A TEENAGER has shared her mental health struggles in the form of a poem.

Eliza Wells-Parkes, aged 13, of Maiden Newton, suffers from feelings of crippling anxiety and said she often feels like her ‘head is screaming inside.’

She struggles to express how she really feels which often results in meltdowns and is why she wanted to share her poem with the world so that others ‘realise they’re not alone’ and so that ‘people know what it’s like.'

Eliza’s mum Georgina Wells explained that her daughter ‘had a really difficult day and was sat in the field with her horse next to her and wrote the poem on her phone.’

She said: “It took her around 10-15 minutes to write and for her to share this with me must be so big for her.

“I am so proud of her for sharing it with me, she never shares things - she said 'mum I wrote this poem and I want to show it to you and I want to show other people, this is how I feel about life.”

Georgina added: “Me and her dad are proud of her, it made me cry when I read it.

“She’s always been an anxious child and as she’s got older, we think she’s okay but she’s not. She never talks about how she’s feeling, she’s written a few different poems as it’s her way to express herself.

“She’s bright and clever, but she feels quite isolated, and she’s pressured herself to do really well.”

Eliza has a pet horse called Sox who she loves spending time with, and Georgina described Sox as Eliza’s ‘saviour’ and ‘happy place.’

Georgina explained that Eliza often feels like ‘her head is screaming inside’ and all she wants to do is ‘fit in.’

"She really struggles to communicate her feelings etc which often results in meltdowns."

Eliza wants to ‘share her poem far and wide’ and expressed to her mum ‘If I can help just one person to realise, they’re not alone’ that she would be happy with that, adding, ‘I’m scared but I want people to know what it’s like.’

She is hoping that her poem can be shared far and wide, be put up in GP surgeries, schools, CAMHS so that other young people can realise that they are not alone and that parents can also understand what life is really like for a child with anxiety.

You can read Eliza’s poem Anxiety here:

As the desolate moon starts its shift,

I sit in the weight of worry waiting for it to pass, 

My mind is like pieces of a puzzle though the pieces don’t quite fit 

As anxiety consumes me,

I sit in my sweaty pit of a bed struggling to get out.

I look in every corner searching for an exit, 

I pound on the sides hoping someone will let me out 

But they never do.

It’s an ongoing cycle.

Wake up.

Go to bed.

Worry.

Wake up.

Go to bed. 

Worry. 

My brain never rests. 

In school the gnawing feeling that if I don’t do well, I’m a failure is never ending,

The ‘they’re probably talking about me’ awakens,

And ‘they are staring at me’ stirs,

I sit there numb,

peering out the window waiting for my self conscious to relax 

But it never does.

Anxiety is like a shadow, 

It looms over me at every good chance I get

Until it consumes me whole and throws me down into its dark hole once more.

Inside my head my brain tries to get rid of it 

But anxiety never leaves. 

It’s stays with you until it’s captivated your whole future and every fun thing you’ve done or will do.

It’s like a hungry carnivore stealthily stalking its prey until…

It’s that time again.

As the desolate moon starts its shift,

I sit in the weight of worry waiting for it to pass, 

Wake up.

Go to bed.

Worry.

Wake up.

Go to bed.

Worry. 

It’s an ongoing cycle. 

My brain never rests.