- We started to have trouble getting her to go to school so that was really difficult, like it was an argument every single day, trying to just get her out of bed to go to school. She wasn't interested. She wasn't sick as such, and then I started to realise everything I was trying wasn't working and we were just fighting all the time, so in the end we just decided that we needed someone else to step in. First off, we needed to see a doctor, so we went in and spoke to the doctor. I guess I didn't really think the doctor would really know much about mental health, and I wasn't sure how he would approach it with her, and she was worried about talking to somebody about what was going on, and he was a man and a stranger but he was really good. I had a chat with him before she saw him, so he knew my concerns, so when he spoke to her he asked lots of questions about how she was feeling and he was really gentle and understanding and that made it really easy for us. He referred her to a psychologist, and when we went to see the psychologist she went in on her own. It was really hard to let her go in on her own. I guess I just had to believe that on this occasion we needed help to deal with this situation. I just had to trust that this person was a professional and that they had her best interests at heart. So I needed to let him have that conversation with her. I sort of worried about being judged as a mother so I found it really difficult to want to reach out and get that help because I felt like I should be able to fix it myself, and also I was a bit worried about her talking to someone because I felt really exposed, like I was worried that she'd be telling them that I wasn't a good parent or that you know be talking about me, when of course, really, it was about her. I didn't want to pump her for information later. I had to sort of say "how did it go?" or "how do you feel?" And she didn't really tell me much, and that was really difficult. But like it's a difference is after a few sessions I could see that she was starting to feel a little bit better so I just had to trust that it was working. I had to remind myself that if I wasn't a good parent we wouldn't be there. My job was to recognise that she needed some sort of help and to reach out to someone, so I was being a good parent, that was what a good parent does. With my daughter working with a psychologist, she's been taught how to recognise how her body feels so she knows when she's starting to feel anxious, or she knows when she's more down than she might usually be. So now when that happens, the first thing she says is, "Mum, I think we need to go and see the psychologist." So she's actually really good at identifying herself when she wants that extra help. It's okay if life's not rosy all the time and it's okay to reach out for that help.