health postpartum - I got thinking about all the different forms loneliness can take, and how it can shift and reshape throughout our lives. It’s such a universal experience, yet subjective one. It can be temporary or chronic, and it can really impact our health. This poem began popping into my head so I jotted a few lines in my phone and told myself I’d finish writing it when I got home.

Now that I have Leo I’m almost never alone, but the irony of that is that is that it can sometimes feel lonely and isolating in a whole new way; to barely get a minute to yourself but also barely have a conversation all week that isn’t babble. It doesn’t help that I work from home, too!

I’ve found pushing myself out to local mum and baby groups, spending time outdoors and getting creative really helps me. It also helps me to observe and accept certain feelings of loneliness as a natural part of living too. But everyone’s loneliness is different and one person’s medicine is another person’s poison. Sometimes loneliness stems from not having the time or opportunity to do those things that help, too.

Sending love to all those struggling with feelings of loneliness, in whatever form. Chronic loneliness is such an awful place to be x