How do you feel?
by Sarah Adams
One of the suggestions for tracking mood is to summarise your day with an emoji. I find it very difficult to find an image that can summarise an entire day which can be like a roller coaster of emotions and physical manifestations of said emotions.
I heard about “temperature blankets” in an online craft group I am a member of – it is basically a snapshot of the weather over a given time in a particular area. They are knitted or crocheted in a basic stitch using a colour to represent the temperature for that day of the year.
I decided that this would be a great outlet for me to portray my own mood on an hour-by-hour basis: if I am happy I feel yellow, when my brain feels foggy or I am feeling low I would be feeling grey or blue, I used black to depict my sleep cycle.
I found this was a good creative outlet for me and helped to reduce some of my massive yarn stash too.
I also found it interesting to look back on previous months - I can often see patterns in how I felt, and this helps me keep track of warning signs that I am struggling and need to be kinder to myself.