Nursing - Support & Self-care Journey - Essay Writing Assessment Answer

Nursing Assignment

Assignment Task

The Task – Part 1.

Enlist Supporters: First, enlist two supporters to help you decide what area of your life to focus on and to help you stay on track. Your supporters can be people in your life outside of University (such as family and friends), other students, or therapeutic supporters (such as a counsellor, personal trainer, nutritionist, etc). If you would like to support/be supported by a fellow student, post a request asking for supporters in the Assessment Forum in Moodle.

Identify issue for change: Next, you will identify an area in your life where you would like to make positive change, focusing on self-care. Some people choose to work on substantial issues like anxiety, while others choose issues like weight-loss, quitting smoking or cutting down on alcohol. The important thing is to identify something that would be meaningful toyou, something you would like to do but do not usually find time for.

Develop a Plan:NB: the plan itself is not marked and does not contribute to the word count, it merely needs to be included at the beginning of your Word document to help your marker understand the points you discuss in your essay.

In collaboration with your supporters develop your self-care plan. Include details of your plan in the first 1-2 pages of your assignment. You can use photos/graphics or images as well as words/tables/graphs. Remember this is a Recovery-based self-care plan so it’s important to be strengths-focused and self-directed in order to best suit you! Your plan should clearly identify:

·What area of your life you want to work on

·How you propose achieving your goal

·What supports you have in place and the role they will play

·What challenges you may face and possible ways of addressingthese

Implement your Plan and keep a journal:NB: the journal does not form part of the document you submit for marking and there is no requirement that anyone else reads your journal but you. The journal is merely to help you remember key reflections and thoughts you will need when writing your essay.

As you progress through your self-care journey it will be helpful to record in your journal:

•how you felt about the support you received each time you interact with supporters

•how your journey is progressing and why

•what helps and/or hinders you along the way and how you deal with any obstacles

Checklist - Part 1.

• Create a self-care plan in collaboration with your supporters
• Implement your plan
• Aim to record in your journal at least 15-20 minutes per week
• For your assessment submission include your plan only (notyour journal entries) as “Part 1”

The Task – Part 2.

In the second part of your document you will write an essay in the first-person using your own self-care experience to compare and contrast to that of mental health consumers, using relevant literature to support your discussion.

Checklist - Part 2.

• Write in a first person academic style.If you're not sure how, go to ‘Assessment tips and examples’ in Moodle for more information.
• Compare and contrast your experience to that of mental health consumers, using relevant literature to support your discussion.

Support & Self-care Journey

Part 1

Developing a Plan

Everyone who has held a job has at some point came under the pressure of workplace related stress. Even when people love what they do at their job, all jobs have their stressful elements. The pressure of meeting deadlines or fulfilling a challenging obligation can be overwhelming to a person and can cause stress. The ability of dealing with stress can mean the difference between being success and failure at work. It is difficult to control all the events that happen in the workplace, but that does not mean one is powerless in handling a difficult situation that leads to stress in the workplace. Some strategies can be utilised to prevent the damaging effects of stress. Workplace stress has been a part of my life for a long time. I have always had a challenge handling some of the workplace stresses that occur in my workplace. Two of my friends, one from my family and a colleague also confirmed this challenge when I asked them to help me in determining an area of my life that needs change. This realisation of my inability to handle stress has motivated me to develop of a goal of making sure that I develop good self-care strategies for handling stress I encounter at my workplace. These strategies will include scheduling time for relaxation and exercises and keeping a good balance between work and time to rest. I will also use self-assessment, meditation and yoga exercise and dance as part of my exercise regime. The other strategy I will use is utilizing support and sharing of stressful feelings with colleagues and a professional counsellor.

Among the strategies in place at my area of work, include social support from other colleagues. In my workplace, there are many avenues for sharing of stress among colleagues. Talking to colleagues will help me in offloading negative feelings and gaining some fresh perspectives. Stressed workers at the workplace are allowed time to seek counselling from counselling therapists. Sometimes stress feelings can be out of control and counselling is the perfect answer to ensuring that one understands what is happening. Counselling is essential as the counsellor can teach new skills for coping with stress like assertion, time management skills, and relaxation techniques. Physical activities are also another stress management strategy at my disposal in my area of work. Exercises are essential in burning up of excess adrenaline and release of endorphins. I am not used to exercising on a regular basis, and I should schedule time in my daily activities to ensure that exercise is squeesed out of my life. I will be exercising daily with things that I enjoy like swimming, taking walks, yoga, dance and gentle workouts in the gym and then building this up to a level that suits me.

The challenge I will face in the implementation of this recovery plan is adherence to the therapy proposed in this plan. I will face a challenge in scheduling time for exercise and counselling due to my busy schedule. Another challenge I am likely to encounter is the ambivalence to use of existing facilities at my workplace for managing stress like sharing my feelings of stress with colleagues. The non-adherence to the proposed plan will be addressed through setting daily goals in adherence and making sure, I implement them on a daily basis and rewarding myself for achieving the set goals and accounting for my failures. Ambivalence to the utilisation of the existing support structures for handling stress will be addressed through being more proactive in seeking help when I am stressed out in the workplace.

Images displaying a stressed worker

Part 2

Introduction

Mental health disorders entail disruptions in emotion, thinking, and behaviour. Small disturbances in these aspects of life are very common, but when these disruptions severely distress a person and interfere with their daily lives, then they can be regarded as mental health illness and disorders. The effects of mental health illnesses may be short-term or long lasting. Mental health affects the way a person behaves, feels and thinks, and different people have different approaches in dealing with mental health and illnesses. Mental health illnesses range from mild forms of illness like anxiety and stress to serious illnesses like depression and bipolar disorder. Mental health patients require serious support from the health care providers in their journey of recovery from mental illness. A patient guided recovery plan that factors the unique needs of the mental health consumer is very essential for recovery. The objective of this paper is assessing the recovery plan I developed for addressing the challenge of stress in my life and highlighting the factors that helped and hindered the attainment of the set recovery goals. The input of my support structure in my life in the recovery plan will also be evaluated. An analysis of the both the internal and the external factors that affected the attainment of the goals set in my recovery will be evaluated. My experiences in implementing my recovery plan for stress will be compared and contrasted to the experiences of mental health patients in their recovery using a reflective approach. A review of the medical models used in the management of stress will be discussed and compared to the approaches I will use to manage stress. The conclusion of this paper draws from the understanding of how the recovery journey informs nursing practises and the importance of maintaining good relationships between nurses and mental health patients in improving their health outcomes.

The necessity for self-care for nurses and mental health consumers as part of their Recovery journey

Virtually all nurses experience stress in their professions. Many areas of the nursing practice are stressful. Working with patients and families in their difficult times of their lives is challenging and sometimes can lead to many nurses neglecting their self-care activities to focus on their patients (Higan, 2016). According to the American Nursing Association, (2012), 70.5 percent of nurses cite the chronic and acute effects of stress and overworking as their main health and safety concern. The major causes of stresses for nurses are unmanageable workloads, understaffing and time pressures, poor relationship with other health care practitioners. Coping with the demanding needs of patients and their families, can also cause lead to stress? Stress leads to burnout and poor job satisfaction among nurses. Job associated stress is most difficult for nurses when it happens during working hours when many forces combine to generate an overwhelming situation. This is the time that most nurses need stress management tools the most.

Holistic nursing views the mental, physical, social and Psychological aspects of health as intercalated and intertwined and what affects one aspect of life influences the others. It is, therefore, important for nurses to manage stress to improve their mental health. Nurses need, to create self-care plans to handle stress in the workplace. A holistic self-care plan that utilises many approaches is important. Improving mental health through self-care plans is important since improvement of one aspect of health leads to positive effects on all other areas of health.

According to the Australian Psychological Society (2014), the process of recovery and treatment for many people with mental health disorders is challenging because their course in the journey of recovery may be erratic. Individuals with mental health issues may have impaired mood and cognition, which affect their planning and decision-making processes and their health outcomes. Individuals with mental health disorders have limited support networks and difficulty in sustaining the relationships with other people (WHO, 2004). Fragmented health care that divides mental health care from the general health also presents some barriers to these individuals and the nurses who care for them. Building supportive networks for individuals with severe mental illnesses is very central in recovery and self-care of mental health patients (HFMHA, 2008). The aim of self-care for nurses is making an explicit case for the continuum of care for self that restores and enhances health that is congruent with a person’s individual values and beliefs (Jean & Ruth, 2008). Self-care is also an essential part of the primary healthcare initiative that nurses should use to prevent illnesses and achieve personal wellbeing (Crossmark, 2015).

Self-care is very important for nurses in preventing burnout. Nurses need to examine themselves in relation to whether or not they are experiencing harmony in all areas of their mind and seek ways of nourishing this harmony within the self-prior to caring for other people. Self-care is a very important intervention for health promotion and management of illness. The promotion of self-care activities in nursing is vital in promoting of wellbeing and the creation of good work environments for nurses (Yolanda, 2013). Self-care is important for nurses so that they can continue helping their respective Patients with maximum efficiency. Self-care is also important in helping nurses understand themselves and nurses need to deviate time exclusively for helping them self-renew and reflect and have quality time away from the issues of work (Kate et al., 2010).

Mental health consumers are very vulnerable to poor quality health care and lack of self-care strategies. This happens because mental health patients may have impaired cognitive skills, underdeveloped interpersonal skills. The stigma associated with mental illness and fragmentation of health care present barriers to mental health patients to access self-care (Elizabeth et al., 2003). Nurses can play a very important role in ensuring that mental health patients recognise the behavioural choices they make and respond to the barriers to self-care when they occur, model them and teach them on how to take actions that promote self-care and promote health. Through developing meaning and purpose of self-care, mental health consumers can grow to appreciate the importance of self-care and gaining a sense of belonging to society beyond their effects of mental illnesses (Elizabeth, 2014). When self-care and recovery are the frameworks for dealing with patients in health care, then consistent and collaborative relationships based on mutual trust, reciprocity and respect are very essential in developing multifaceted healing of mental health patients in their complex contexts.

In the recovery journey, some of the internal barriers experienced in the Implementation of the self-care plan were the challenges of overcoming personal attitudes and beliefs in obtaining professional help in managing stress. The external barriers to following the plan were limited support and attention from health care providers.

The major barriers for many mental health consumers to self-care in the handling of stress are disruptions in their behaviour and decision-making processes that affect their ability to stick to self-care plans. The external barriers to self-care that many mental health consumers face are Psychosocial and cultural barriers such as stigma attached to mental illness patients. Good support and relationships between healthcare care providers and mentally ill patients is essential in making sure that mental health patients remain motivated to their plans for self-care. Good support and relationship with family members is also important for mental health consumers in sticking to their self-care plans.

The challenge in the recovery journey of insufficient support and attention from nurses in healthcare facilities is parallel to the challenge faced by many mental health patients in obtaining quality mental health. The busy schedule of many healthcare practitioners is a challenge for many nurses to give enough time and attention to patients in addressing their unique health needs. Limited attention and support also prevent the building of good relationships between nurses and Patients (Mary, 2008). Nurses, therefore, need to have ample time to focus on the individual needs of every patient and cultivate good relationships with their patients to help in improving their patients’ health outcomes.

Role of strategies and Plans of Self-care

Self-care is an intrinsic and highly important activity for good health. The strategies employed for self-care vary depending on the person. The remedies proposed for self-care and dealing with stress are varied and effective according to the individual traits. Some people are passive and tend to surrender to their circumstances, leading to feelings of hopelessness and powerlessness while others are proactive in dealing with stress (David et al., 2010). In my self-care journey for recovering from stress, the self-Directed strategies used are

a) Physical Approaches

My recovery journey from stress entails a daily exercise routine of 30 minutes exercises involving gym workout, dances, and Yoga. Stress and burnout are physiological responses, which are caused by specific events in the people’s lives that lead to an increase in high blood pressure and the redirection of blood to the major organs and increase in heartbeat rates. These complex events can be avoided through maintaining good health to reduce incidences of stress (Vicki, 2012). Because of the explosive reactions that stress causes to the body, a more healthy body is, therefore, very likely of dealing with stress. Exercise will play an essential function in promoting my health status by allowing the body to be ready to handle stress appropriately. Exercise breaks down adrenaline and promotes the production of endorphin hormones that promote welling. Exercises are, therefore, very important for mental health consumers in overcoming the stresses caused by their illness (Elizabeth, 2014).

b) Mental Plans and Strategies

In my self-care journey for managing stress, Relaxation techniques such as self-reflection, meditation, and breathing exercise are part of my strategy. I will engage in mental exercises that draw me away from the stressing events and provide a relaxed state. Self-reflection is also important in evaluating the causes of stress. The major cause of stress in my workplace is the inability of meeting certain deadlines and achieving certain goals. I will also ensure that I develop a better scheduling of work processes in my workplace to reduce chances of work overwhelm and the inability of beating deadlines.

Counselling is also part of my self-care strategy of recovering from stress. I have consulted a trained therapist who is helping me overcome negative thoughts through identifying the unhelpful thoughts emotions and behaviours so that I can relax and offload stressing emotions. Counselling helps in replacing the negative thoughts with more helpful thoughts that lead to alleviation of stress. My experiences with the counselling therapist were positive. The therapist provided support and made me the leader in my journey of recovery. My goals in the recovery journey was reducing incidences of stress to a minimum and ensuring that I am better equipped to handle stress when it occurs. In my recovery journey from stress, I realised it was hard to recover completely from stress in a short period, and the recovery process was a gradual journey that made me better equipped in handling stress when it occurred in the workplace. I was able to appreciate the support of family, friends, and the therapist in the recovery journey. Their support motivated me to remain motivated in my recovery journey. My experiences in my recovery journey are similar to the journey of recovery for mental health patients. The process of recovery from mental health is a process of setting goals and plans for improving health and embarking on it as a journey rather than a destination. Support From colleagues, family, and therapist are essential for people with mental health illnesses.

Traditionally, mental health area was grounded on the biomedical model where mental disorders were regarded as chronic illness caused by unchangeable neuron-pathological changes in the brain and deficits in the information processing potential. The process of recovery of mental health consumers was also viewed as impossible. This view of mental illnesses made mental health consumers have low self-esteem, and feel dissimilar from other people. Mental health patients with Low self-esteem and have a low quality of life and poor psychosocial functioning, and are more likely to experience a relapse of disruptive behaviours in the process slowing the process of recovery (Huiting, 2013).

The management of mental health illness is best handled using the Bio-psychological rather than the biological model of managing diseases. The biological model regards illness as caused by physical agents like bacteria, virus, and chemicals with the exclusion of other factors. The bio-psychological model regards illness as caused by physical agents, social and psychological factors. Bio-psychological approaches use multi-disciplinary approaches like medical and behavioural approaches in the prevention of illnesses (Mary, 2008). The decision to use a multidisciplinary approach in the management of stress in my recovery process is informed by the fact that stress is caused by psychosocial factors that require some multiple approaches in their management.

Patient centred care entails respect of the patient’s attitudes, beliefs, preferences, and the recognition of patient’s unique needs, and effective communication between patients and health practitioners. The Management of mental health illnesses relies on patient centred methods of management. Self-directed methods are effective in the management of chronic mental illnesses and cognitive symptoms. The use of self-directed methods in the management of illness may be hampered by poor relationships with family and health care providers. Mental health patients need the support of family and health care providers in using self-directed methods of managing their illnesses (Mary, 2008).

The recovery-based approach in the management of mental health is the best bio psychological model of managing mental illness. Recovery based approach is different since it does not focus on the pathology of the disease, compliance and the eradication of the symptoms and signs of mental illnesses, The recovery approach acknowledges that every individual has some unique set of abilities, which can be used in the recovery journey. The recovery approach also considers the individual needs and wants of consumers. The recovery approach focuses on a person’s experiences values and self-management in the journey of recovery (NSMHS, 2010). In the recovery based approach, the relationship between the healthy practitioner and the patient is a collaborative process of a shared process of making decisions, which takes into account a comprehension of the experiences of patients drivers in their care. Recovery based approach is based on several principles (NHS, 2010).

Recovery-oriented mental health recognises the uniqueness of the individual and the recovery outcomes are personal and unique for every individual. This approach therefore empowers mental health patients to be in charge of their care. Recovery-oriented approach also helps mental health consumers in making real choices in the recovery journey. Respect for client autonomy, attitudes, rights, and dignity are the hallmarks of the recovery approach. Recovery-oriented approach to mental health is also based on collaboration and enhanced communication between the health care provider and mental health patient. The role of the practitioner is supporting patient in their journey of recovery rather than just managing and treating symptoms (Mental Health foundation, 2016).

The objective of the recovery model is helping people look beyond their illness and encourage them to set goals and develop relationships that give value to their lives. The concept of recovery in mental health entails staying in control of one’s life despite the existence of mental health problem. Recovery in mental health means focussing care on supporting the process of recovery and enhancing resilience. Recovery from mental health entails giving hope to a person that they can live a meaningful life despite the existence of the mental illness. The recovery journey is a process rather than a destination that requires a well-organised system of support from family friends and professionals (NSMHS, 2010).

The experiences of live researchers with mental health problems also emphasise the importance of personal care plans and the use of the biopsychic-social approaches in managing mental disorders, For example, Mary O’Hagan, lived experiences in psychiatric hospital and Personal journey from mental illness made her change her view of mental illness. Her earlier views on mental illness were that it was hard recovering from mental illness, her views on mental health also made her deny the existence of mental health illnesses, and in the processes covering up and feeling alienated with other people. Her experiences with following a personal plan for recovery from illness made her change her view of recovery from mental illness. She stopped viewing mental health illness as an undesirable aspect of her life and felt no need for covering her illness. Her view of recovery approach from mental illness is that it is an individual process driven by mental health consumers with collaboration from the health care providers and the society. Mental health recovery is about living well while managing and living with the conditions brought about by mental illnesses (O’Hagan, 2012).

Mary Copeland struggle with mental disorders like extreme mood swings, depression and anxiety also made her contribute significantly to the recovery approach in mental health. Mental illnesses made her feel social isolation and repeated hardships. In a journey to restore her health and life, she become disappointed with the psychiatric model of managing mental health illness and the way it relied on the biomedical model that emphasised her recovery from illness. Mary devised her own journey of finding the best strategies for recovery through carrying out a survey among her peers. From 125 interviews, she identified that self-advocacy, self-support, personal responsibility, education, and Hope as the major principles essential for recovery and the use of wellness tools she also began facilitating support groups for people looking for recovery from mental illness. The principles drew from the experiences of the mental health patients to identify the type of strategies that work for them in recovery from mental disorders. In the process, Mary developed a coping plan called WRAP that helped her anticipate and manage the inevitable difficulties and stress caused by mental illness. WRAP also helped her remain positive and focussed on her recovery journey WRAP is now utilised in many informal recovery programs in many countries as a personal plan for recovery from mental health (Copeland Centre, 2012).

Among The recovery approaches available to people with mental health illnesses are:

a) Cognitive behavioural therapy is focussed approach used in promoting self-care to mental health consumers. CBG is based on the principle of cognitions having a major influence on behaviour vice versa. Cognitive behaviour therapy is grounded on the principle of distressing thoughts and feelings being the main cause of faulty thinking patterns. In cognitive behavioural therapy, a trained therapist works with a person with mental health illness in helping them dissipate the negative thoughts and experiences (HFMHA, 2008).

b) WRAP (Wellness Recovery Action Planning)

WRAP is a self-care strategy where people are supported to generate recovery plans, set their recovery goals and motivations to recovery. Mental health consumers developed the tool. WRAP enhances mental health patients in their control of mental health, enhances personal empowerment aids mental health patients in achieving their goals and dreams. WRAP also articulates the way other people should support a person with mental illness when symptoms make them handicapped to make decisions for themselves (Mental Health Foundation, 2016).

c) DREEM is a tool for research and evaluation of the recovery journey of mental health consumers. It is a self-evaluation tool for supporting mental health patients through gathering data about their journey. DREEM acts as a marker of where people are in their recovery journey and is essential in helping mental health patients stay focussed on the recovery journey. Another recovery approach available for mental health consumers is Checklist for Good Practise. This is a manual written by service users to guide mental health patients in their recovery journey (Mental Health Foundation, 2016).

The good relationship I had with my counsellor , friends and colleague were vital in making sure I experienced the recovery principles of autonomy, empathy, and connection My experiences in the recovery process was not different from those of other mental health consumers. Mental health consumers need to experience the recovery principles for their journey of recovery from mental health to have positive outcomes.

Factors that hinder the effectiveness of self-care plan and people with health care issues

The major barriers to self-care are attitudes and beliefs that prevented me from adhering to their self-care plans. These beliefs and attitudes resulted in the non-adherence to the self-care strategies available to nurses. Limited time in my schedule to focus on my self-care plan was also a major challenge at the beginning of the recovery Journey. The major barrier for people with mental health illness to self-care is erratic behaviour and limited cognition abilities that may affect the ability of mental health consumers from focusing on self-care. Many mental health patients cognitive and behaviours are influenced by the state of the overwhelming effects of their conditions on their behaviour. The self-care are strategies for mental health consumers should ,therefore, need to focus on the interactions between the mental health conditions and the skills necessary for self-care for mental patients (US Department of Health, 2010).

The Partnership with supporters of the health care plan while sustaining a self-directed approach to the adoption of the self-care plan.

In the self-care recovery journey, there was insufficient support from colleagues in the sharing of stressful events in the workplace. The scheduling of duties in the workplace to allow time for self-care and relaxation was also not favourable to allow time for physical activities during the day. Many colleagues in the workplace focused more on their duties and had little time discussing emotions and feelings about the workplace stress. The process of discussing emotions and stressful situations requires enough time for self-reflection and renewal. Support from colleagues was time limited due to the busy schedules of colleagues that did not give enough time for handling of all the feelings and issues raised. Some of the other colleagues considered workplace stresses to be a normal occurrence in their lives. This realisation warranted a change of strategy to consulting a professional counsellor. The professional counsellor was supportive in offering continuous support and personalised care. I had a powerful relationship with my counsellor who helped me remain motivated to my self-care plan. The wonderful and collaborative relationship I had with my professional counsellor in helping me stay focused on my recovery Journey signifies the importance of good relationships between healthcare providers and mentally ill patients. Mentally ill patients have unique needs that require good relationship and personalised attention from the healthcare providers to address adequately.

Conclusion

This study aimed at creating a plan for self-care through identifying and implementing an intervention plan for managing stress, and then compare, and contrast its implementation with the implementation of self-care strategies for people with mental illnesses. The issue identified for intervention was handling workplace related stress. From this analysis, it was apparent that self-care is very important for mental health consumers in promoting their health and wellbeing. Mental health consumers who practice self-care are highly motivated and positioned better in handling illness. Although many patients with mental health illnesses face huge barriers in the provision of healthcare, self-care improves the healthcare of mental patients through making them leaders in determining their health outcomes and well-being. The major barrier to self-care for many patients with mental health illness is unpredictable behaviour caused by mental illnesses that affect their adherence to plans of self-care plans. However, Recovery based approach is the best way of managing all the unique challenges faced by patients with mental health illnesses in improving their mental health.