Sweeney's Blogs

Being Different: Blog 1 – An Introduction

February 25, 2019June 18, 2021James Sweeney

Hello and Welcome to Sweeney’s Blogs!

This is the first blog in the new Being Different series! This series is going to be taking a look at what Being Different really means, the impact that it can have on your life and the general importance of being different in life. Throughout the series we are going to try and change peoples views to show that being different is what makes us who we are, if we were all the same then life would get boring very quickly!

The Being Different series is going to focus on the more positive approach of being different. When I was younger and first heard words such as odd and weird I used to think about them as insults and I use to take offence by them but now, under a more positive mindset and thought process, I appreciate the words as they mean that I am me, I am different and I am doing justice to myself.

The old adage of is it better to be a “Leader” or a “Follower” is a question that I always hear getting asked to people. It is one of the questions we are going to be looking at in the second blog in the series, where we’ll be investigating what being different really means & how the definition we may have had before may be an old fashioned view, which could do with a bit of a modern update.

That’s all I want to talk about in today’s blog! I hope you all are looking forward to reading all of the blogs in this new Being Different series! As always feedback is always appreciated. Let me know what you think of this series or any other that I have done. If you do have any questions or queries, then please message me and I will do my best to answer them.

Thanks,

James

Alzheimer’s Acceptance – Blog 1 -Introduction

February 18, 2019August 8, 2020James Sweeney

Hello all,

This is going to be the first blog in my new Alzheimer’s Acceptance series. This blog is going to act as an introduction into the series of blogs that will be released in the upcoming weeks regarding this topic.

Acceptance. A single word with hundreds of meanings and hundreds of obstacles. To accept a new reality or a new set of obstacles are things people face in day to day life. This series of blogs is going to focus on the different variables and facts you need to acknowledge and accept in relation to Alzheimer’s.

Alzheimer’s is a very complex and interesting topic that can really be confusing to get your head around. People try to tackle it as one subject and one milestone which has ill-advised effects on both our Mental Health as well as our Physical Health. To even try and understand an illness such as Alzheimer’s as just one entity can ultimately make acceptance next to impossible. To truly acknowledge and accept what is going on in someone’s head and how to cope with it you need to break the condition down into smaller more manageable milestones.

By splitting the problem into smaller manageable milestones, you allow yourself to increase your understanding on a step by step basis, slowly learning and accepting each point as appropriate. This helps your mind make sense of what is going on and allows you to think rationally about the right steps that you need to take. Breaking down the problem eases the pressure on both you and the person suffering. You can slowly understand different bits gradually, instead of having to do it all at once.

Thank you for reading today’s blog! I feel like I am really going to enjoy writing this series as I am going to be able to link my own personal experience in with the topic. If anyone has any feedback on this blog or any other blogs that I have done please do get in touch! If anyone has any suggestions for blogs they want to see or feedback they want to give then please do not hesitate to message me as well!

Thanks as always,

James Sweeney

Learn to walk before you can run

Poetry? A Guide to How to Manage Stress using Poems.

February 12, 2019August 8, 2020James Sweeney

Hello,

If you have read any of my previous blogs, you would have seen that I have quite an interest in Poetry. I like to write poems about topics that interest or stress me out as it helps me manage my problems. In this blog, I am going to be describing how poems help me and how to write them.

Firstly I am going to talk about how poems help me. In times when I am stressed or worried about something I often feel a bit lost. In these times it is common for my stutter to flare up and it becomes increasingly hard to talk to people. It’s in these times that I start writing poems. I find that poems are a great way for me to express how I am feeling at a particular time at a level which is easy to understand.

These poems allow me to directly convey how I am feeling alongside what I want to say without running into obstacles such as my stutter or accidentally phrasing things wrong. I have written poems about almost anything. I have written poems about my stutter, my Grandmothers Alzheimer’s, Mental health and many other topics. I like to always follow a set pattern that I have when I make a poem which becomes evident if you have seen more than one of my poems. I like to always refer back to two lines or a paragraph in a way that is similar to how a chorus is repeated in a song.

Next, I am going to be talking about how to construct a poem. When I make a poem the first thing I need is a topic. After I have chosen my topic I look for particular words that relate to that topic. An example of how to do this can be seen as follows: in my poem about My Grandmother, I chose the topic of Alzheimer’s. From this topic, I picked out several words such as memories, kindness and friend to name a few.

From this step, I start to think of rhyming words for the topical words I have chosen. The number of rhymes for each word can vary based on the style of poem you want to create. I usually create my poem using rhyming couplets, however, I have constructed poems in the past using whole verses full of rhyming words.

If you are having trouble finding rhyming words then there are ways around it. Firstly you can find synonyms to the word that you want to use. When you have found an appropriate synonym you can again try to find a word that rhymes with it. If you are still having trouble rhyming a particular word then you can use a website such as RhymeZone.

The next stage to develop your poem is to group together your rhyming couplets/paragraphs. Try to arrange the paragraphs/stanzas in a way that flows whilst also making sense. You want to present the theme of the poem you are writing about almost instantly to allow the reader to fully understand and appreciate it. To try and maximise the flow of the poem you could repeat two or three lines at the end of the paragraph. This helps to ensure that the poem is easy to follow and easy to read. After following these steps you should have an excellent poem!

Thank you for reading and I hope this guide to how to write poems has been helpful for you. As always any feedback on this blog and all of my other blogs is greatly appreciated! Hope to see you all again soon. If you have any questions or poems that you want me to check to be sure to message me.

James Sweeney

Nobody gets to live life backward. Look ahead, that is where your future lies – Ann Landers

Content Schedule Update – February 2019

February 10, 2019August 8, 2020James Sweeney

Hello,

This blog is going to add as an update blog for the upcoming weeks. I am going to be briefly talking about what I am hoping to do in regards to content in my blogs for the upcoming weeks.

As my blog is still in it’s early stages I think it is important to briefly cover every field that I want to talk about. I will be starting some ‘blog series’ that I hope to carry on in the future.

Over the next few weeks my blogs will be focused around Mental Health, Stress and Stuttering. I am interested in going into University Stress for Students in the future but I am still thinking about how I am going to do this.

This is only meant to be a short blog providing answers for the large variety of blogs that have been released lately. I will be posting a blog sometime this week about how I write poems and how they help manage stress. If anyone has any requests for blogs or questions please get in contact with me.

Thanks for reading and keep an eye out for my future blogs!

James Sweeney

Poem – Looking into the Mind of Mental Health

February 9, 2019November 22, 2021James Sweeney

Looking into the Mind of Mental Health is a poem that I wrote back when I was going through a rather rough patch with my own Mental Health. The poem takes a look at some of the thoughts that can go through your head when thinking of Mental illnesses such as Anxiety, Depression & PTSD.

Here is the poem:

Looking into the Mind of Mental Health

My depression is at an all-time high,

I’m not sure how to fix it, I don’t know why,

Is it worth solving, is it worth a try?

Do I just stop or go to bed and lie?

How do I escape this cycle of self-hatred?

This self-torture mechanism I have created,

When feelings are difficult to be translated,

When all you want to feel like again, is elated.

My anxiety is at quite a high peak,

My mind-sets darkening, turning bleak,

My positivity’s slowly draining, like a boat with a leak,

Is it worth saving, or is my mind too weak?

How do I escape this cycle of self-hatred?

This self-torture mechanism I have created,

When feelings are difficult to be translated,

When all you want to feel like again, is elated.

I’m worried that my PTSD will come back,

Then my social and work life will slack,

One person left alone like a wolf without a pack,

When life gets tough is it worth the hack?

How do I escape this cycle of self-hatred?

This self-torture mechanism I have created,

When feelings are difficult to be translated,

When all you want to feel like again, is elated.

What if the bullying happens again?

Will I cope? Or break like I did when I was ten,

This fear I’ve got, my childhood is the stem,

I’m lost for words, can’t put words to the pen.

How do I escape this cycle of self-hatred?

This self-torture mechanism I have created,

When feelings are difficult to be translated,

When all you want to feel like again, is elated.

Hope you all enjoyed the poem! Let me know what you think!

Thanks for reading and I hope you have a great day!

James Sweeney

Rhythmical Thinking: A Stuttering Solution?

February 7, 2019September 16, 2022James Sweeney

Stuttering is one of life’s obstacles that can prove difficult to overcome. Certain types of people learn methods and techniques to help overcome stuttering, however, others can struggle. I’m going to be doing a series of blogs with methods I use to help reduce the amount I stutter. This method I like to refer to as the Rhythmical Thinking method.

During times when I stutter a lot, I always try a wide range of techniques to help reduce it. When I was younger there was a time when no matter what method I tried, I could not stop stuttering. I struggled to think of what to do and then a thought came to my head. I started thinking of a musical beat in my head. I slowly started to increase the beat when I stopped stuttering and I went back to speaking normally. I’ll go into detail about how this works after I give a bit of a background to how it worked for me.

I’ve been part of a brass band since I was very young. I learned to play the trombone when I was in year 3 in school and am still learning today. As I grew up playing in a brass band I experienced lots of different musical beats, rhythms and tempos/speeds. After playing these pieces hundreds of times you learn how to compose these beats in your own head.

Now how the Rhythmical Thinking technique works is as follows. When you start to stutter a lot you stop and think of a beat. This beat can be as fast or slow as you want it to be however I recommend starting with a slow beat. Once you have this beat in your head you can either just keep it in your head or you can tap your fingers or toes to it.

After the beat has remained constant in your head for a while start speaking in time with the beat. As you start to reduce the amount you stutter slowly increase the beat until you get back to normal. As you increase the speed ensure that you are still stuttering less. If you start to stutter more again then slow down again and try again. This should help you stop stuttering.

Thanks for reading and I hope you have a great day!

James Sweeney

Alzheimer’s: The Bookcase Analogy

February 5, 2019August 8, 2020James Sweeney

The Bookcase Analogy is a theory I first found through a video, which was created by The Alzheimer’s Society . The theory is one of the many theories used to describe how Alzheimer’s affects a persons mind. The Bookcase Analogy is a great way to describe and visualise Alzheimer, as well as the effect that it has on your life.

The Bookcase Analogy is an excellent theory used to describe the affect Alzheimer’s has on a persons mind. The theory starts out like this: Imagine a persons mind as a Bookcase. As you get with every Bookcase, there are several shelves on the Bookcase. In our example each shelve is a decade(10 years).

Now imagine the Bookcase gets damaged. When books fall off the bookcase they are lost and/or misplaced, this is similar to how Alzheimer’s affects the mind. The books in this instance correspond to memories. If they fall off the shelf they are lost or missing. This leaves gaps in the shelves and or memories. This can lead to certain people having to relive the death of a loved one or numerous other tragedies that have happened in their life. This can be very upsetting for the sufferer.

These absences of memories can be very confusing to the person who has Alzheimer’s. These can lead to them having enlarged emotions. What I mean by this is that certain emotions can be amplified by this stress. Sufferers can become very anxious, stressed, jumpy or any other sort of emotion caused by this stress.

Books can also be swapped on a bookcase. This is an excellent way to link a bookcase to Alzheimer’s. The swapping of books can be linked to how Alzheimer’s meddles with people memories. If a bookcase if damaged or the books are swapped it can cause great confusion and can possibly lead to violence not usually seen by some people who are suffering with Alzheimer’s.

This damaging of the bookcase can also lead go the sufferer getting confused about how old they are. People can suddenly think they’re 30 years old when they’re 70 or they could think that they are 80 years old when they are only 40. This confusion can also relate to mood swings. People can get really annoyed that they cannot remember certain memories and it cab lead to them becoming very angry or upset very suddenly. Although these mood swings are usually temporary, they can cause a great deal of unrest for the casualty and of course surrounding family and friends.

Thank you for reading and I hope you have learned something new today. Any feedback on this blog would be appreciated. you can either contact me via the contact form provided on the website or via the Facebook page.

James Sweeney

“It occurred to me that at one point it was like I had two diseases – one was Alzheimer’s, and the other was knowing I had Alzheimer’s” – Terry Pratchett

A Grandmother, Mother and to all a Friend

February 4, 2019January 20, 2023James Sweeney

This is a poem I made for my Grandmother, when I found out that she had Alzheimer’s Disease. The poem is a very personal one for me and can also be located on my Alzheimer’s website, Don’t Forget Me. The poem acts a nostalgia train for me going through my life and the memories that I share with my Nana.

Note: Cap is a nickname that my brother made for my grandfather 🙂

A Grandmother, a Mother and to all a friend,
A person who would inspire you to the very end.

For a person who did so much for so many,
If she needed help she would try not to ask for any,
A nurse for years and a sister to her ward,
If you ever wanted to go for a walk she would be first on board,
A strong lady who could walk for miles,
Would take you up and down the aisles,
A Grandmother, a Mother and to all a friend,
A person who would help you to the very end.

For a Nana who devoted her life to Cap,
She could make a killer bacon bap,
A devoted wife, partner and the very best friend,
The two together were the ultimate blend,
A woman who would help no matter who you were,
Who would help you see clearly if your mind was a blur,
A Grandmother, a Mother and to all a friend,
A person who you would admire to the very end.

For a Grandmother who would go for walks down the beach,
She would always share advice, never to preach,
For all the walking we did on the rocks,
She never thought to comment on my very weird crocs,
For the rock pools we would look for all day,
A task that would need us to go all around the bay,
A Grandmother, a Mother and to all a friend,
A person who would guide you to the very end.

For a woman who could make the very best scone,
Any memories of her will never be gone,
A kind patient and incredible baker,
She would not even tell me off when I was a troublemaker,
A lady who could make the tastiest teisin lap,
She always would let me steal Caps cap,
A Grandmother, a Mother and to all a friend,
A person who would inspire you to the very end.

Thanks for reading my poem dedicated to my grandmother, my best friend, my hero. If you would like to let me know what you thought of the poem, please drop me a message in the comments or through our Facebook page. Although my grandmother’s Alzheimer’s has stole the memories from her, they’ll never take them away from me!

Thanks for reading & I hope you have a lovely day!

James Sweeney

The Journey Begins

February 3, 2019August 8, 2020James Sweeney

Hello and Welcome to Sweeney’s Blogs!

I am James Sweeney and I am from South Wales. I am going to be writing weekly blogs on this page covering topics such as Mental Health, Stuttering, Stress and many more. I am aiming to upload one new blog a week talking about a new topic. For this blog, I will be using a theme that is free to use from WordPress.

I currently own and run my own website called Don’t Forget Me. This website revolves around Alzheimer’s, it talks about what it is, how you can recognise it, ways to accept it and things to do to try and get past it. Some of the blogs I will be writing will be expanding some of the points I make on the website. If you would like to visit the website please do, the link is a follows: http://www.dontforgetme.org.uk.

Otherwise please enjoy the blogs that i will be writing, if you have any questions or queries or comments about a blog feel free to contact me. The best ways would either be through the Don’t Forget Me website or email me: Sweeneyblogs@outlook.com.

Thanks and Enjoy,

James Sweeney