Thumbelina Lillie

We may be isolated, but we’re not alone

megan — Sun, 14 Mar 2021 19:48:59 +0000

It’s been 3 months since I last wrote something, and I feel like so much has happened in a short space of time. Before I start this, a little PSA. When I experience things, for some reason afterwards, I like to write about them. It’s almost like finishing a chapter, or closing a book. It’s that big sigh of relief for me. I don’t have the readership I once did on this blog, but believe me when I say that this is for me just as much as it is for anyone else going through similar stuff. If someone else can read this and be like ‘I’m not alone in this’ and understand that it’s ok, I’m content. – They say that healing isn’t linear and that mental health is a journey, and well, the past few months have really proved that for me. Despite the past 12 months being, well, you know how they’ve been, it seems like the last 6 months have been the hardest slog for me. It all kicked off on my birthday last October. I went for a walk with my partner, parents & dogs on the morning of my birthday and then went off […]

The post We may be isolated, but we’re not alone appeared first on Thumbelina Lillie.

Trying To Make Uncertainty A New Friend Of Mine

megan — Sun, 13 Dec 2020 16:18:05 +0000

I am a creature of habit and a person of comfort. What I really mean, is that I like things the way that they are and I am quite content in my little life bubble, thank you very much. So when life rocks the boat sometimes (& oh boy hasn’t 2020 been a storm?!) it can cause me major anxiety and for my overthinking to kick in and be set to overdrive. Uncertainty has been a massive theme for myself and everyone else this year, and some recent self-exploration in therapy has made me sit and think of how I want to level-up as a person. What I’m Scared Of When I say living with uncertainty, this can be pretty much anything. From the big life-changing things that can happen to the small details that can sometimes occur. It can be from a client call not going well at work, to Josh picking up the wrong pizza bases from the shop. (Or, y’know a global pandemic????) Even when I’m expecting it, change isn’t something that often works well for me and I’ll do anything for an ‘easy life’ sometimes. I often lean towards situations that are familiar, safe and where […]

The post Trying To Make Uncertainty A New Friend Of Mine appeared first on Thumbelina Lillie.

4 Ways My Stress Manifests (& What I Do About It)

megan — Sun, 22 Nov 2020 10:45:35 +0000

[This post is in collaboration with HERPOtherm] It’s common knowledge that I’m a worrisome person. Even if something’s not a big deal, you bet that I’m gonna sit and ponder over it anyway. Over the years, I’ve also been somewhat of a people pleaser and this, combined with all that worry, can often bring on that thing we like to call stress. Stress is one of those things that creeps up on me when I’ve been busy, or rather, my mind has. It builds up, builds up, builds up and then hits me like a ton of bricks to the point where I have to give myself a good talking to. As we grow up, I don’t know about you, but I find that we can learn to figure out how to deal with ourselves. Through growth (and therapy certainly helps!) we learn to put things in place so that we can tackle stress when it happens. Although sometimes I don’t realise it’s happening until the peak hits, there are some coping mechanisms I’ve developed to help me get by and back on track to regular life. Introducing to you, the four stages of my stress. Giving you all the […]

The post 4 Ways My Stress Manifests (& What I Do About It) appeared first on Thumbelina Lillie.

Why Mental Health Is Not A Choice

megan — Sun, 25 Oct 2020 13:08:21 +0000

DISCLAIMER & TRIGGER WARNING; Discussion of mental health and mental illness. For the past 3 years, I have chosen working out as one of my coping strategies for when it comes to dealing with my mental health struggles. It has worked tremendously and I’ve written more about it in this post where I shared how Fitness Saved My Mental Health. But recently, I had a bit of a drop in motivation when it came to going to the gym. This can happen from time to time and especially around this time of year as it gets colder and darker, but this time it was more prominent. A slight injury had me feeling low and some intrusive thoughts meant that, in my mind, ‘I couldn’t possibly go to the gym’. I thought that everyone was watching, commenting, judging what I was doing. But spoiler alert; they obviously weren’t and aren’t, but my mind led me to believe they were. Then after a while, I trained at a friend’s gym, posted a little video on my fitness Instagram and received a comment that said that, in a nutshell, mental health was a ‘choice’. I’m sorry, but I’m not having it. If feeling […]

The post Why Mental Health Is Not A Choice appeared first on Thumbelina Lillie.

I Think I Know What Other People Are Thinking

megan — Tue, 20 Oct 2020 15:22:12 +0000

Right, I’m psychic. I must be. I have this really annoying trait that I’m struggling to work with right now which is that I think I know what other people are thinking, particularly about me and the things that I do and say. I know what you’re thinking (see), ‘Megan, put away your Crystal Ball. How could you possibly know something like that?!’. My mind likes to think that it knows what is going on in other people’s heads and usually, it assumes that those things aren’t nice. & do you know what? It can be really bloody exhausting. Going Back & Forward, Up & Down I realised that my blogs right now are going a bit here, there and everywhere. From being bored of hating myself and refusing to shrink, it seems a bit strange going back down this anxious route of thinking already. But that’s exactly what it is like when you struggle with a mental illness. It’s a whole wave, a loop-de-loop rollercoaster of emotion where you’ll have the highs and the lows. There are good days, there are fantastic days, there are meh days and there are down days. I have just learnt how to roll […]

The post I Think I Know What Other People Are Thinking appeared first on Thumbelina Lillie.

Living In Lockdown Limbo With An Anxious Mind

megan — Sun, 11 Oct 2020 11:42:33 +0000

‘Tighter lockdown restrictions likely to be announced on Monday’. ‘No. Don’t do that to me!’ was what I thought as I read the news headlines on Friday afternoon. You know when people say to you ‘We need to talk later‘, and it’s the ‘later’ bit that really gets you? You begin to feel worried and frustrated, like what on earth could they possibly be going to tell you?! I’ve felt exactly like that this weekend. So obviously, I’m writing about it. My Two States of Mind This past year has been difficult for us all in many different ways but with one common theme. When we slowly emerged from the nation-wide lockdown a few months back, I naively felt like we were almost there. I had that little bit of hope held tight to my chest that life was slowly returning back to normal. I was back in the office, back going to the gym and seeing friends and family just that little bit more regularly (alas, from a distance and no hugs were involved – SOB). Apart from the distancing and mask-wearing, I felt like things were getting back to normal. But we all know that’s not the case. […]

The post Living In Lockdown Limbo With An Anxious Mind appeared first on Thumbelina Lillie.

Why I Refuse To Shrink Myself

megan — Sun, 04 Oct 2020 18:29:05 +0000

TW; Eating Disorders, Weight chat ‘You’ve put on half a stone, is that ok?’ said the Nurse, a nervous, concerned look on her face. No, that’s not a snippet from a book I’m reading, those very words were said to me earlier this week. But bare with, this post isn’t exactly about weight but here’s the story that sparked this week’s musings… It’s been over a year since I physically saw a Nurse regarding my contraceptive pill because of that virus that’s still flying around. So on Monday, I had to book myself a socially distanced appointment to do just that. A bit of background on my weight; I’ve always weighed around the same (give or take a kilo or two) apart from the last year or so where my training has been more consistent. Because of my training efforts, I’ve put on a few lbs of muscle and have naturally become that little bit bigger. Who’s bothered? (Not me.) I know how these appointments work, you get weighed, you get your blood pressure taken and the same old questions are asked. It’s usually an in and out, Bob’s-your-Uncle kinda thing. I have previously ‘blind weighed’ at the Doctors because […]

The post Why I Refuse To Shrink Myself appeared first on Thumbelina Lillie.

It’s Official, I’m Bored Of Hating Myself

megan — Sun, 27 Sep 2020 11:52:41 +0000

I get it. That might sound a bit extreme to some of you, but to other people, I feel like you may see where I am coming from, at least a little bit. I feel like I have literally spent the last several years of my life really hating on ‘me’. But I don’t mean that this is a constant thing and I don’t always necessarily mean that it is always related to the way that I look either. Let me explain where I’m coming from. ‘Ugh, Why?!’ The above phrase feels like something I’ve internally repeated to myself for what seems like a lifetime. A constant questioning of what I’ve done, what I’ve said, what I look like or how I’m feeling. ‘Ugh, why didn’t you just say that if that is what you thought ?’ ‘Ugh, why did you react like that, they probably think you’re really weird now.’ ‘Ugh, why do my arms have to look like this in this type of sleeve?’ ‘Ugh, why do I feel so lonely, I definitely don’t have enough friends. It’s probably because I’m…’ Welcome to an example of what goes through my brain every now and then. By every now […]

The post It’s Official, I’m Bored Of Hating Myself appeared first on Thumbelina Lillie.

My Moment on Not Having A ‘Thing’

megan — Sun, 20 Sep 2020 09:28:09 +0000

Last night I came out with the words, ‘I just don’t know what my thing is any more’. You know when people just have their ‘thing’ and that’s what they do? Yeah? I wasn’t sure whether I had anything that I felt was mine. An Old ‘Thing’ For a long time I guess ‘blogging’ was my thing. It was a topic of conversation that would always come up whether I was chatting to family, friends or new people. They would ask how it was going, say how pleased they were for my latest collaboration or even envy over my lasted product gifting. Blogging was my ‘thing’. Especially when I first began way back in 2012 and nobody really knew what it was all about and it wasn’t really something that people did. Nowadays it’s always the questions of, ‘Oh, you don’t really blog that much anymore, do you?’ or ‘You don’t still do all that beauty stuff now, huh?’ or even ‘Don’t you miss all the free stuff you used to get?!’. It’s almost as if they’re disappointed that I stopped (or rather, it’s my internal anxiety telling me that they think that, odds are they don’t). Don’t get me […]

The post My Moment on Not Having A ‘Thing’ appeared first on Thumbelina Lillie.

Taking Steps Sideways

megan — Thu, 30 Jul 2020 12:47:31 +0000

I had the intention of writing this blog post on taking steps sideways with a fitness focus as I’m going through a whole load of changes in that respect. But I feel like this is something that can be said for a whole bunch of other stuff. Recently I felt a little bit like I was going backwards. I felt like my mental health was being taken for a bit of a tipple and that things just didn’t seem to be moving forward. I was feeling easily overwhelmed, didn’t feel like I was ‘going anywhere’ in various aspects of life and was unsure of the direction life was taking me. (Maybe good ol’ Rona had something to do with this, who knows?) I took some time, sat down with myself and realised that I most definitely wasn’t moving backwards, instead I’ve decided that I’m moving sideways. I wasn’t necessarily taking a big U-turn, but rather a diversion of sorts. & hell to the yes, that is ok. Living in Chaos & Order Almost a month ago now, I made the decision to begin working with some Mindset coaches. The team at Mindset RX’d are fitness-focused, but teach a whole bunch […]

The post Taking Steps Sideways appeared first on Thumbelina Lillie.