Living with a mental health condition is hard. Luckily, technology has stepped in and can make life a little easier when it’s hard to get out of bed in the morning. Check out the apps below to start taking back your life, baby step by baby step.

1. For Medication Management: Medisafe

Medisafe is an application that you can use to track your medication intake. Think of it like a virtual pillbox and medication alarm. You can tell Medisafe when you alert you that you need to take your medication. For example, if you take your medication in the morning with breakfast, you can set the alarm for 9:00am. If you take a separate medication at night before bed, you might set that medication alarm for 11:00pm. Then, Medisafe will remind you 3 times in different intervals that you need to take the medication.

Once you take the medication, you can record that you've taken it using the app. Over the period of a week, Medisafe will tell you how consistent you've been with taking the medication. There are also options in the app to learn more about the medication itself, which can be useful if you're starting a new medication for the first time.

Availability: IOS and Android

2. For Mood-tracking and a Community: MoodPanda

MoodPanda is pretty self-explanatory. You can track your mood as often as you want by updating your status anonymously in the community that MoodPanda provides. People can see the status if you choose to let them, and they can "like" it or give you "hugs" based on your mood and/or what you've written.

The mood scale, out of 10, can be tracked over an extended period of time with various graphs and calendar features. It's very useful to see how your mood fluctuates, especially if you are dealing with a mood disorder or know you are prone to mood swings or depressive and/or manic states. This can help you learn your own behavioral patterns, leading to more efficient management of those behaviors or moods.

Availability: IOS, Android, and Web

3. For Mood-tracking and Pen Pals: Stigma

Stigma is similar to MoodPanda in the sense that it offers mood tracking and a community. It is slightly more anonymous than MoodPanda, but it's a little less customizable or "trackable" with mood. You can decide whether or not you want your mood-journal entries to be completely private or anonymously public, which is a useful feature.

The newest feature of Stigma, Pen Pals, lets you find other people struggling with their mental health, matches you up based on common interests and goals and then lets you talk to them anonymously after both parties have consented to be contacted. In a world where mental illness leaves many feels isolated and alone, this can be very reassuring and comforting.

Availability: IOS and eventually Android

4. For Wellness-tracking and Self-Care Activities: BoosterBuddy

BoosterBuddy is an app that was developed to track basic wellness and game-ify self-care and wellness activities. It makes getting better feel less like a chore. You can customize reminders for medication and to-dos in addition to "checking in" once a day to see how safe and healthy you're feeling that day.

The self-care activities are really what make BoosterBuddy stand out. The goal of the app is to wake up your animal-buddy that you choose by completing three random self-care activities given to you each day. This way, you can earn "coins" to decorate your animal-buddy, who gives you positive quotes when he's awake. It's a great way to get yourself to do little things like going for a walk, or even just giving you reminders that make sure you're staying hydrated. These activities may seem small, but when you've accomplished them it always feels like you're taking baby steps to healing your body and mind.

Availability: IOS and Android

5. For Meditation and Relaxation: Calm

Calm is a great way to take a break and meditate or get background noise that soothes you. It's "freemium", meaning you'll have to pay to get the full features. However, I've found myself perfectly happy with the basic, free features that Calm provides, such as a 7-day session on learning the basics of mindfulness, individual meditation tracks, and relaxing background sounds and visuals of beaches, forests, lakes, and more.

Sometimes, we need to take a break and give ourselves a break. Calm is a great way to do that while learning tips and tricks of mindfulness and overall feeling a little more calm than when we began.

Availability: IOS, Android, and Web