Movember

Officially begins today, Please support our MoBro’s in their efforts to increase Awareness for men’s health including Depression and Prostate Cancer!

During November each year, Movember is responsible for the sprouting of moustaches on thousands of men’s faces in Australia and around the world. The aim of which is to raise vital funds and awareness for men’s health, specifically prostate cancer and depression in men.

On Movember 1st, guys register at Movember.com with a clean-shaven face and then for the rest of the month, these selfless and generous men, known as Mo Bros, groom, trim and wax their way into the annals of fine moustachery. Supported by the women in their lives, Mo Sistas, Movember Mo Bros raise funds by seeking out sponsorship for their Mo growing efforts.

Mo Bros effectively become walking, talking billboards for the 30 days of November and through their actions and words raise awareness by prompting private and public conversation around the often ignored issue of men’s health.

At the end of the month, Mo Bros and their female supporters (known as Mo Sistas) celebrate their gallantry and valor by either throwing their own Movember party or attending one of the infamous Gala Partés held around the world by Movember, for Movember.

Donations Close August 16th!

The girls had an Amazing Day participating in Run Melbourne representing our page. They work really hard even at school and church to increase awareness of mental health. They don’t talk about it the way we do. Rather they talk about, acknowledge and respect the feelings of their classmates and those around them. Expressing care for their friends and even those who aren’t….if only they would express more care for each other’s feelings my life would be complete!

But sisterly love aside, they really do try to make a difference in the lives of those they meet. Tomorrow at school during the assembly they will be each presented with a certificate for their efforts. completing the 3km Kids run for the Run Melbourne Event and in doing so Raising $240 which everyday hero provides to Neuroscience Research Australia, to continue valuable research into this Disorder.

They didn’t do it for me, they didn’t even do it for their step father. In fact they did it for a very good friend of theirs who has been their pen pal for a number of years who lives in the US, a 19 year old girl named Alex who lives with Bipolar Disorder.

I have a 20×30 print of Shannon and Jac during the run along the Yarra which the largest donor will be receiving once donations close this month.

Please do take the time to Visit their individual blogs available from our Team Page, see their Finish line Video’s and their story of why this means so much to them individually.

For three young ladies aged 7, 9 and 10. I am amazingly proud of what my daughters achieved last month and the determination and motivation with which they did it. I encourage you all to support them, and promise you that it means so much to them that they will be back again for a repeat performance next year!

Donations can be made at their Everyday Hero Pages.

http://www.youtube.com/p/679C260D7CA41999?version=3&hl=en_GB&fs=1

*sigh*

op is Monday, what a conclusion to mother’s day, and even with endless MRI’s and other tests they still don’t know what it is until they actually open her heart….

and he is being a miserable twat 😦 *sigh* and half my friends are having meltdowns…..so have my last cigarette of a whole new packet which didn’t last 2 days :S yep officially a smoker again…and take a deep breath and pull it all together again…again….again….

yep im going to go to the enquiry sitting For Victoria’s Vulnerable Children and tell them these mongrels can’t swing from all to nothing and back again they gotta work with what they have to give our kids a chance….which means putting everything behind a child’s family unit….

I really want to upgrade our cafepress so that I can put up a variety of designs for people to choose from for different items but I can’t afford to do that until I have some money to sink into it and would have to figure out a way for sales to cover costs and then it wont be free of any mark up so will put that off for now…..and merely ponder the best way to do so.

would really love to have some contributors for our blog with some comments as carer’s support’s and people who live with bipolar disorder.

Why do I do this? put the effort in and post….besides it just making me feel useful….he possibly thinks it is all about him….. but it isn’t……. you all maybe think it is all about you…..well it isn’t….some may even think it is about MY kids….but it isn’t that either……my mother….nope….my uncles….nope….my cousins….nope….my brother’s….nope….my ex’s family….nope not even them at a stretch.

I have spent literally 60% of my life picking up people with mental illness and helping (not doing all of it myself) put themselves back on their feet but primarily making sure they are alive to be able to recover and learn to manage whichever disorder they live with.

Mental Illness is much more prevalent that anyone realises or is willing to admit and while there is a problem with pathologising every nuance of humanity, which is outright wrong….just like the goal of obtaining good physical health we all just as importantly good mental health. it doesn’t take a disorder to bring us down, it doesn’t take pathology to cause us to stumble on our path.

it is as simple as lost hope.

when our mental health suffers the first thing we do is loose hope and mostly importantly for everyone with a disorder or not is to retain hope….and while our mental health services catch only a fraction of those who need them….even if only to be guided to the right path for recovery….hope is hazy….so I do it for everyone….me, my kids, my partner, my family included….

we all sometimes need a road map on how to recover……

Fund Raising

Now do NOT panic on me please, I am not looking to make any money, if we do make some money in the mean time it all goes towards research and services through already existing charities I AM NOT A CHARITY and I do NOT want the paperwork! even if it means giving away my designs to a good cause for free 😀 so be it I really do hate paperwork. and BASTS already owns by affiliation about 10% of my work anyway 😉 so it may as well keep it.

Tonight I created a Cafepress for BASTS there is no mark up on any of it it is all exclusively at cafepress prices. The merchandise is available for you, if you like it great if you don’t that is fine there is no pressure to buy it, but if you want an item which can stimulate discussion go for it, personally I like how the teddy looks I might grab a couple for my girls.

We also as a page decided to form a team for the www.swearstop.com.au a fundraising event hosted by www.everydayhero.com.au for the purpose of raising funds for the schizophrenia research institute.

Now the motivation of participation in these events is not exclusively to raise money and get you to open your wallet, the Main aim of participating in these events is to increase working as a community, stimulating idea’s of things you could do within your own community to increase awareness and even discussion. What could you do and to some extent even to let you know that we are here and not just anonymous people spamming the latest mental health articles. I can’t run in marathons as I have restricted mobility. but I can participate in swearstop so I am extra excited to do so since I feel kind of useless missing out on most of the fundraising events which happen around here as you need to be able to run for them.

I am also toying with the idea of forming a team to run in the Run Melbourne Event in October with funds going towards whichever mental health charity we decide. It will give us a chance and excuse to connect with BASTS members in Melbourne and provided we don’t score a team of 50….well how about we make it the first 5 to sign up to our Run Melbourne Team score a Drink Bottle and T-shirt, for the day of the run, My shout! (I am on a disability pension after all)

Musings on change

Change,

A fear inspiring word for many, but it is the change we fear or the cascade of changes which follow.

Catalyst, the thing which instigates the following actions and reactions.

To change schools, often means a change in friends, changes the nature of our friendships with existing friends distancing and reducing the time available to relate and communicate, new teachers, new classrooms, new attitudes, once again facing introductions and adjustment periods.

The same can be said for treatments, new treatment regime. You never know when you start if it will work out or not, you have an extended adjustment period learning new side effects you may experience, risks, risk management which accompanies this regime, possible necessary dietary changes, home and routine changes to minimize or accommodate the change in side effects or effectiveness.

Will this new regime open the door to my home expanding my range of living, to encompass the local campus, shopping centre, performing arts centre, library, cinema?

Or will I begin imitating Mrs Pea Body and fluid retention leave me planning my day and journey’s according to toilet stops?

Will I need a new wardrobe in a month to accommodate a spreading waistline due to increased appetite and prescription drug induced metabolic syndrome or be left standing starkers as my clothes are too small to fit any more?

Will I still be able to go to work and tolerate the noise and sounds of my workplace, or will photophobia (light sensitivity), Hyperacusis (sound sensitivity), or Akathesia (inner restlessness) keep me paralysed at home?

Will I be able to enjoy a single weekly Beer with my old friends or will it leave me vomiting and lethargic?

Will I be able to sleep a regular 8 hours every night and wake feeling rested, or will I sleep for 17 hours at a time struggle to remember to take my medications due to regularly sleeping through their assigned times to take them and waking feeling tormented and frayed?

Will change be for the better or the worse? Will change give me new spoons each day or will it merely redistribute the same spoons across my day with differing priorities? Will things improve or will I merely exist? We cannot know until we try, often fear of past bad changes will hinder us in taking the opportunity to try new changes for the sake of the 50/50 risk which comes with each change of better or worse.

We MUST be open and honest with our doctors, they see a person in front of them with an ailment which needs treating and often do not see or comprehend the way our health is weaved intricately through our day to day life, they rely on us to let them know the extent of the impact any changes or conditions make on our live’s which exist outside of their consulting room.

When you live by the number of spoons you hold each day, we are more conscious of each spoon we loose.

will the desire to live a full life allow me to achieve it or will poor treatment and guidance eventually leave us reliant on doctors and specialists to keep our bodies functioning in spite of our minds due to long term side effects.

One day somehow, someway life will get better, we will learn who our friends are, who is worth spending spoons on, who is there to keep us from despair, how to live each day to its fullest and how to find satisfaction in our own little piece of the world. While the road to get there is rocky we cannot let that deter us from travelling the road to our destination, and when we walk that road carefully knowingly navigating all obstacles it presents to us, greater satisfaction can be found at the journey’s end.

Today’s Question

1. What behaviour or physical signs would arouse concern for a friend for their mental health?
2. And what are some of the things you could do?
   1. without pressuring them to get further help.
   2. Or suggesting that they get further help if there are signs of Mental illness.

Write for us

Those wondering what I am asking them to write about,

What would you say if someone was diagnosed with bipolar disorder yesterday and came to you and asked “what should I do?”

is what I am asking you to write about

Welcome to the BA~STS Blog

If you would like to become a contributor or editor please let me know.

Admins please do send your email addresses to allow me to share the ropes if you feel a compulsion to wander around here too,

I still have some of the pages to polish off for now they are little more than holding pages to assist with construction of the basic structure, but it is ready for you all to put your thinking caps on as to how you would like this used, what would you like to see provided or discussed?

We have access to Polls, Post’s, multimedia features and the list goes on.

I hope it is so far pretty enough for you and simple enough that you can find what little there is so far.