Niall Harbison Profile picture
Jul 23 13 tweets 6 min read Read on X
I’ve suffered from depression and anxiety for over 25 years.

I thought I’d share some things that help me. Not medical advice but rather trial and error through many dark days of personal experience.

Here are 10 things that help me battle anxiety and depression… (1/12) Image
1. Give up alcohol 🍺 🍷

It took a trip to ICU for me to finally do this after 25 years. Nothing has had a bigger positive impact on my mental health and anxiety than quitting booze.

Alcohol is literally a depressant. Cut it out and you’ll be less depressed. (2/12) Image
2. Move your body 🏃‍♂️ 🏊

When the dark fog descends or before it does just try to move. It’s often the last thing you can contemplate. But exercise for me has been the key.

Even if it’s just walking 100 yards for some fresh air movement is key (3/12) Image
3. Get medical help

I take some tablets and supplements. I have to accept it’s an illness and I sometimes need help. If you had a broken leg or cancer you’d take medicines.

You might not need medicines but talk to a doctor. If you do there’s no shame (4/12) Image
4. Tell people about it

Monumentally hard. I didn’t tell anyone for over a decade. A problem shared is a problem halved. My friends and family all know I have depression now.

It’s hard for everyone to understand but people are wonderful (5/12) Image
5. Body scan / Massage

Two things that work for me are online body scans (YouTube 30 mins). It’s like a meditation. Calms you right down.

I also find Thai massage helps massively. An hour or 90 mins to calm the mind. (6/12) Image
6. Cut down screen time

The irony I’m tweeting this thread is not lost on me. However a phone is like a little black depression box with bad news and low self worth coming out of it.

Cut down the 2 hours scrolling in bed or pointless screen time (7/12) Image
7. Don’t put yourself in bad positions.

I don’t go to bars. I cut down watching live sports as was a trigger to drink. I changed many of my friends to non drinking people. Get away from toxic work or relationships. Be brutal about making good decisions for your health (8/12) Image
8. Listen to your body

I now know when I’m tired. If I get irritable. If I have a bad nights sleep. If I’ve been around too many people being sociable. Depression and anxiety kick in.

It’s hard but learning the signs and taking time to work on yourself are key (9/12) Image
9. Accept you have to live with it

I often wish I could just fix it. That it would be gone forever. But for many it won’t. I now know I can have more good days than bad by making smart choices. I also have to accept I might do everything right and it still comes back (10/12) Image
10. Do more of what you love

It’s not always easy when you feel down or anxious. But try to find and do something you love. For me it’s helping dogs. In a selfish way it makes me feel good about myself. Find something that makes you feel good about yourself too (11/12)
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Believe me I don’t have it fully sorted. If I followed my own advice and did 10/10 I’d be in better shape. The reality is life comes in the way so I try do at least 5-6.

There’s other tools like therapy and fixing underlying problems but I hope these help someone (12/12)
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I share a lot more of the dogs and my mental health on my Insta.

A follow there would be massively appreciated 🥰🙏 instagram.com/niall.harbison
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More from @NiallHarbison

Jul 20
This our newest arrival. He’s our second husky who we’ve finally caught after 6 weeks of trying.

We’ve called him Prince because we already have Bowie his sister here.

They have been living wild in Thailand which is obviously not an ideal place for huskies… (1/7) 🧵 Image
They had been abandoned by foreign owners. They’d found themselves a villa to live in but mainly disappeared into the jungle.

We got lucky early on and a local trapper Bowie in a garden. She’s very friendly and although thin she’s settled in well with us (2/7)


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She’s a gorgeous dog and friendly as she clearly knew human contact. Shes best friend with Mr Big.

The climate here is much too hot for this breed. Leaving them to fend for themselves was very poor behavior.

We tried for weeks but couldn’t find her brother (3/7)
Read 7 tweets
Jul 16
This is little Candy. Just a week ago she had no hope in life as a street dog with 3 legs.

She was getting left behind size wise as she couldn’t compete for the food.

It’s the start of her journey but her life has started to drastically improve…. (1/6) 🧵 Image
She was living in the jungle under some old building materials. Candy wasn’t easy to catch even with a missing leg.

She had the usual illnesses like anemia, was covered in ticks and was struggling to stay alive. (2/6)





We can’t be 100% sure but Sybille who is a human doctor thinks she injured her leg when very young. Candy then probably ate her own leg off in order to survive. She wasn’t born like this.

She did a good job as it’s clean and we’ve healed her up in the last week (3/6) Image
Read 6 tweets
Jul 16
Last week lovely young dog lover Myo alerted us about the massive Parvovirus outbreak where he lives. It’s a migrant workers camp with 20+ dogs.

It’s been a tough week but we’ve made progress. A lot of good will come from this (1/7) 🧵 Image
4 of the puppies had died by the time we caught the outbreak. We managed to get 2 to the vets onto drips. Sadly one of them died after 48 hours in the vets.

The vets managed to save 1 and we brought him back to Myo today. Its a brutal disease for the young (2/7)
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The good news is we managed to save all the big dogs. They are all now vaccinated and safe. The little puppy has beaten the Parvo now and we’ve got him on growth food and meds bulking up.

Losing the puppies was bad but Myo saved the rest of the dogs (3/7)

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Read 7 tweets
Jul 12
I’ve done a lot of rescues but even I didn’t think this one would be possible.

This is Faith. She was caged up, neglected and used for breeding. This photo was take on the 9th of June. Just over a month ago.

Today she got some unbelievably good news…(1/7) 🧵 Image
Faith had a lot of issues but her biggest problem was her eye. You can see her here after the initial grooming coming in.

🪱 Those are indeed maggots coming out of her eye. They were eating it away. I can’t begin to describe the smell they day (2/7)
There was a lot of grooming, a lot of vet trips and getting her and her brother Phoenix fixed up. We were able to fix everything.

The only problem was the eye. It was so badly damaged and no skin around it we were told 99% it was gone. She’d need an operation (3/7)
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Read 7 tweets
Jul 10
This young man is called Myo and I only met him today for the first time.

He’s from Myanmar and he was single handedly trying to keep 20 street dogs alive that were in big trouble and he reached out for help.

There are good people in this world (1/10) 🧵 Image
Myo lives in a migrant workers camp where there are 20+ dogs and the people live on top of each other. Everybody here feeds the dogs and they are kind to them but last night a huge outbreak of parvovirus started.

It’s absolutely lethal to dogs (2/10)
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The dogs started dropping quickly. These bigger ones were ok (they are sleeping) and he rounded them all up in his room to take care of them.

Parvovirus takes the puppies and sick dogs. We helped last night but 4 puppies died. Nothing can be done it’s so fast (3/10)
Read 10 tweets
Jul 7
He used to be a street dog who had to fight on his own to survive in Thailand.

King Whacker of Scotland now has a new role in life… to project his new little baby brother Flynn.

A beautiful story… (1/7) 🧵 Image
Whacker had the hardest possible start in life. Someone tried to kill him with a pick axe. Life on the streets is incredibly tough for these dogs.

Luckily they missed by a millimeter and I managed to save him (2/7)
A year ago this week, fully healed, Whacker headed off on the journey from Scotland to Thailand to his new family.

He was the one dog I always worried about as he loved people but was very territorial and protective after a life on the streets. Hes also very sensitive (3/7)
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Read 8 tweets

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