In today’s tech savvy world, it probably comes as no surprise that there now exists a range of ‘apps’ to motivate and assist people to improve aspects of their mental health.
Imood Joural is a mood diary that helps you uncover things about yourself – the way you think or why you behave in certain ways in certain situations – which you might otherwise miss. It does this first by asking you to rank your mood (from downright terrible on the low side, to ecstatic on the up side). You can do this by selecting a mood, writing about it, or taking a picture of your face in order to assess its expression. The app then tracks the results, providing a mood chart to help you and your counsellor identify your emotional patterns. You can do this daily, or if you prefer, each week, and you can establish alarms which remind you to record your mood at various times throughout the day or week. The app also enables you to record the reason behind your mood, if you know the cause. Whether you have anxiety, depression or ocd, or you simply wish to increase your personal insight and know yourself better, this app might be a helpful way to aid you in your discovery. To download the app, go to itunes.
Superbetter is an app developed by game creators as a tool to assist people to develop resilience in their personal lives. Resliience enables people to stay strong, happy and purposeful even in difficult times. Based on empirical evidence, and designed with the support of psychologists and medical researches, every element of the app is intended to develop resilient emotions, strength, and feelings of connectivity. Superbetter allows you to customise the program so that it is responsive to your individual needs or the particular circumstance that you might be dealing with. Superbetter provides suggestions and ways to improve your mood and increase your resilience, in response to what you tell it. For more info, head to www.superbetter.com
CTH MoodTracker is supposed to assist people suffering from bipolar disorder, low mood or depression better handle their emotions. It does this by creating a profile which youyou’re your therapist can then review together. The app also monitors the effectiveness of any treatment you might be having, by tracking your experience from day to day. Not unlike Imood Diary, CTH MoodTracker tracks your emotional state or mood to create an overall picture of your emotional experience. In addition to capturing and recording your changing mood, the app also helps to collate information relating to your sleeping patterns, any medicine that you might be taking, and any events that might be impacting on your mood. Some practitioners, especially those practising Cognitive Behaviour Therapy, will find this sort of tracking to be an extremely useful tool in the treatment of mood and anxiety disorders. For more info, click here.
Whilst none of these apps claim to cure sufferers (and nor should they), the tools they offer can play an important part in your road to recovery. By helping you to easily collect information on your patterns of behaviour and emotions, and by neatly collating them into easy to read charts and maps, these sorts of apps can be an excellent starting point from which your therapist can offer suitable treatment and provide you with the tools you need to improve your emotional well-being.
