ZUELA: Lingerie that reminds you to take care of yourself

You might be wondering what lingerie has to do with mental health. It’s as simple as this, ‘THE FIRST PIECE YOU PUT ON IN THE MORNING AS PART OF YOUR MORNING ROUTINE; THAT REMINDS YOU TO BE KIND TO YOURSELF’ I really appreciate this quote from Steff the founder of Zuela.

She started the brand through her own struggles with mental health and I wanted to talk here today about my struggles in hopes that it would help somebody else.

I always feel very vulnerable sharing personal struggles but I’ve done it before and I know first hand how much it’s helped somebody, just by speaking up!

I don’t want to go into a long story. So let’s call this a long story short. Approximately 5 years ago, I hit rock bottom. I’d been depressed before, suffered with anxiety since god knows when (I just didn’t realise that it was a condition and thought I was weird) I don’t think I can really explain how awful I felt.

I used to look into the mirror and it was like I was empty. There was a person starring back at me but it was like nobody was inside of me. I felt hollow. I didn’t even really feel sad I just felt nothing. 

I struggled terribly with insomnia. And I had a huge fear of death. But at the same time I didn’t really want to be here anymore. I remember staying awake until 4-5am every morning until my body couldn’t cope and I’d fall to sleep. Then I would wake early feeling panicky. For no real reason. I went on for weeks feeling this way. It could’ve been months to be honest time was a blur.

I eventually spoke to my doctor about the way I was feeling and she referred me to a group that focused on mental health. I found the group overwhelming. It helped hearing that other people were feeling similar to myself but it wasn’t healing anything that was going on inside my mind. So I started one to one counselling and honestly this was the best thing I’ve ever done. I learnt an abundance about mental health. I started to understand why I was feeling the way I felt and discovered my triggers. This motivated me to research into depression and anxiety and I found that diet can play a huge part in the way we feel mentally, so I took steps to create balancing meals and started to study nutrition. I started a strict self care regimen and every night I would bathe in magnesium salts or Epsom salts. I started using essential oils and approached every natural remedy that I had discovered on my search to heal.

What I learnt through this tough time is that you won’t feel better after one day, one week or maybe even one month. But the main thing is you’re motivated to take control of your mental health. I learnt that CBT gives you back control over your mind once you learn the skill of CBT you can never forget it, it engraves itself into your mind and you use it without even thinking. You have to be patient with yourself. Talking to a professional will do more for your wellbeing than you might think. Meditation is magic. Yoga too! Learning to understand why you react and behave the way you do helps you grow and evolve and though you may feel bad about certain situations you shouldn’t because it’s not your fault your mind ended up this way. We are conditioned from a very young age and the smallest thing can shape your mentality. A lot of my triggers came from childhood.

I am grateful that I have been through the worst time, it was horrendous and I started to believe that I would never get better and that I would never feel happy or passionate again. I would watch laurel and hardy on loop in bed so that I had some sort of joy. I remember one night I had a panic attack so severe I thought I was about to die. I made my family call the ambulance because it felt like my heart had stopped I couldn’t feel anything it was such a surreal experience. That was the first time I experienced anything like that I felt so guilty when the paramedics explained what had happened to me! This wasn’t the last time I had a panic attack, anxiety or depression. Since that dark time I’ve suffered with PND twice after both of my babies and also pre natal depression during my pregnancy with Béla.

The difference was I was able to control it. They were still very difficult times. But I knew as soon as I started to react and feel certain ways that I needed to speak to somebody before things got out of control. I had to have counselling again after Béla as things started to get really bad and I didn’t want to leave the house and if I had to I would have a melt down before. But I saw a private therapist and she was incredible and again a lot of issues came up from childhood and because I was now a mother my mind started to fear things again.

Sometimes I do start to loose control a bit but I have the tools to turn things around and I know from experience that talking to people helps so much. But also choosing to take care of myself even if that may seem selfish to other people we have to do what’s best for us at these difficult times.

My main points of advice to you if you’re suffering with anxiety, depression or panic attacks would be...

1. Counselling
2. Self care regimen
3. Wholesome healthy food
4. Magnesium baths and supplement
5. Meditation
6. Yoga
7. Quit watching hectic TV (eg. NEWS, soap operas or anything that could cause fear or worry or stressful emotions)
8. Reading (CBT books or any type of self help book)
9. Do something you’re passionate about think back to childhood and what made you most happy for me it was dance, dancing was the final thing that I needed for my self care!
10. Be patient with yourself and know that it will get better and all these feelings will soon be in your past.

You can see me here happily wearing the beautiful lingerie set by Zuela. Crystals are very healing and I’m really looking forward to getting myself some more crystals that I can scatter around the house. But I love that I can wear my crystals with the Zuela crystal wear lingerie. Each day reminding myself to take care of me! I also love the put your positive pants on tee! Which you can grab here.

Zuela are an ethical lingerie brand you’ll instantly fall in love with. The softest most beautiful underwear ever. You can go onto the website and click the link ‘find your fit’ this is especially great for men buying for their partners (I used to work in lingerie stores and the poor guys didn’t know where to start!) take the quiz (tip: check her bra and panty size from pairs she regularly wears from her undies drawer, just don’t get caught!) Zuela incorporates a pocket full of crystals into each bra to help promote wellbeing in order to help mental health. I’m a huge fan of crystals and their energy so I’ve truly fallen for this brand. The founder of Zuela Steff struggled with mental health and it was through that struggle Zuela was born! Taken from my blog post here.

I want to just add here if you’re going through a hard time or suffering with mental health. Male or Female. Please if you need someone know that I am here to talk too and there are so many people out there that are willing to help you ♥️