Episode 201: Unveiling the Power of Self-Care: How One Caregiver Found Her Rituals and Regained Her Life
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Episode Transcript
My ritual story
My self-care rituals are hidden.
They don’t call for any attention and don’t require me to stop anything to do them.
They’re integrated into my day and are “what I do”.
Sounds too simple, you might say.
Or maybe the fact that I made it sound so easy… intuitive… privileged is what is annoying you right now.
Don’t get me wrong. Caring for yourself is difficult to say the least.
I woke up the day before I became a caregiver like any normal day. Got my daughter off to school and my husband off to work. I’m sure I taught a yoga class and trained some people at the gym. As I try to imagine that last day before becoming a caregiver life seemed to be easy. It was easy to workout and take long walks. It was easy to meditate and practice Yoga. It was easy to spend time enjoying being outdoors and having fun with my family.
Then the next day I became a caregiver and all of that self-care fell apart. All I did was go to work. Teach people how to relax and release their stress and then came home to become more stressed.
I had the tools to care for myself because I’m trained in teaching them. I used tools to care for myself until caregiving hit me so hard I lost my grip on everything and in trying to pull myself back up I only held on to what was the most important to me at the time…. My family. The threat of loosing my husband felt too real. The threat of my family falling apart was ever present and the best I could do was hold my breath and fight to keep my family together.
You and I know that can only last for so long before you start to really feel like shit. I found myself under an enormous amount of stress, I was anxious all the time and would cry about nothing. It didn’t take too long before my nervous system began to shut down and it felt impossible to enjoy moments because I was always focussed on what was going to happen next.
I was the most miserable I’ve ever been in my life during the first six months to a year of being a caregiver. I was miserable because I immediately stopped taking care of myself.
That was over a decade ago. Over that time I’ve realized that
- I don’t have to hate my life if I'm a caregiver
- My husband’s cancer doesn’t control my families ability to enjoy life, go on adventures and have fun, we do
- Taking care of myself is a requirement not only because I am a caregiver but because I am a mother and a wife and so many other things to so many other people.
Bringing back things I do only for myself, no matter if it was a phone call with a friend, getting out for a walk, or sitting quietly in my home felt like a fight in the beginning. Sure I could blame having too many people in the house as a reason why I didn’t meditate. Or needing to wait for a phone call from a Dr for not going on a walk.
But it was all bullshit.
I was fighting myself.
I wasn’t able to make myself a priority until I accepted the fact that I was my biggest problem.
Sure, there were occasionally some obstacles outside of myself but most times I gave them more power than they deserved.
When I finally got over myself. When I made taking care of me just as important as getting my husband to oncology appointments and my daughter to school. I began to focus more on the things I needed.
What I desperately needed was quiet, I needed to not have to give to anyone but myself and I needed to tell my body that it was safe.
That is still the core of needs I draw from daily. When I have too much noise, real or perceived, in my life I need a break. When there is a Dr’s visit coming up or my husband or daughter aren’t feeling well my nervous system kicks into fight or flight and I have to reverse that and allow myself to feel safe again. When I move for myself I have to be ok with not letting it become me training them or leading them in a personal workout session for the person who might be with me. I need to move and feel and not have to give.
Your core needs are most likely different from mine. But when I’m in periods of my life where there are high moments of stress caused by illness, surgery or uncertainty that cause me to shift into being a caregiver more than usual or for holy shit moments I know what I need to bring myself back based on those core needs.
However, that only works for me if I have a running everyday level of care. Things that I do everyday so that when the Holy Shit days come up I’m not running on empty.
The things I do all the time that no one pays attention to because it’s just what I do.
I have these things divided up between by morning and evening rituals.
Ritual might seem like an odd word to use and I’m not using it in a religious sense. When I use the word I’m talking about something that I do everyday to care for myself. You might counter by suggesting that it’s a habit but I would disagree. A habit is something you do without thinking like brushing your teeth. A ritual is something you do that helps you focus on the present moment, has a meaning that may only make sense to you, is done with intention and has the power to alleviate anxiety and center you.
You can turn any habit into a ritual. For example, I brush my teeth every morning and evening. Most times I don’t remember anything specific about the act of brushing my teeth a minute after I’ve walked away from my sink. It’s just something I do.
There have been periods of my life when I have used teeth brushing as a morning ritual. Instead of just brushing and walking away, not paying attention to what I’m even doing, I focus on the actual brushing of my teeth. I imagine that I’m brushing away all the nastiness left over from the day before and I’m starting off my day clean and fresh. I breathe intentionally so I can enjoy the scent of the toothpaste. I experience the massaging of my gums by the brush. And most importantly I look at myself in the mirror and think of a positive thought about my reflection.
Big difference between brushing your teeth as a habit and as part of a morning ritual.
Most importantly, from the outside no one would know the difference.
You see the things I do for myself are hidden by the simple fact that they are normal everyday things anyone would do but by making them a ritual they become special to just me. It took a little bit of trial and error and a lot of consistency to find what works for me. But now that I have those simple things that make a big difference in my day I control how I care for myself with little barrier but myself to contend with.
Here is an example of some of the things I do as part of my morning ritual.
I delay opening my eyes
When I find myself waking up I don’t open my eyes right away (unless my alarm goes off which, for me, is one of the worst feelings in the world). I stay still and just start to notice what I’m feeling…
Is my body sore?
Is my mind already racing?
Do I detect sunlight or is it still dark outside?
What can I hear?
I don’t actually fill this moment with positive thoughts or try to push away negativity or dread from the day. I just notice what my senses are telling me and try not to think about anything at all.
How often do you wake up way too fast to turn off a jarring alarm or start to think about how much you are going to hate your day? You’re setting yourself up to have a difficult day before even rolling out of bed.
I will sit on the edge of my bed. Maybe move my feet around while I look out the window. Just take in the beginning of he day.
Just doing that alone can help you start off your day with less stress than you usually start it off with.
There are other things like:
Looking out the window in silence while I drink my cup of coffee.
Staying off of social media and email for the first hour of my day.
Take 5 min to meditate while I wait for my brain to wake up.
Decide on what the focus of my day will be many times based on how I feel when I first wake up.
These are all things I do in my morning that, other than the meditating, you would have no idea were part of a morning ritual.
There are things I do in the evening and at night that help me let go of the day before going to bed.
I make a mental or written note of what I want to get done the next day and look at my calendar to see what I have scheduled. I try to make the last 30 min of my day electronic free. When I go to sleep I actually get comfortable and close my eyes instead of falling asleep while watching something on TV. I do a little active dreaming while waiting to fall asleep. I imagine myself in a beautiful place or recall the sound of waves on the beach. Or I’ll focus on my breathing. Just like in the morning, I try not to problem solve or really think about anything right before going to sleep.
No one can see me doing most of the things I do to help regulate any stress I live with and keep from feeling overwhelmed. These are the things I do to help create resilience so when things do get more serious or something unexpected happens I am not approaching it already overwhelmed with life.
In the next three episodes of this podcast I will help you figure out how to create rituals that you can easily incorporate into your day.
I look forward to helping you through that process so you can begin to enjoy your days a little more than you are now.
Thanks for listening.
