Sunshine on dark days - Why I'm supporting Christmas For CAMHS cause to spread festive cheer to young mental health inpatients
Ten years on from the most difficult period in her life, she is hoping to bring some sunshine to other people in their darkest days, by supporting the work of Christmas for CAMHS. The charity provides Christmas gifts every year for those who are inpatients in child and adolescent mental health service (CAMHS) wards across the UK over the festive period.
Ellie is running 5km a day throughout December to raise funds for the cause. “At the moment, 27-year-old Ellie running a 5k a day is like hell,” she says, “but it’s nothing compared to the hells I faced in that rough period of my life and that so many other people go through in mental health crises. So I wanted to push myself.”
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Hide AdEllie, who lives near Settle, North Yorkshire, was under CAMHS between the ages of 15 and 19, originally accessing services as a result of suffering panic attacks. "I would become really overwhelmed, tearful, didn’t want to talk to anyone, didn’t want to leave the house, didn’t want to do anything,” she says.


At the peak, she dropped out of school during sixth form. “From that point onwards, I was in a bit of a cycle where I would have six months of so of being fine, ambitious, energetic, bright, bubbly. Every six months or so I’d then have this big crash, back to how I was when I dropped out of school, really anxious, really overwhelmed, really tearful, not wanting to go out, see anyone, do anything.”
This went on well into her early 20s. Despite therapy and medication, Ellie was stuck in the same cycle – and she was starting to think there was more going on than anxiety and mental health struggles. A chance conversation then set her down the path of confirming just that. "I was having some counselling through a job that I’d got in lockdown, working at a call centre. I brought up a conversation I’d had with my then-partner to the counsellor and she asked me has it ever been looked into why you take things so literally?”
Ellie began researching neurodiversity and felt she had traits of ADHD and autism. A formal diagnosis of the former came in October 2021 and the latter in April 2022. “It changed my whole life,” she says. “It’s a really big moment of acceptance for yourself and validation and realising that it was never that there was something wrong with me or that I was broken or that I was bad person, I was just missing this really important piece of context about myself.
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Hide Ad"There was a lot of forgiveness I think. The fact I had to drop out of school, I always felt like wasted potential. I had offers to study maths at uni but I just couldn’t do that last bit to go so that had always weighed heavy. I could then look at that with a different lens of obviously I became overwhelmed as I didn’t have any support throughout my school life.”


“Throughout school I also had a really rough time socially,” she continues. “With the new context, you can recognise...actually I have a social disability and I communicate slightly differently and that’s been misunderstood...It allows you to forgive yourself.”
Ellie’s whole career now has been built from her experience. She is an ADHD and autism activist and content creator – and the author of two books. In the first, Unmasked, she works to challenge the common misconceptions about neurodivergent conditions that are preventing people from getting the diagnoses they need. Her latest, How to be You, is a practical guide to help people to work with their neurodivergent brain rather than against it.
Explaining her thoughts behind the book, Ellie says: “When you get diagnosed, it’s a massive life-changing realisation of ah that makes sense why that’s happened and I understand myself a bit better now but then also, well what now? I’ve never learnt how I’m supposed to support myself or how I differ from other people.”
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Hide AdEllie has now raised more than £3,000 towards her £5,000 target for Christmas for CAMHS. “It’s nice for me personally to take on a challenge like this,” she says. “As someone with ADHD, I so often have these big impulsive ideas but it’s rare I follow through with something…It’s nice for me to have something I’ve got to stick to. I’ve got the accountability, I’ve got people who have donated and I want to do it for the charity.”
To support Ellie, visit justgiving.com/page/elliemidds