It may come as no surprise that struggling with finances can have a significant effect on your mental health and overall financial well-being. It is difficult to compartmentalise worries about money when finances play a part in almost every aspect of daily life. Given the current economic climate and predicted financial uncertainty, it’s important to be as mindful with ourselves as we are with our budgets.
How Financial Worries Can Affect Mental Health
In 2022, it was reported that 46% of people in debt also experience mental health problems.
The relationship between financial worries and mental stress seems unrelenting. Financial stress causes mental stress, which makes it difficult to manage finances, which leads to more financial stress.
You might be wondering, ‘what constitutes a mental health problem serious enough to affect the ability to manage your finances?’. While it is more likely that people with diagnosed mental illnesses will have a difficult time managing finances, there are indicators of extreme stress each and every one of us should consider, as they will have a serious effect on financial stability. If you’re not paying attention to your mental health, these signs of stress could go unnoticed as they can perpetuate your struggle with debt.
Can Financial Worries Affect Your Sleep?
If you’re struggling to fall asleep at night, financial stress may well be the cause. A recent UK survey found a direct correlation between households that report quality sleep and financial resources. It was also revealed that a healthy sleeping pattern strengthens emotional resilience in the face of stressful situations. This once again demonstrates the frustrating cycle at play.
If you sleep well, your emotional and logical facilities are re-charged. This’ll help to deal with everyday finance management. If, however, you’re worried about managing finances, you may struggle to get good quality sleep.
Other signs of serious stress include the increase in, or loss of, appetite, inability to focus, or an adrenal overload stemming from living in a constant fight or flight response. In turn, this may have a negative affect on your immune system, and overall health. These changes in your regular routine will inevitably rear their head due to a lack of self care and mindfulness.
How to Cope with Financial Stress
Whether you already understand your relationship with mental health, or if this is the first time you’re considering the role your mental health plays in your life – it’s a good idea to include your well-being in your preparation plans as the nation faces economic uncertainty. We spoke to CEO and Founder of Provide, Miranda Khadr, about her advice for anyone factoring in more self care to their financial planning.
The first step is breaking the cycle of financial stress and mental stress. This can only be achieved by taking action. Very rarely will things work out well otherwise, and certainly not in a reasonable timeline. And while the team at Provide are not mental health experts, we are finance experts and have a few tips on how to support positive financial well-being.
Don’t be afraid to ask for mental health support.
Being silent in your own suffering will not lead to a way out of the cycle. Mental health problems surrounding money are common. As such, there are many mental health resources that can offer support.
Share your concerns with others around you.
If you vocalise your concerns, you are likely to find others who can empathise with your situation. They can offer advice from experience, or simply a sense of knowing someone understands what you’re going through can make the journey seem less lonely.
Take action as soon as possible.
Doing nothing will continue the cycle of financial and mental stress. And the longer you wait to take action, the more of a toll your financial well-being will take, which will make it harder to work on.
Make the most of resources like debt advisors.
Debt advisors are trained to help people in financial trouble. Having a professional to navigate your financial journey will take some of the burden and mental stress off your shoulders, and help you compartmentalise your financial duties from the rest of your daily routine.
How to Improve Financial Well-being by Using Provide
The Provide Finance team wants to help borrowers and brokers break the cycle of financial stress and mental health, and cultivate a community focused on financial well-being. And we do not want our users to feel overwhelmed by the finance journey. The Provide platform is designed to be easy to navigate. This includes instant access to lenders that suit your financial requirements. Because the last thing you need when you feel stressed is an overwhelming amount of barriers to funding solutions.
Our team of financial experts are at hand to help you at any point in the journey. We always love hearing what our customers have to say about their experience on the platform. Your feedback lets us know what new tools we can develop to make Provide the simplest path to positive financial well-being.
Together, we go far.
What is your experience with financial well-being? Have you identified a link between financial stress and mental health in your own life? What have you done to help break this overwhelming cycle?
Provide Finance Ltd FRN:967707 is an Appointed Representative of Yellow Stone Finance Group Ltd which is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority FRN. 814533. Yellow Stone Finance Group Ltd is a credit broker not a lender.