Tensions at work or at home and the stress of trying to make ends meet can leave us feeling strung out. Staying active is a tried and tested way of letting off steam and switching off for a while.

Get active with a low cost junior gym membership for 11 to 15 year olds and £60 annual membership for over 60s. Or if you prefer to be outside, find your nearest park and enjoy a walk or run free of charge!

If organised exercise isn't your thing, try walking or cycling to get where you need to go. It's cheaper and healthier.

To remain physically healthy, we need to be able to eat the right things and stay warm. There may be information in some of our other cost of living pages that could help with this.

Families with school aged children might enjoy some of our Easy Peasy Cook recipes which offer you ideas for feeding your family for under a fiver.

There are lots of websites offering great ideas for eating well on a budget. Check out the links below or just surf the web for a wider selection of ideas.

Budget recipes and advice - BBC Food

Eat well - NHS

If you haven't managed this before, now might be the time. It's a major money saver whilst also giving your health an enormous boost. 

NHS Support to Quit Smoking

We know that smoking is bad for our health and can increase the risk of developing serious health conditions, including COPD and cancer. However, it can also have a negative impact on our mental health, as well as our bank accounts.

We understand that people often smoke to help them cope, especially when many of us have money worries right now. However, for people who are already struggling, smoking can actually make your mental health and money worries worse. For example, if you smoke twenty cigarettes per day, then quitting could save you at least £3115* per year (source ASH Scotland).

Quit Your Way is NHS Lanarkshire’s free stop smoking service and offers 12 weeks of support to anyone who smokes, including free nicotine replacement therapy, and specialist support to quit for pregnant women and those with mental health problems. Even if you have tried to stop before without success – we know nicotine is a powerful, addictive drug - we’re here to help and support you when you feel ready.

Call - 0800 84 84 84.

Quit your way, NHS Lanarkshire

If you're managing to eat well and stay active this will certainly help. There’s a great deal of information online to guide you in improving your wellbeing:

Mind's guide to everyday living

NHS tips for mental wellbeing

Samaritans self-help advice

If your mood is quite low it would be worth talking to someone about how you’re feeling. It’s very common for a person to feel better when they have talked over their feelings with a friend or family member. Alternatively, try

• making an appointment with your GP,
• calling a support helpline like Breathing Space (0800 83 85 87) or Samaritans (116 123)

Keeping our homes warm and damp free is always more of a challenge through the winter months. This year some of us may be fearful of putting the heating on at all because of escalating energy costs.

But tackling damp and preventing mould is important because both can cause a range of health problems. So whilst we must be careful about wasting energy, some heat in the home will really help to keep the atmosphere dry and damp free.

Once of the biggest causes of damp in the home is condensation and there are a number of self-help measures worth pursuing to avoid it.

• Help with travelling to healthcare providers
• Help with dental costs
• Benefits for people who are sick or disabled