BLOGMAS 2022 | DAY SIXTEEN: TWO ESSENTIALS FOR PLANNING & CREATING BLOGMAS | WHITLEY BAY CHRISTMAS MARKET AT SPANISH CITY

Welcome to Day Sixteen of Blogmas 2022!

In late November, I visited the Whitley Bay Christmas Market which was hosted by Spanish City, a historic building in the nearby costal town. “Now, how did that inspire this post?” I hear you say… Well, I went with a best-friend – Martin Baker, who is also a mental health blogger (all of his links are at the end of the post!) – and so whenever we get together, we’re pretty often talking blog stuff (totally a technical term!)! And that means so much to me, because Martin is the only person in my life who has a blog and with I’m NOT Disordered being one of the biggest and most important parts of my life, it’s so crucial that I have someone to talk to about it who will truly understand where I’m coming from. And so, our chat – when we went for food after the Market – about the effort going into Blogmas 2022, inspired me to write this post…  

“You have to be burning with an idea, or a problem, or a wrong that you want to right. If you’re not passionate enough from the start, you’ll never stick it out.”

Steve Jobs

MENTAL HEALTH & CREATIVITY | IN COLLABORATION WITH TIME TO CHANGE STORYCAMP 2020

We’ve reached the end of Time To Change’s Storycamp this year and the final briefing is all about creativity with the intention of content creators deciding on their own theme; but I liked the idea of just writing about creativity and how it can impact mental health…


I’d say that I’ve always been creative; when I was little, I used to love cutting things out of magazines and catalogues and making collages from them with my Nana. But I think my biggest creative outlet was through writing. I used to write so many short stories – mainly about horses because I was absolutely obsessed with them and took riding lessons for a while – that my Mum and Nana would read. I’d watch their reactions; a laugh or a smile, and it taught me the power words can have over the reader’s thoughts and feelings.


As I got older, I began developing a fascination with the idea of working in Fashion and decided to opt for Textiles as an exam subject in High School. Unfortunately, the subject’s Teacher was probably the least encouraging person in the world! The criticism she was full of was never constructive, and she was forever filling my head with doubts on my ability in the subject. I became so sceptical that by the end of the exams I had lost all interest and passion for drawing or being creative in any way.