We know it, but sometimes it's hard for us to take action behind supporting appropriate selfcare. I’ve been guilty of abusing legal substances in my life. From alcohol, tobacco, sugar, I’ve allowed these substances to regulate my mood, my energy levels and short-term feelings of happiness.
On where ideas Launch we’ll be talking to Charlotte Hopkins, who has dedicated two decades of her career to helping provide the right support to people experiencing addiction. Charlotte works in the private sector and has unique insight on how prevalent these issues are even amongst professionals who do not typically seek public support for their struggles.
Katherine Ann Byam 0:02
Hello, Charlotte, and welcome to our show.
Charlotte Hopkins 0:04
Hi, thank you for having me.
Katherine Ann Byam 0:06
Wonderful to have you. So Charlotte, I wanted to have you on the show because even I have been going through my own traumas in dealing with the stress of being on lockdown for the third time in the UK. And also in terms of getting myself motivated to do what I need to do for my business as an entrepreneur. And I look around me and I see a mix of experiences with this whole lockdown.
So there are people who have sort of stable jobs who are able to possibly get into different things like maybe painting or different types of activities that they can use to sort of deal with the passage of time. But there are others who are facing a lot of different realities. For example, the nurses who are possibly on the brink. And as well as entrepreneurs, who may not be able to generate as much cash for their business, and things like that. So I just wanted to talk to you a little bit about how people are dealing with their well-being during this lockdown and your thoughts on it?
Charlotte Hopkins 1:16
Yeah. I think it's a really, really interesting topic. And for me, in the UK, we band around this one in four people have mental health quite often. And I vehemently disagree for me, it's four in four of us. So every single one of us at some point will experience some levels of mental ill health. So yes, there's one in four of us that may have a diagnosis or meaning medication. Right on the other side of the spectrum, there's that one in four of us who will never need any extra support. We will just deal with it ourselves and kind of crack on with life. And then there's this 50% of us that at some point may need extra support.
And that's not to say we need extra specialist support from a mental health service, for example. But what it means is that we need to find some level of self care. We might need to just wallow and watch ridiculous amounts of Netflix for the day. And we might find other coping mechanisms that are some healthy, some not-so-healthy. But actually the reality is that at some point in our lives, every single one of us will experience some levels of mental ill health. And I think what COVID has done is just exacerbated that. I think what's really interesting for me is I've worked over 20 years within the substance misuse sector.
So I worked with a lot of people with quite complex co-occurring health and wellbeing needs anything from offending behaviour to homelessness to substance misuse to mental health. And actually what we're seeing is, for a lot of people, they're really resilient. It's the people who are used to the routine and the structure of their day. They're often the people that are really struggling.
And then if you look at kind of professionals and entrepreneurs and those people who are used to kind of go into the office and a nine to five, dropping their kids off at school, picking them upcoming home, making tea, watching Netflix, go into bed doing it all again, that structure has been completely stripped out. So it's no wonder we're all feeling slightly stressed, anxious, and I call it really touchy. I have my touchy moments where I'm like, "Oh, just leave me alone." But that's because I think most of us like that structure, which we've been completely thrown out of.
Katherine Ann Byam 3:38
Yeah, absolutely. And we need to dig in a little bit to this piece about how people are dealing with what they're going through. And just just another little anecdote. So I live in a building of flats. And one of those flats, there are, I guess, it's a couple who smoke weed all day long. And it's a problem because it comes through the doors and the doors aren't perfectly sealed. So we have filled in our car doors like this, the smell of weed like all day long. And I think to myself, how are we coping? How are they doing this? But what I realised is that there are a lot of people finding sort of substance mechanisms to help them cope. And I just wanted to talk a little bit about that and your work in that space as well to understand why this is happening and what we could do.
Charlotte Hopkins 4:33
Yeah, I guess just to start with, the majority of people will use any kind of drugs whether that's cannabis, alcohol, heroin, even cocaine. It doesn't really matter what the substance is and the majority will use it for fun and enjoyment. And so your neighbours are probably just having a really really nice time. They're probably fairly relaxed and enjoying stuff. And, but actually we see it quite commonly across high-performing professionals in particular. So there's lots of people who I've worked alongside who are really professional in what they do.
They are nurses, doctors, managers, HR leads, they are consultants, police officers, all kinds of "professional people," and they will often self medicate with more often than not alcohol because it's legal, and with other substances as well. And there's multiple reasons why they'll use that one really quickly. So, you know, for many people, if they're stressed, or they're anxious or overwhelmed, they've had a really busy, crazy week at work, or the kids are performing at home, and they just need to unwind really quickly. And for lots of people that answer is found in a glass of wine. And for 90% of the people that use alcohol, they'll never have any issues with it. They'll be able to stop when they're ready. But there's always that small percentage that will build this tolerance to their substance and find themselves kind of caught a cropper.
And I always say that nobody sets out and has a glass of wine or a line of cocaine or even a spliff, nobody sets out and says, "all right, in three years time, I'm gonna be completely addicted, and I'm going to need some extra support." So it kind of creeps upon us. We don't always expect it. Nobody intentionally sets out to need specialist support to support them with their drug or alcohol use. So the substance itself will often help that person, I guess, self medicate is one word, but just it gives them something that means it tips the balance towards why they use it.
And we do see it more frequently within high professionals. It's just that, you know, people who've got disposable income will often go and see private practice, so they won't turn up in any of the statistics, because that's not where the statistics come from. They come from crime and the crime stats, and they come from EGP. And they come from health professionals, and most professionals who've got some kind of substance use or substance misuse are unlikely to walk into traditional services because they don't want to be found out.
Katherine Ann Byam 7:29
When did they know they needed help?
Charlotte Hopkins 7:32
Oh that's the big question. And I often think that those around them know that they need help before they do. I think if we were to apply logic, there's probably this gut feeling when somebody starts to hide they use when they're hiding it from loved ones, when they realise that they've overspent on a budget that they may have had, when they look in the recycle bins and realise that there's an extra ten, fifteen, five, two bottles in the recycle bin that they weren't expecting, when they use on a day that they weren't planning to when it goes from a Friday to Saturday to either Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday.
So there's all kinds of situations and occurrences that we would look at with somebody to discuss whether it's a problem for them. Part of the challenge, I think, is that often family friends, colleagues and neighbours will see that there's a bit of a concern more than the user themselves. Because there's an outsider looking in. It's so much easier for us to see the harm or the damage or the risks that it's having or the impact it's having on someone's life. When we're in it, often we're still experiencing the phone or the enjoyment or the pleasure, it's still giving us some kind of reward.
So it's very challenging to identify, and I'm sure you know, I definitely like to overindulge in chocolate cake and crisps and I could eat a bag, a big bag of crisps not a problem at all. I know that I shouldn't eat a big bag of crisps. I know I shouldn't eat a full chocolate cake. But there are times where we do that. So often we know the implications yet we can still tip that balance because the pleasure and the reward is so much greater. So it is definitely a big open answer question that is very individual to that person and their family.
Katherine Ann Byam 9:32
Yeah. And what are the sort of ways that people can start to, let's say, cope or or remediate this?
Charlotte Hopkins 9:43
For me, it's self care. I've extremely experienced burnout twice and I experienced it in two very different ways. So the first time I experienced burnout, I was like a little Duracell Bunny and, you know, people who know me know that I'm constantly got multiple projects on the go. I've got two kids, two children, I've got a husband that my life is quite busy. And the first time I experienced burnout, I just was going, going, going, going going, and I just fell off the end of the cliff, I knew that I hadn't been looking after myself. I kind of lost a lot of weight. I wasn't eating properly. There was no kind of self care routine at all.
And I swore I would never do it again. 10 years later, I experienced burnout in a very different way. So from that perspective, I found myself in a burnout position, but this time more of it manifested in a way that I was becoming somebody I wasn't. I was doing work that I didn't feel sat with my values. I was missing family occasions. I missed my son's very first parents evening. And I think any parents listening will know that that's a big No, no. And so there were just little things that I realised that whilst I didn't acknowledge that I was in burnout, I was absolutely in burnout. So for me, it's becoming really conscious of what you need to take that selfcare.
What I find with a lot of the people I've worked with where substances are involved is that it takes a while for people to realise that that's not necessarily the most healthy way for them to destress, unwind, and deal with overwhelm. And now part of what the work we do is look at how you can put mechanisms in place that aren't based around chemicals, essentially, whether that's food or whether that's wine, or whether that's cocaine. It doesn't really matter what it is. It's about finding that balance of activities that will help provide that selfcare. And that can range from anything from meditation, from walking, getting in nature, it could be colouring, and watching Netflix.
It's a whole different range of things that people need to try so that they can experience what works so that when the crisis actually occurs when they find themselves at that breaking point, they've got these kinds of trigger points that will identify when it's tipping into crisis, or when it's manageable. Yeah, and of course, COVID has taken away some of that. So where people would previously be able to go to the gym, for example, COVID completely removed that. And so there are definitely additional challenges right now.
Katherine Ann Byam 12:46
How can me as a family member, or you know, anyone, as a family member support their partners or loved ones? When do they recognise this as happening? How can I help? Like, is it okay for us to try to create, like a pattern interrupt? Like, what do you recommend? How do we go about this? I think it's really hard as a family member because we often see that destruction, or that kind of ripple and impact on our loved ones far before they do. So the biggest advice is to stay patient, which can be really, really hard.
And people often I've spoken to family members who've often said to me, I feel really guilty, but I don't want to stay with them anymore. And I think I'm a huge advocate for self-care first, regardless of what your loved ones are going through. And if as a loved one, you're feeling that you're doing as much as you can, there may come a point where you have to step back. For those people who are actually living and breathing it, then you actually have to make sure you've got self-care mechanisms in place first.
And my best advice is to speak to family support, and there are so many amazing family support services out there that will be able to give more specific advice on what you can do. But I think it's about knowing limitations is a really fine line between kind of colluding and unintentionally supporting somebody's use of substances and being able to provide them with needed support as well.
Katherine Ann Byam 14:38
So what about if the person seems to be in a depressive state? So what's the recommendation for people who are seeping into depression? I've read recently that statistics around suicides were starting to climb during this pandemic as well. What can we do for people who are going through that sort of thing?
Charlotte Hopkins 15:04
Yeah, I'm a huge advocate for just asking for support. And I think you're absolutely right. The levels of suicide are rising as are the levels of abuse in our house are rising, as our alcohol levels are rising, as our just general, mental health issues are rising. All of these things are exasperated during this situation. So the best advice for me is to seek that advice. Now that advice doesn't have to necessarily come from a specialist service. And I think always seeing your GP is a really great starting point because they're in a position to then really understand the nuances of whether there's any family history of mental health, or whether this is situational.
And my biggest advice - if you do see a professional of any kind is to write down everything that's going on for you before you go. Because when we go in, if you're anything like me, you walk into that GP and all of a sudden, you feel absolutely fine. There's nothing going on, I don't really know why I'm here. So lots of people kind of forget what's been going on for them. And so writing down the kind of symptoms that you're experiencing is really important. I think having a really hard look, I'm a huge advocate of creating a diary.
So for example, when people come and work with us from a substance use perspective, what we'll often do is ask them to record when and why and what they're drinking or using, but also look at that mood, and what kind of was around that. Were they feeling low or depressed? Or were they actually feeling really excited, and you know, wanted to just have some excitement in their life. And what that allows somebody to do is really look at those patterns, and then take action. And when you're in kind of a depression or you've got some anxiety or whatever those feelings are that you're really struggling with, it's very hard to pull yourself out of that.
So having somebody who can almost be like an accountability buddy just to kind of give you a nudge to say, "actually, are you okay today?" or "do you need some space?" or "do you need to talk?" or "do you just need a hug?" So there's this spectrum of “I’m kind of feeling low in mood and I just need a little support," and then right on the other end, then there's this diagnosis of depression, which may or may not require some more medical intervention.
Katherine Ann Byam 17:40
Perfect, Charlotte. Can you tell our listeners how they would be able to find out about your services? You know, this is obviously a choice that people make probably as a family, or maybe a very individual one. But how can they reach out if they want to get more advice or guidance from you?
Charlotte Hopkins 17:56
Yeah, we can be contactable via our website, which is www.kinbee.co.uk. And we specialise in providing support, education, and awareness around anything to do with complex co-occurring needs. So what I would say is we have a really great network of professionals that can be referred to or we can refer. I wouldn't say refer on your behalf, but we can advise to get in contact with and then on social media, anybody can just search for Charlotte Hopkins and anything around the happy pursuit of excellence and I should pop up.
Katherine Ann Byam 18:34
Perfect. Thanks so much for joining us and for your guidance today, Charlotte.
Charlotte Hopkins 18:38
Thanks for having me.