let's talk about 'self-care'

hey all.  i am sitting at a starbucks with my laptop on my lap (heh) and earbuds in my ears (heh) listening to some cool music, sipping on a cold brew with sweet cream, munching on a bacon and gruyere egg bite on a saturday morning.  it is cold and cloudy outside.  everything about this is glorious.

because i'm by myself.  wooohoooo!  for real though.  after being at home with alllll 3 kids for the first three days of this week because of the snow days, and then back to normal schedule for the last two days of the week, i am done.  D-O-N-E.  i love love love my kids, i love my husband and i am so thankful and happy with my life.  but i have to take some time for myself.

i feel like i just recently really understood what self-care is about for me.  i never really thought about it before kids because i basically just did whatever i wanted whenever i wanted.  but kids changes all that.  there is so much responsibility in my life and in my days now that it's kinda scary sometimes.  like, who gave me permission to take care of a household and raise children?

i admit, after my son was born i really owned the mom-martyr role.  partly because it was the first time for being a mom, partly because he was a challenging baby, partly because i just wasn't educated on how to take on this new role and still take care of myself.  there are lots of other factors as well such as the societal pressures and expectations for moms, and the unreal burden that millions of women before us have shouldered.

with the birth of my daughter, i started to get it a little more.  i had postpartum anxiety and realized that i really needed to take care of myself so that i could take care of my kiddos.  and then when she was a little older, like toddler age, i started taking a little more time for myself like hanging out with my girls or going out to the big city on a weeknight to check out an art gallery (gasp!)  or going to the spa, or even a weekend out of town with my bestie.

but still, i didn't really get it.  i would randomly do these things sometimes, but was STILL not really taking care of myself.

then i got accidentally pregnant and was forced to chill out a little bit because i am old af and not in the best shape to have another baby.  but we were blessed with this sweet little soul and so there i was with another round of 24 hours a day nausea, fatigue and just all the uncomfortable-ness of the first trimester.

fast forward to the postpartum period.  i had educated myself so much better this time around about the postpartum period mostly because there are just so many more resources these days and so many more mothers speaking out about it and lots more support now.  intuitively i also knew that because of my age and probably postpartum depletion i would need to be more serious about self-care after the baby was born.  my in-laws were with us a bit before the main event, and stayed for about 4 weeks afterwards THANK GOD!!! we wouldn't have gotten through that period of time without them, for sure.  well, not as easily anyway.  and i was able to just rest afterwards.  like, for the first two weeks i didn't do anything.  i rested, healed, fed my baby, fed myself and let my family take care of the other kids and the household stuff.  a few years ago i most definitely would have felt so so so guilty for doing that.  but not this time around.

in fact, this third pregnancy and baby has been a major blessing in lots of ways.  one of them being that i have had to take care of myself for real this time.

i was aware that i would probably experience postpartum anxiety again this time around.  i felt like i was keeping it together pretty well and being aware of my triggers and stuff.  but it started creeping in  here and there and then-boom!  anxiety blew in full force and had me experiencing scary panic attacks, intrusive thoughts and paralysis (not like i couldn't move my legs paralysis, but like i all of a sudden don't know how to function paralysis).  it was really awful.  i have been taking care of it and i will write a few posts about it that goes into more detail.  but anyway i was really forced this time around to figure it out.

so, to get to the meat of what this post is about; self-care.  i am finally at the point that i understand self-care for what it is and what it needs to be for myself.  and i feel like it's important to talk about because i feel like the term "self-care", especially for moms, is mis-represented.  previously, in my mind, i used to think of it as taking some time here and there to do something like get a pedicure or hang out with friends or something to that effect.  but often times it's so hard to get that kind of time, and it's stressful to schedule and get stuff like that set up.  and honestly, i would go do those things but still felt like i needed more.  and then i felt guilty for feeling like i needed more.

it wasn't until recently that i had a huge aha moment.  so much clarity around the issue.  while those kinds of outings that i mentioned above are great and fun and are also needed sometimes, it's not super sustainable and it's also not effective in making me feel like i am being filled up.  it's not like i can go to the spa every week.

so just like the way other moments of clarity happen for me, through confirmations, nudges and sometimes huge billboard-like messages, it started crystallizing in my head what i need.  it's kind of a hedge-podge of stuff up there in my head, haha.  lots of conflicting emotions and dichotomous beliefs.  i'm still trying to sort it out.  but after christmas and before the new year i started to feel a knowing and a real understanding.  i love being with my kids.  i want to be with them, i want to educate them and play with them and be there for them.  i want to be the one to pick them up from school and make their snacks and teach them how to fold laundry.  i like the feeling of accomplishment that i get from making dinner, feeding my family and cleaning the kitchen to a sparkling, sanitized, organized space again.  and even though it is a never ending dumpster-fire of a job, i even kind of enjoy the tangibility of finishing sorting, washing, drying, folding and putting away the effing laundry.

i want to be all the things to all the people.  i feel like i have a purpose, and when i am in the right mental/spiritual/emotional state i feel like i can worship GOD through my service to my family.

but i HAVE to fill myself up.  i cannot pour from an empty cup.  it is so cliche, i know.  and it's something i have repeated to myself and my friends and family over and over for years.  but i feel like i finallllllllllyyyyyyy understands what it means for real.  ready for this----it's the day to day things.  just like it's the daily monotony that can make you feel like you are drowning or reaching the end of your rope or whatever, it's also the daily habits that can fill you up.  actually, it's mostly the small things that we do in the day that make a difference.  and because i don't have large chunks of time to do these things, i have to do those small things in those pockets of time.

i took some time a couple weeks back to do a brain dump, just writing everything down that was in my head, and then wrote down my goals for right now.  not necessarily for the year or whatever but just stuff for right now.  and then i wrote down a daily schedule so that i could see the time that i had in the day to accomplish my goals.  it was immensely helpful.  and it also made me realize all the stupid small things that i need to do for myself on a daily basis that i push off because someone or something else needs my time.  but i am not doing that anymore.  actually, i am still working on being consistent with it.  but i am in the right mindset to do this now.

most of the things that i need to feel filled up are so simple that it's easy for me to overlook and that's how i end up feeling fed up, resentful, and exhausted in so may ways.  but i realized that i need a few things in the day; to be able to feel clean (for me this means a shower at my preferred frequency), teeth brushed, time to do my skincare routine, eat when i need to eat, drink water, taking the 2 minutes to go to the bathroom, pray, read, talk to an adult human, talk to my husband, check in with my girls and support system.  i realized that in the day, i will feel thirsty and then i would think "oh, i need to drink water, i a thirsty, but first i need to nurse the baby and then change her and get a snack for ava and then put another load of laundry in..." and on and on until i realized that i hadn't had hardly any water that day.  and i am a water drinker---i enjoy it, and i have never had any issues with drinking lots of water throughout the day.  but i started to see what i do to myself, pushing my basic needs out of the way time and again until my body physically responds in a negative way.  same with eating.  and praying.  and bathing FFS!

so, i wrote these things down, and i am practicing them every day.  and i am setting up "linchpins" that are vital to those habits and to the success of meeting my goals.  for the water example above, when i make breakfast for myself and the kids, i immediately fill up my water bottle and carry it around with me so that i can drink water throughout the day.  and when it's empty, i immediately go fill it up.  and in case i forget, my support system i.e. my girlfriends that are also working on their goals, remind me via marco polo.  more about all of that later, but basically i am setting up the systems and framework to be successful in my actions of self-care.

to wrap it up, my point is that self-care often times comes across as these big, grandiose, complicated and self-indulgent acts, when in reality it's mostly just the things we need to do every day to feel like a human being.  that will look different for each of us based on our needs, the needs of our family and what our days look like, as well as our individual temperaments and personalities.

so, if you are in this stage of your life, too, and i don't know one person who feels like they are always doing what they need to do to take proper care of themselves, think about the basic things in your day that make you feel nurtured.  don't do anything yet, just pay attention, observe and reflect.  maybe do that for a few days or a week.  then write it down.  then you can start to think about what you can do to meet those basic needs on a daily basis.  that's how it starts.  small things everyday, this creates habits and habits are the actions that will bring success.

what are some of your basics?  let's talk about this and support each other!