“Always
work hard, be honest, and be proud of who you are.”
Patricia
Velasquez
Another Mental Health Awareness Week over! I feel like it actually went so quick! So, for anyone who may have missed some of the posts, I’ve added their links, a bit about each one, my thoughts and feelings upon reflection of each of them, other important links, and any lessons learnt from each post…
Description:
The
Launch Post was very basic, and I just chatted through my decision to create
the Series for this Week, my thoughts on inspiration, and a ton of links for
each of my collaboration partners (links which I’ve also included in this
post!).
Reflection & Lessons Learnt:
The
largest lesson I learnt here was actually regarding the Instagram side of
things! I have created carousels for each of the Days this Week with each
graphic in the carousel being about different parts of the post that day. I
kept the insight fairly vague though so as to still entice people to read the
full blog post on I’m NOT Disordered. So, the reflection and lesson learnt came
when I posted the entire carousel on my personal Instagram (@aimes_wilson) and
I realised this would mean less chance of people vising the same content on I’m
NOT Disordered’s account. In the end, I put just the title graphic of the
carousel as the image on my Instagram and then the entire carousel on the
blog’s.
Other Important Links:
Twitter/X:
@aimes_wilson
Instagram:
@imnotdisordered
Day
Two: Collaboration with Waythrough
Description:
For Day
Two, my collaboration with Waythrough came from the fact that not only have I
been on their caseload for over ten years, but also because we’ve worked
together many times before. They also have a Life Experience Council which, I
feel, really tackles the concept of ‘community’ so I felt it apt to talk about
that more. I also included another member of the Council and fellow service
user as well as the Inclusion Manager for Waythrough and they each answered the
same two questions about the meetings, how they cope with any difficult moments
in them, and their favourite moments too.
Reflection & Lessons Learnt:
The
largest lesson I learnt which I actually then used in the preparation for my
collaboration with CNTW was around the Instagram post for it. I had created
images for Instagram carousels on each Day, but Waythrough wanted to create
their own graphic for the social media shares. So, in discussing this, we got
onto the topic of using the ‘collaboration’ feature on Instagram too – which is
where the lesson comes in – and so Waythrough put together the copy (comms and
marketing speak for the text that accompanies social media posts). Upon reading
it though, I had to point out that it wouldn’t read right because the collaboration
feature means that the same exact content goes on both accounts and their copy
read ‘we’ve teamed up I’m NOT Disordered’ so I pointed out that this wouldn’t
make sense if it was being read on I’m NOT Disordered’s Instagram (@imnotdisordered)! And
so, I drafted something different that read ‘Waythrough have teamed up with I’m
NOT Disordered…’ (you can see/read the whole post here) and they accepted
that and recognised what I meant about it needing to reach right on both
accounts. I’m very glad that this happened with Waythrough and not a
collaboration partner who I might have been more hesitant to correct or point something
out to them. At the end of the day though, I – and the partner – have to
recognise that I’m NOT Disordered is an incredibly popular blog now (over 2.3
million of you – exact count is at the top of the blog, to the right of your
screen) and so it’s important that social media content about it, is to a good
standard and most importantly, a standard of which I’m happy is a good representation
of my blog and all of its lovely readers!
Other Important Links:
Instagram: @waythrough_UK
Twitter/X: @waythrough_UK
Facebook: WaythroughUK
Website: www.waythrough.org.uk
Day
Three: Collaboration with Cats Protection
Description:
Having
collaborated on around 20 occasions, I thought that teaming up with Cats
Protection for Mental Health Awareness Week would be a more creative
partnership and something which not many people would expect. We decided to
have the content take the form of a Q&A with a Cat Care Volunteer to look
at her responsibilities but also the view that Cats Protection takes on the
theme of ‘community.’
Reflection & Lessons Learnt:
I
always massively enjoy working with Cats Protection, but this time was a little
different because we actually tend to do quite short-notice partnership in that
it’ll often be – at the most – one month’s notice in agreeing to do it and it
being published. For MHAW however, we actually started talks about this one a
fair few months ago! And I was incredibly chuffed that they were so on-the-ball
with the whole thing! In working with Cats Protection, I’m always in touch with
the Celebrity and Influencer Relationships Manager and so she really took the
lead from the Cats Protection side of things. She coordinated the Q&A with
the Cat Care Volunteer, had the title graphic designed, and passed the edits
and drafts to the Volunteer. Working so promptly has taught me not to be afraid
to ask other Collaboration partners to do that too. Where my idea for a
collaboration has been well in advance, I think it’d be a good idea to set timescales
for responses, decisions, and drafts etc so that there’s an understanding of
how much work needs to be done from the offset. This would also help – not only
the partner – but myself, to know what to prioritise and when to prioritise it.
Other Important Links:
Cats Protection | UK’s Largest
Cat Welfare Charity
Description:
On this
date, I decided to go with the creator (Mental Health Foundation) of Mental
Health Awareness Week’s encouragement to take part in Wear It Green Day where I
wore – and took a few photos in – a green jumper (which I’d honestly forgotten
I owned!). This Day was created as a means of not only raising awareness of
mental health, but also so raise money for the Foundation’s essential research
and delivering of various programmes. In the blog post, I included links to the
various resources that the Foundation had created to help you in creating
events etc and raising money for the Foundation.
Reflection & Lessons Learnt:
On Day
Four, I actually decided to do a bit of extra content in addition to the
carousel graphics on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook and published some
content in the Stories feature on both Facebook and Twitter. I did this because
upon looking at the content that the Mental Health Foundation was
sharing/reposting, it was typically people or organisation’s content on Stories
as opposed to an actual post/carousel. I felt quite proud that I’d made that comms
and marketing observation and decided to use it to mine – and my blog’s –
advantage, because it worked; I received tweets etc from the Foundation
thanking me for getting involved and supporting the cause. I decided to I look
in their replies section on Twitter to check if this was a standard message
going to everyone who tags them today and saw that they’re actually only doing
it for the content which organisations are publishing, so I feel quite special
to have earned that – as a Blogger – tweet too! These two observations and sort
of, extra thoughts I put into my content, proved to be a really big motivation and
self-confidence boost to kind of… recognise that I was going to additional lengths
and that a lot of that came from my career and education in comms and
marketing. So, I’m very proud these are things I’ve learnt to do/consider.
Other Important Links:
Wear it Green Day | Mental
Health Foundation
Day
Five: Collaboration with CNTW
Description:
On this
Day, I decided to collaborate with my local mental health NHS Trust: Cumbria,
Northumberland, Tyne and Wear NHS Foundation Trust (CNTW) because they were the
most obvious and appropriate partner for this Awareness Week. In this
partnership content, we talked through their Involvement Bank which is an
initiative that was created a few years ago where service users and carers come
together to take on opportunities of co-production when wards, staff, and
departments within the Trust want the thoughts, feelings, and opinions of
service users and carers for their new projects, campaigns, or just instances
of needing to make a decision. The Bank illustrates equality and respect, and
this really confronts the community concept of the Us Vs Them culture which I
believe is rife in mental health services.
Reflection & Lessons Learnt:
This actually
ended up being an emotional collaboration. I was sitting in the garden waiting
for my Taxi to a Dentist appointment when I got the notification on Instagram
that CNTW had accepted the collaboration label request on the post I’d
published sharing the link and carousel images for this post. Completely unexpectedly,
my eyes filled with tears with the recognition of how far I’ve come in my
mental health journey specifically. I mean, to think of the relationship I once
had with CNTW of being sectioned and mistreat by some professionals and
services who used to have such a poor and uneducated attitude around
Personality Disorders and how to help and support someone with that diagnosis.
To now working alongside them in more of a professional respect and having them
advertise my blog and all that I do… It’s just incredible and kind of
overwhelming too. Like, to adjust to having such a different role with the
Trust it takes time, and it takes a lot of thought and consideration – and I
think this is largely because I 100% never expected things to get to ever get
to this point. To be fair, I think that a lot of the Trust’s staff who were
around when I first became poorly, had no faith either because they often
commented that I wouldn’t make it to my next Birthday! Very thankful and
grateful to have proven those people wrong and to see that the Trust seems to
no longer employ staff with such poor and misunderstanding attitudes and
behaviours. It really helps me to feel like I can be truly appreciative of
them.
Other Important Links:
Cumbria, Northumberland, Tyne
and Wear NHS Foundation Trust (cntw.nhs.uk)
CNTWNHS (@cntw.nhs) • Instagram
photos and videos
Cumbria, Northumberland, Tyne
and Wear NHS Foundation Trust (facebook.com)
Day
Six: Collaboration with Gum On My Shoe
Description:
For the
penultimate Day of Mental Health Awareness Week 2025, I partnered with one of
my best-friends and fellow Blogger, Martin Baker of Gum On My Shoe. We created
ten questions, and each answered them and then I published Martin’s answers,
and he has published mine on his blog (linked below).
Reflection & Lessons Learnt:
Today’s
reflection isn’t so much about this specific collaboration as it is about the
entire Week and how grateful I am to have finished another MHAW series! Although,
one thing that has added to my gratitude and really encouraged my sense of achievement
and of celebrating and marking that, was the fact that I spent the best part of
‘today’ (Day Six) with the person this collaboration was with; one of my
best-friend’s! And we had a really lovely and fun time with lots of takeaway,
alcohol, and a brand new true-crime series on Netflix (Fred
and Rose West: A British Horror Story)! Anyway, spending the day doing my
favourite things (especially the food and Netflix!) was the perfect way to end
the Week and the best way to feel really rewarded for all the time and effort I’ve
genuinely put into this entire Series. I just hope everyone/readers are happy
with content and have enjoyed the collaborations – I mean, the view statistics
look like you all have! So, thank you for your time and I look forward to
seeing you all in the next one!
Other Important Links:
Blog: www.gumonmyshoe.com
Facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/GumOnMyShoe
Twitter/X:
https://twitter.com/GumOnMyShoeBook
Instagram:
https://instagram.com/marty_at_gumonmyshoe