Jaelle's advice column | Jaelle's Advice About Mental health

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Q: Since surviving a natural disater two weeks ago and losing everything I own but thanks be to God I did not lose my life, I am having a hard time getting past my fears. We have had sever weather for several days an my nerves are on edge. I can not sleep. I can not stop thinking about this at all. I'm living in constant fear. I know that the chances are slim that this happen again, I know I have no control over it and I know I need to move forward but I don't know how. I sit up worrying all night. I slept in my unfinished basement one night because of my fears. I can not continue living this way. I don't want to live in the basement everytime there is a storm. I don't want to avoid certain activites because of this fear. What can I do? Have any of you been through this? Please help me! I'm terrified!

I haven't been in a natural disaster but I have experienced some trauma. The things you mention - constant worrying, focusing on what happened, etc - are signs of you trying to process what happened to you.

Because it's been two weeks and the dear hasn't abated, I think you should go see a doctor and get evaluated for having Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Either way you need to get this out of your system, otherwise it will continue to eat and eat at you.

http://www.aftertheinjury.org/learnTraumatic.html?gclid=CP61ofzL5KoCFcYUKgoddDgB9g has more info on this disorder. Depending on how you feel about this I understand if you feel shame about going to talk to someone. You're not crazy or mentally ill & I want you to remember that. You are a normal person who has experienced something horrible, and who is having trouble "getting over it". Some people have better resiliency skills and can just get over things but others (like me) need a bit of an extra hand in order to recover from what happened.

Please do yourself a favor and let yourself get some help.

Q: I always over-think things. I always feel like I need to be on top when it comes to school. If I don't get A's or B's, but more so A's, I panic. I cry. If I do bad in a class, I feel like a loser. I feel like I'm not worth anything. I haven't had good luck in jobs. But, I've worked at these random offices and couldn't handle the work-load with school and all my other priorities. I was working close to 30 hours a week. I start working at school tomorrow and I'm so excited that I'll be at school. I've been looking for a job at school for 2 years! And it's only 15 hours a week. So, I can handle my classes and activities and enjoy my college years... just with a little money in my pocket. But, I'm scared because I've just over-thought it. I want to be a good employee. If you can send me any advice on how to stop over-thinking and just be proud of my accomplishments, please let me know.

Thank you!

I feel like this a lot sometimes - no matter how awesome you are, you always feel like it's not enough. So to help me combat it (because I am a creative type, and yes, this is a creative project) I went out and got myself a huge sheet of poster board.

On the top of it I wrote: THINGS THAT MAKE ME AWESOME.

Then I brainstormed what made me awesome, whether it was from working with adults with disabilities while earning a Bachelor of Arts with a Gender Studies minor to the fact that I know all the words to "Don't Stop Believing". You are awesome, just sometimes you need a reminder of it. And a visual poster is always a good reminder.

I also (because feedback is nice) made little business cards. On the card it says, "You are awesome because _______." Then I went to people I knew, and told them why I wanted them to write down something awesome about me. A few didn't want to write which was cool but I got some really nice comments about things I didn't know about. Or you could ask this question on Facebook. See what happens, what people say.