Living with a heart condition or surviving a serious heart-related event can be stressful and overwhelming for you and your family.
It’s important to be kind to yourself, give yourself plenty of time and space to recover, and ask for and accept help.
The Irish Heart Foundation offer emotional wellbeing supports that are designed to help you cope after a sudden heart illness or a new diagnosis. They give you the tools and techniques to use anytime you start to feel anxious or down. All our emotional wellbeing supports are available to people living with conditions and to adult family members.
Using mindfulness techniques can help you cope better with difficult thoughts and feel calmer. It can help you cope get through days when you feel overwhelmed. Learn how to practise mindfulness at our 8-week online course (1½ hours per week).
This four-week course (2 hours per week) helps you have more control over your mind. It helps you challenge difficult thoughts, take back control and live according to your values. Designed by Professor Neil Frude, clinical psychologist, ACTivate your Life is based on acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT). This course is available online and in-person.
Sometime people need professional support to cope with a heart condition. Members of the Irish Heart Foundation can apply for professional counselling. Most counselling is by phone or online. In-person counselling may be available depending on your location. This service is available subject to a review of applications and funding.
Join our email community for information on counselling, course dates and other supports.
Contact our Nurse Support Line on 01 6685001, email support@irishheart.ie to book a course place or apply for professional counselling.
Experiencing a heart diagnosis or stroke can feel isolating – it can be difficult to talk about how you feel or the symptoms you may be living with. This is where peer support comes in. Peer support involves bringing people with a similar lived experience together to share knowledge, offer support and create a safe and understanding environment in which you can recover or learn self-management skills.
Our Let’s Talk telephone service is available on completion of our Heart Connect and Stroke Connect service. Please call our Nurse Support Line on 01 688 5001. You can learn more here
What is self compassion? If mindfulness teaches us to be more aware of our present moment experience, self-compassion teaches us how to relate to our present moment experience in (what is for most of us) a very different way.
It involves treating oneself as one would a friend, being more mindful, and understanding our situation in the context of a larger human experience. When we can be more understanding and gentler with ourselves, identify less with the emotions that surround our mistakes, and understand that challenging experiences are a normal part of the larger human experience, we become stronger and more resilient. There is now a significant body of evidence showing that practicing self-compassion is strongly correlated with increased emotional resilience and well-being, in addition to reduced stress and anxiety (Source: Stanford Medicine – The Scientific Benefits of Self Compassion).
This course will draw on aspects of Mindful Self Compassion, Compassion Focused Therapy and Mindfulness Based Compassionate Living.
We offer a number of courses in self compassion throughout the year(depending on demand) as a follow on course for those who have some experience of mindfulness or who have completed the IHF mindfulness introduction course.
Participants will learn a variety of formal and informal practices which have been shown to increase self-compassion and resilience. Practicing over a 6 week period gives participants a chance to incorporate the practices into their lives and observe the benefits for themselves.
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Call our Nurse Support Line with any questions or concerns you may have about managing life with heart failure. Our Nurse Support Line is available on 01 688 5001, from 9am to 5pm every Monday, and from 9am to 1pm, Tuesday to Friday.
Speak to one of our nurses:
Phone 01 668 5001 Monday 9am - 5pm, Tuesday - Friday 9am - 1pm
2025-06-20
