Self-care

This past January, after we had finally figured out what on earth was going on with R., I mused about how done in I was from the month of December and how much of my support R. needed just to be marginally functional. I said I knew that taking care of myself was important, but acknowledged that during that particular season, other than just surviving, I wasn't sure there had been room for anything else, especially not for my usual self-care methods. I wondered if I was missing something.

I've been thinking about that question for five months now and I've come to a couple of conclusions. The first is that I was working with an incorrect assumption: That would be that we should be able to nurture ourselves through all seasons regardless of what is going on. And when you read about self-care, this is kind of the underlying message, isn't it? That to be really on top of things and to be truly emotionally healthy, that we need to up our self-care game so that even the worst circumstances are manageable.

Just reading that tacit assumption can make you realize that it is totally impossible. Life isn't like that. Sometimes there are tragedies or seasons where the absolute best you can do is just survive. Self-care is thrown about like a panacea to everything. It's not, at least not in the midst of a crisis. 

Sometimes self-care can come off sounding a lot like denial. "I will do nice things for myself and that will help me ignore the hard parts of my life." It's as though treating ourselves with enough manicures, lunches, girls' nights out, lattes, bubble baths, and movie binges will erase the feelings that are causing us to seek "self-care" in the first place. 

As I've been thinking about this, I'm beginning to realize that the best self-care we can give ourselves is honesty. Some seasons are hard and scary... or there are the seasons that are grief filled... or are overwhelming...  The list could be long. Because life is like that. It is okay, more than okay, actually, to accept the hard. To admit to yourself that you have little margin and that's how it is at that moment. It's okay to admit things are hard and that you are struggling. 

Then when the crisis is passed, the next best bit of self-care we can give ourselves is time and space to process the experience and to recover. To be compassionate to ourselves. I did something smart in January after we got R. stabilized. I pretty much took all extra activities and commitments off the calendar. We led a very quiet life that month while everyone settled back down. I read a lot. I made things. And I just sat. How often do we give ourselves time to process what we've been through, to give our bodies tine to recover? We don't, actually. Instead of confronting all of the emotions that roil around inside us we cover them up with false self-care. What we deeply need is to be compassionate with ourselves, to say things were hard, we did our best, we are tired, and to remind ourselves we won't always feel this way.

I think there is a third type of self-care. Sometimes when the crisis doesn't seem to end it becomes chronic. Our bodies were not designed to live with constant cortisol (the fight/flight/freeze neurotransmitter) running through them. At this point, the best self-care is seeking help, admitting you can't do it yourself. Maybe this means seeing your doctor, finding someone to talk to, looking for resources to help change a situation, seeking experience from someone who has survived your current situation. The worst thing you can do is assume that this is how life will always be, it will never get better. I guarantee you are wrong and your crystal ball is broken. 

Self-care is really much more than consumer culture wants you to believe. It's hard to package and sell honesty, compassion, and vulnerability, but these three things are how we can truly care for ourselves... and each other.