Dear Oliver,
How are you?
Spring has finally arrived here in the UK and it feels great to be able to get outside more and enjoy some warm weather for a change.
I imagine you don’t know what it’s like to have cold, wet weather almost every day for 6 months in you’re in Spain?
Good weather can really lift your mood.
It’s nice to say that life in general is pretty good right now. A few good surprises have come my way over the past couple of weeks.
But life’s not always like that. Sometimes the surprises that come along can be less enjoyable.
And that’s something I feel I can offer you as a father.
Preparing you for the tough times, because I’ve been through many.
I don’t know if you know, but May is Mental Health Awareness month.
It wasn’t really talked about 20 years ago, and people didn’t have the understanding they seem to have today about the vast array of things that can affect mental health.
I wish we’d known back then what we know now.
The good thing is though that the saying “forewarned is forearmed” should mean that you have a better chance of keeping your mental health strong. If I’d been able to be your real father, I hope I’d have used my experiences to prepare you for the things you’ll face along your way through life.
Here’s one simple thing I hope you’ll remember:
If you’re ever feeling the weight of the world upon you, if you ever struggle with any mental health issues, I want you to try and trace the path back to where they began… and I’m almost certain you’ll realise – they were caused by someone else.
Whenever I’ve felt at my lowest it’s because I’ve been bullied, cheated on, lied to… and all of these things came from someone else. Find the right people to be around and you’ll find every day gets better.
The weapons that harm our mental health
These things are tough on kids, but in adulthood it gets way more complicated. These are some of the main things I’ve learned can do the most damage to our mind.
LIES and DECEPTION
People lying to you will always take its toll on your MH. Just trying to figure out if they’re telling you the truth with anything and everything they say will drain your energy.
And the more energy you waste on their lies, the less is left for you to take care of yourself.
CHEATING
It’s basically an extension of lying.
When two people get into a relationship, it’s best to communicate and understand what each person thinks the status of it is.
Because sometimes one person thinks they are a boyfriend/girlfriend partnership, whereas the other person thinks you’re there to pay their bills so they can have fun behind your back shagging anything with a pulse.
BULLYING
Bullying can have a terrible effect on a persons mental health.
Bullies often target something about their victim that they think will be a weak point, and they make sure to use it when they really want to hurt that person.
We all have flaws. There’s not 1 perfect person in the 8 billion currently on Earth. Bullies tend to make themselves feel better about their own shortcomings by raising attention of someone else’s.
A great quote I heard recently in a video on social media goes: “Shitty people do shitty things to you because they feel shitty about themselves, not because you deserve to have shitty things done to you” – @Caoiltemaclean
I met a woman once. She was awfully shitty to me, so I can only imagine how shitty she felt about herself. I’ve also heard she was horrible to a lot of other men too. I wonder what happened to make her that way?
IF YOU’RE STRUGGLING, TALK TO SOMEONE
It’s the most important thing to remember: don’t lock things in, it only makes it worse.
I’m here if you ever need to talk.
Even if you’re in good health and just want to talk about how great life is – I’ll listen to that too!
Yours Sincerely
This letter is part of the ‘Oliver Jack MustoWhat’s the Story’ Series
