Worries about money can have an impact on your mental health, and your mental health can affect how you manage your money.

It’s important to understand how the two affect each other, and learn how to manage your money to support and boost your mood.

How can money affect my mental health?

Learning how mental health and money are connected might help if you're struggling.

Sorting things out might feel like an overwhelming task and lots of things may be out of your control, but try taking things one step at a time.

The tips on this page are to help you get started.

Money & Mental Health Tips

Mental health can affect the way you deal with money
Money problems can affect your mental health
Feelings associated with money
Get to know your money and mood patterns
Overspending when you're unwell
Here are some tips that might stop you from overspending:

Claiming benefits

We know it’s hard to access benefits. Often the media, or other people’s views, makes it feel like there’s a stigma attached to benefits. Some people have misconceptions about why we need benefits, and what they’re used for.

For many of us with mental health problems, it can feel like the whole benefits system isn’t designed to meet our needs, but it’s important to know that benefits are there to support you. You have a right to claim them if you’re struggling to manage or just need that bit extra help.

Even though the system is hard to navigate, there are lots of places where you can get support and information to help you with your claim and we can help you through Firm Foundations

Dealing with services

We all have to deal with different services, whether that’s a bank, energy provider, or a phone company.

You might decide to tell the service you’re dealing with that you have a mental health problem. This is up to you, and it’s important to think carefully about the decision. If you tell them, it might help them to be more understanding and give you any extra support you need, but you might also be worried about how you will be treated.

It can feel hard to talk about money problems, especially if you've had a bad experience in the past as you might feel as if there's no point trying again. 

If you need support with money, your mental health, or both, you can reach out to our Firm Foundations or Money & Me teams and we can help you work with partner services.

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