ME
NTAL HEALTH SERVICES & GLOSSARY
The LCA recognises the unique mental health needs of its members as a priority.
Our aim is to provide all members with access to confidential mental health support services and to help members deal with the inherent challenges that the football industry presents, providing support for you to address areas where your thinking, feeling or behaviours may be negatively affecting your ability to manage the day-to-day demands of life and enjoy a sense of positive wellbeing.
Online LCA Psychology Sessions offer an accessible, confidential way to receive mental health and wellbeing guidance.
LCA members can access three 1-hour sessions each year, subject to availability. The sessions are intended to provide an initial assessment of any mental health concerns, offer useful tools and coping strategies, and potentially make recommendations or referrals to further treatment.*
To receive more information about the terms of access or to confidentially reserve an initial one-hour session please email LCA Wellbeing Manager – Sophie Cliff at sophie.cliff@leaguecoaches.com
*recommendations or referrals may include NHS, specialist charities or private health options. Additional costs may apply.
The LCA Mental Health Glossary assists members to better understand the terminology associated with various mental health issues. This is a useful resource which provides a brief summary of each issue and how an LCA member might seek support.
Please note this document includes reference to themes, which might trigger unwelcome and distressing memories or thoughts for some LCA members.
Addictions
Addiction is not having control over doing, taking or using something to the point where it could be harmful to you or affects your day-to-day life. Addiction is most commonly associated with gambling, drugs, alcohol or smoking but it is possible to be addicted to just about anything including; work internet, solvents, sex, and spending money. The feeling of engaging in an activity can be enjoyable and create a powerful urge to engage in the substance again, and a good sign of an addictive behaviour is when not having it causes withdrawal symptoms or a feeling of a “come down”. The strain of managing an addiction can seriously damage your work life and relationships.
The LCA Psychology Sessions can work with you to understand psychological and physical effects of addiction.
Alcohol Misuse
Misusing alcohol is using alcohol to help function through life. You may feel you need to drink alcohol to relax or switch off, to feel more confident, to enjoy yourself, or deal with stress.
LCA Psychology Sessions can help you understand your relationship with alcohol and enable you to cope in healthier ways.
Anxiety
Anxiety is characterized by a feeling of unease or worry. Anxiety can further feel like being restless or on edge, being irritable or getting tired easily, having difficulty concentrating or feeling your mind goes blank, the feeling of butterflies in the stomach or having tense muscles.
LCA Psychology Sessions can help you to recognise your anxiety, thought patterns which may be contributing to anxiety and work with you to help, reduce anxious feelings.
Bereavement
Bereavement is typically the feelings associated with losing someone important to us, however there are other types of loss such as the end of the relationship, losing a job or home. Bereavement can cause many different symptoms and they affect you in different ways. Some of the most common symptoms of bereavement include shock or numbness, which is usually the first reaction, overwhelming sadness, tiredness or exhaustion, anger or guilt.
It is not always east to recognize when bereavement, grief of loss are the reasons you are acting differently, therefore the LCA Psychology Sessions can provide you space to work through this.
Burnout
Burnout is a state of emotional, physical and mental exhaustion caused by excessive and prolonged stress. It occurs when you feel overwhelmed, emotionally drained and you may start to fall short of being able to meet constant demands. At its most severe experiences of burnout, it can affect you physically with a feeling of dizziness, increased agitation and feelings of being numb and disconnected from yourself and the world around you.
LCA Psychology Sessions can work with you to assess the physical and psychological effects of burnout in order to reduce it and enable you to function optimally again.
Coping
Coping is the way in which your thoughts, feelings and behaviours interlink to manage stressful situations. You lean on your coping mechanisms during stressful times to keep yourself functioning allowing you to fully adjust to demands. Ways of thinking, feeling and behaving which underpin coping can be helpful and adaptive to your health or unhelpful and potentially harmful to your health.
LCA Psychology Sessions can work with you to continually improve and move towards healthy and adaptive strategies to cope with demands of life.
Crisis Support
Crisis support may be needed when your behaviour or thoughts become so out of control that your general functioning has been severely impaired and you cannot resume personal responsibility. The situation is so extreme that you must be treated immediately as you become a danger to self and others.
The LCA can facilitate immediate access to specialist medical experts and access to crisis support including psychiatric and medical assessment and any hospital admission in order to help you function safely and healthily again.
Depression
Depression is a state that involves having a low mood for a prolonged period. It can also cause a range of other changes to how you feel or behave including being restless, agitated or irritable, difficulty thinking clearly or making decisions, loss of interest in sex, difficulty remembering or concentrating on things, using more tobacco, alcohol or other drugs than usual, difficulty sleeping, or sleeping too much and changes in your appetite. Not all of these symptoms need to be experienced for depression to be present but rather a few symptoms for over a two-week period.
LCA Psychology Sessions can help to identify depression and create a support plan to improve depressive symptoms.
Diagnosis
Often it can be difficult to find out what might be causing you to the think, feel or behave in certain ways. It is important to take the time and effort to get an accurate assessment and diagnosis, which may help determine the appropriate support. Diagnosis are often required for mental illnesses, which the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM5) holds.
Specialist medical experts can work with you to understand if you need a diagnosis and subsequent long-term treatment plan.
Eating Disorders / Disordered Eating
An eating disorder is a mental health condition where you use the control of food to cope with feelings or situations. Unhealthy eating behaviours may include eating too much or too little or worrying about your weight or body shape.
LCA Psychology Sessions can help you examine your relationship with food for optimal biological and psychological health.
Family/Relationship Breakdown
Family or romantic partner relationships have a direct impact on your mental health and your ability to be happy. Breakdowns and challenges may arise in the family system or romantic relationships and can cause emotional and psychological distress, which is often difficult to work through and make sense of alone.
LCA Psychology Sessions can provide you with a confidential and neutral space to speak about and explore your thoughts and feelings around any relational challenge you may be experiencing.
Family Support / Support Network
Family support can be extremely important in facilitating your progress towards achieving your goals, especially in an industry that is characterized by high pressure, instability, scrutiny and a sense that at times, you are ‘doing it on your own’. Additionally, working in football often places significant demands and pressure on your family and dependents.
LCA Psychology Sessions can support you and your family members with the ways to build and maintain supportive and positive family relationships.
Medication
Medications can play important roles in improving mental health and mental disorders/ conditions. They are often used in combination with other treatments, such as therapy and there are many different medications and dosages.
Specialist medical experts can help you understand if you may benefit from medication to help improve mental health conditions/disorders and illnesses.
Mind and Body Connection
The mind and body are intrinsically linked which significantly influences physical and emotional health. This is known as the mind-body connection. How you think and feel has an effect on your body’s physical health and vice versa.
LCA Psychology Sessions can help you understand your mind and body connection and help you to build habits and routines to positively influence their connection.
Obsessive Compulsive Disorder
Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) is a long lasting disorder which you may experience uncontrollable and reoccurring thoughts, (obsessions) or compulsive/repetitive behaviours or both. OCD has time-consuming symptoms that can cause significant distress or interfere with daily life.
LCA Psychology Sessions can help you manage OCD tendencies or disorders.
Organic Disorders (Dementia)
Organic disorders are psychological issues caused by damage to the brain and brain tissues. Organic brain disorders include Alzheimer's (also called dementia), Huntington's disease, Parkinson's disease.
LCA Psychology Sessions can help support you, and signpost you to specialist support, if you have an organic disorder.
Personality Disorder
A personality disorder makes a person think, feel, behave or relate to others very differently than other people. Personality disorders are assessed as mild, moderate or severe personality disorders and symptoms may look like disordered thinking, impulsive behaviour, problems controlling your emotions, concerns that other people will abandon you, intense but unstable relationships.
LCA Psychology Sessions can help assess if you have a personality disorder
Recovery
Recovery is returning to your normal or a better state. If you are not recovering well from day-to-day job and life pressures, commitments and demands, you may lack concentration, feel tired, feel physically sore across your body, may catch colds or get common cold sores more regularly. You may also feel more emotional than normal, becoming more easily upset or frustrated.
LCA Psychology Sessions can help you to develop recovery plans, schedules and skills, and help you use recovery as a driver of performance
Resilience
Resilience is your capacity to maintain adequate functioning after being subject to challenges or under pressure. Resilience is not about endurance it is about resetting and recharging. It is a dynamic process not a fixed trait and it can be developed and practiced. Low resilience prevents you from bouncing back after a challenge.
LCA Psychology Sessions can help develop your resilience to achieve performance and personal wellbeing aims.
Self-Harm
Self-harm is when you hurt yourself as a way of dealing with very difficult feelings, painful memories or overwhelming situations and experiences. You may self-harm as a way to express something that is hard to put into words, turn invisible thoughts or feelings into something visible, change emotional pain into physical pain, reduce overwhelming emotional feelings or thoughts, have a sense of being in control, punish yourself or to stop feeling numb or disconnected.
LCA Psychology Sessions can help you to understand self-harm and reduce its occurrence.
Stress
Stress is a state of worry or mental tension caused by a difficult situation. Stress is a natural human response that prompts us to address challenges and threats in our lives. Everyone experiences stress to some degree. The way we respond to stress, however, makes a big difference to our overall wellbeing.
LCA Psychology Sessions can help you understand your stressors and triggers and help you to improve your day to day functioning and ability to withstand stress.
Suicidal Thoughts
Suicidal thoughts are thoughts about ending your life or feeling that people would be better off without you. Often suicide thoughts are thinking about methods of suicide or making clear plans to take your own life. If you are feeling suicidal, you might be scared or confused by these feelings. You may find the feelings overwhelming.
The LCA can facilitate immediate access to specialist medical experts to understand your suicidal thoughts and decide a suitable intervention programme to help reduce these thoughts.
If you have any concerns about this, please seek support from the LCA or a specialist medical expert.
Below is a list of contact numbers which can be used in times of crisis:
Samaritans – 116 123 (24 hours)
NHS – 111 (24 hours)
Campaign Against Living Miserably (CALM) - 0800 58 58 58 – 5pm to midnight every day
The LMA and LCA is partnered with Shining a Light on Suicide – more information and resources regarding suicide prevention can be found on the website: https://shiningalightonsuicide.org.uk/