Louis Watkins, 24, from Newport, was convinced he was suffering a heart attack and became a ‘shell of myself’
The first time Louis remembers experiencing anxiety he thought he was having a heart attack and during his first panic attack he thought he was dying. His misunderstanding of his symptoms comes from never having open conversations about emotions and mental health being a young man.
Now after years of struggling with anxiety, Louis has worked towards changing the stigma men face when talking about such topics and showing that expressing emotion does not make you weak but instead takes strength. His men’s self-care brand has created a community of men learning to talk about how they feel and take time to take care of themselves not just physically but mentally.
Like many people in Wales, Louis noticed the significant negative impact the Covid-19 pandemic had on his mental health. Stay informed on the latest health news by signing up to our newsletter here
Louis Watkins, 24, grew up in Newport with his two brothers. Only starting to really care about his education during his GCSE’s, he put pressure on himself to get the grades he needed to study his A-levels. Then whilst in sixth form “nothing else mattered” to him.
He said: “In sixth form, nothing else mattered other than getting my A-levels and it put a lot of strain on so many aspects of my life. Then when I didn’t get the results I wanted to, I thought my life was over.”
Whilst the results he received were not what he had hoped for, Louis got an apprenticeship working with a railway company in design engineering in 2019.
It wasn’t long before the nationwide lockdown was announced and Louis became a “shell” of himself, being frightened by the virus and isolated at home. He said: “I need to feel like I’m doing something actively, otherwise my mind just goes crazy.
“It was the first time I started to feel like a shell of myself. I think Covid really knocked me for six, I wanted it to be eased so bad that I was scared to go outside because I just wanted it to end but I also couldn’t deal with the social isolation aspect of it.”
Whilst restrictions eased, Louis’ anxiety and struggles with his mental health only got worse. In 2020, he became so anxious that he felt as if he was having a heart attack, not understanding the physical symptoms of anxiety.
On an average day at his grandparents house, during a typical conversation, Louis began to feel lightheaded. He said: “I had this massive lightheaded rush. I felt like I was going to pass out and thought to myself ‘what is going on?’
“I’m just staring at my bamp thinking ‘what do I say?’ We were in the middle of a conversation and it just happened. I didn’t feel good, I felt awful and I didn’t say anything about it. I think it was probably the first time I’ve experienced it.”
Louis began to feel anxious more often but to him he thought he was dying as he still did not feel like he could open up to anyone about the way he was feeling and the symptoms that he was experiencing.
He remembers walking down the street and thinking he was having a heart attack, saying: “I was walking down the street and I just needed to sit down and my head was just going crazy. Then I had a time where my chest was really tight. and my arms started tingling and I thought I was having a heart attack.
“I went to the hospital, and they told me I was fine, that nothing’s wrong.
Looking back on it now, I think it was probably the first ever panic attack I’ve had but because I’d never experienced it I was freaking out, I didn’t know what it was. I thought I was dying.”
Along with his anxiety, Louis felt bouts of “numbness” where he was neither happy nor sad but instead didn’t feel anything.
Louis said: “I felt numb, I wasn’t happy and I wasn’t unhappy, it was just nothing. I just couldn’t show any emotion. It felt weird, I didn’t know why I was feeling that way. I think I was just so hard on myself and like I wasn’t being nice to myself. I couldn’t pinpoint exactly why that was.
“I think because I didn’t know how to channel what I was feeling mentally and my anxiety. I didn’t know who to turn to or how to speak about it, so I felt almost weak really. And it made me feel more isolated.”
It wasn’t until he started to struggle with his mental health that he realised just how closed off he was with his friends and family about the way he was feeling. He’d noticed that he had never spoken on an “emotional level” with his friends and that the way they were truly feeling had never been a topic of conversation.
He said: “It was only when I got older that I realised that, because I actually messaged my mates in a group chat saying that I was really struggling.
“It was the first time I reached out and they said ‘it will get better, bro’ and I knew that they probably felt as uncomfortable receiving that message as I did sending it because it is the first time we spoke about it. Because they probably feel the same, we just don’t know how to communicate it.”
He began to question why he couldn’t talk to the people closest to him and sought to change that not just for himself but for all men.
Whilst still doing his apprenticeship in 2021, he started working on his skincare brand Clear For Men that aims to empower men in feeling more confident as well as normalising conversations around mental health.
Clear For Men was officially launched in August 2022 and Louis juggled both the business and his apprenticeship for two years until he was made redundant in December 2024, allowing him to take the leap and focus on the brand full time.
The Take Five cleanser from Louis’ brand encourages men to take the time to prioritise selfcare which can often be a “taboo” subject for men.
As well as promoting men taking care of their skin, Louis uses his brand and platforms on social media to generate conversations amongst men about mental health, encouraging them to talk to others about the way they are feeling and when they are struggling.
Through Clear For Men, the men in Louis’ life have been more comfortable talking openly and honestly about their emotions. He said: “A lot of my mates now say to me that they feel more comfortable talking about their mental health than they ever have before.
“My brothers are more open about anxiety. I don’t think the words anxious or anxiety, I ever heard my brothers say before I started the business so now I can see that it’s more normalised.
“I feel 10 times more comfortable speaking about it now. I want to show people that it’s not weak to talk about it, it’s important to.”
Louis has received multiple messages from customers and followers of his about how he has helped them with their mental health. He said: “The response from men that I have helped keeps me going, especially when times get tough. Someone commented on one of my videos ‘you saved my life without even realising it’ and it sent shivers down my spine.”
With each product bought from Clear For Men, 15% of the profits go to mental health charities, CALM and Mind which Louis has recently become an ambassador for.