I feel so sad and angry! A students journey to positive mental health

Student C often found himself excluded from the class for his behaviour. He would sit quietly outside the room or he would find his way upstairs to speak to a person in leadership. The counsellor would engage with him and over a series of meetings together they worked out what the issue was.

Student C would declare often and in different ways that he was ‘bad,’ ‘dumb,’ ‘stupid’ etc. He was adamant about this and it seemed that he would not be moved from that position!

He was big in stature for his age, quiet and withdrawn generally which seemed to reflect the low estimation he had of himself. He seemed to feel angry, not towards others but more towards himself. When feelings ran high he could express himself in ways that were not acceptable but understandable. He might run his pen across his page of work or indeed rip the page out of his exercise book. He would write ‘STUPID’ across the brim of his school hat in texta. His frustration was palpable and his ideas about himself were entrenched and deeply ingrained.     

This would not change until he became aware of the beliefs he held, that were irrational, meaning not helpful; barriers to him achieving his goals.

We decided that we would give irrational and unhelpful ideas a name. We called intrusive and debilitating thoughts *Brain Bully thoughts. They were attached to Brain Bully self-talk e.g. ‘I’m dumb and stupid or bad’ for instance. We isolated one to work on and agreed that the idea of being ‘bad’ would be the place to start.

We talked about ‘being’ bad and what that meant. It was a global self-rating term, a word or idea that described his total being or his personhood. We also talked about the word ‘being’ and what that meant. We agreed that it could mean ‘the way I am’ i.e. I am my badness.

We then talked about how ‘I’m bad’ could be a Brain Bully belief. We noted how this thinking got in the way of his happiness and his ability to set and pursue his goals. This was the test we applied to the Brain Bully belief ‘I am bad.’ If it stopped us feeling OK then we could call it for what it was; Brain Bully thinking.

We continued to explore the idea that he was ‘his badness’ and where this idea may have originated. He said that he tried hard to do the right thing and when he didn’t behave as others thought he ‘should’ he felt responsible for how others felt. For instance his mum would say things like, ‘you make me sad when you do that.’ Or, ‘you make me mad when you do that.’ This message he had heard all his life so he believed he was responsible for how his mum felt i.e. he ‘made’ her mad and sad.

We had pinpointed why he believed he was a ‘bad’ person. He articulated his belief thus; ‘I am a bad person because I make my mum sad. If it wasn’t for me she would be happy. It’s all my fault!’ This is a heavy burden for a young person to bear. Where would we go from here? We’ve established that his irrational, Brain Bully thinking is connected to how he feels and behaves. His belief he is a ‘bad’ and ‘worthless’ person is connected to or accompanied by behaviours and emotions that are self-defeating i.e. sad (depressed?), anxious and withdrawing, destroying stuff etc. We established that his strength of feeling is connected to how he thinks (believes) things are or should be e.g. I should be ‘good’ but I am ‘bad’ (which I shouldn’t be!).

What then is a ‘good’ person? We talked about all the things that make us who we are and decided that we have many positive attributes and things we could get better at but it would be difficult to argue that we can indeed ‘be’ good or ‘be’ bad. Can we take one attribute or quality which is good or bad and then decide we are that attribute or quality? Can we claim to be good if we did something well? That would be illogical because though we have done well in one instance we still have things we could improve. So we cannot ‘be’ the thing that we are good at can we? And we cannot ‘be’ the thing we are bad at!

We established a new idea to challenge the Brain Bully belief that we can ‘be’ good or we can ‘be’ bad. We agreed to use (think) the idea that ‘we are OK no matter what. We are worthwhile no matter what.’ In other words though we might do ‘bad’ or inappropriate things we are not bad for doing them, we are still worthwhile. Student C would have to do a lot of work to change what he believed about himself but this was an important start. We set some homework for ourselves that when we stuffed up we would try hard to learn from our mistakes but we would refuse to believe that we were ‘bad’ for making our mistakes.

So student C would train himself to believe that when he makes a mistake and his mum feels angry and she says ‘you make me mad!’ he will remind himself that he is OK no matter what. He will feel sorry for his mistake and try hard to do better but he will not put himself down. He will build the rational (self-helpful) belief of ‘I’m OK no matter what!’ This will help student C to feel sad and disappointed rather that depressed and angry.

We also gave a name to the rational and useful (self-helpful) thinking we were practicing to make new beliefs to replace the old Brain Bully beliefs that can be intrusive and harmful; *Brain Friend thinking.

Of course we acknowledged that when mum says ‘you make me angry’ that she is expressing a Brain Bully belief that hides somewhere in her mind. Student C understood what his mum was yet to realise!

Student C made great progress and one day his mum called and asked if she could come to see me …..

*Brain Bully and *Brain Friend are terms used in the early childhood teaching/counselling resource 'Have a Go Spaghettio!'©