Winter is well on its way which can be a tough time for a lot of students, especially those who may suffer with SAD (Seasonal affective disorder) which can affect your mood massively, more so during the winter months. Daylight now disappears by 4pm which can leave you feeling demotivated, tired and more down than ever and with December/January being tough months for students with deadlines and upcoming exams, that’s without the added pressure from Covid-19, its very important to take extra measures to look after yourselves over the next couple of difficult months as it can take a huge toll on your mental health. Following the recent announcement, it has been revealed students now have a ‘travel window’ from the 3rd to the 9th of December to go home for the Christmas period. This also means that teaching will be 100% online from then and I for one am left feeling deflated and unclear as to what this means for things such as exams etc and I’m sure many other students have questions that not even the university can answer yet. A lot of you may also be thinking who can I turn too now? What support is there out there for me?
Not many students are aware of the online anonymous peer support network called Big White Wall/together all, which is free to access for all Edge Hill students. BWW is available 24/7 and is moderated and facilitated by clinicians so you’re always safeguarded whilst using the service. It promotes early intervention and self-management of mental health and wellbeing by giving you unlimited access to self-help courses such as ‘managing health anxiety’ ‘managing OCD’ etc, a community forum which is a safe space to provide or be provided with peer-to-peer emotional support, help and guidance, you can post how you are feeling and ask for advice or offer advice to other anonymous users on a post they have created. You will be able to create a journal which is basically a diary to record down your thoughts and feelings and will also have access to a ‘goal setter’ where you can record down any goals you have in mind and when you want to achieve them by. There are a number of rules you have to abide by when using the service which should provide you with the reassurance that this site is completely confidential, safe and there to help you work through what has been troubling you. These can be found here https://togetherall.com/en-gb/house-rules/
All that is needed for you to access BWW is your Edge Hill student email account and an internet connection, no referral is needed, and you can access from your phone/laptop/iPad at anytime, anywhere! Just go to the website ; https://togetherall.com/en-gb/ and click register. Make sure to not incorporate your name anywhere in the details you provide to allow the service to be completely confidential for your own safety. It is also encouraged that you signpost students to this resource as much as you can as people who may really benefit from a service like this may not know it exists. From personal experience it is very useful signing up as even if you don’t want to access it every day you can still refer back to it whenever you are feeling low and need extra support. I know I will be making much more use out of it for the rest of these unprecedented times to help me through working online/assignment deadlines.
