It’s no secret that I’m in therapy. I’ve been in and out of it but went back a few months ago.
It’s hard work and not my favourite thing but it is helpful.
My therapist is not all nice and pat on the head either. She is in fact incredibly tough and expects me to work hard on myself to get through the issues that we have pinpointed are causes and triggers of my anxiety. She can’t cure me, but she is working with me to try and help me.
She’s given me a task.
21 days of M.E.N.S
Meditation, Exercise, Nutrition & Sleep.
They are all areas that are massively neglected or not managed well.
I neglect myself to run around after everyone else. This is not good for my mental health. She has basically told me that if I don’t make an effort to work on these basic things and manage my self-care better, then I am facing total burn out and possibly a breakdown. She is very much working on the holistic side of things as well as the mental therapeutic issues, and she can see that I am juggling plates. She has already helped me to start eliminating areas of stress in my life deleting WhatsApp and managing my social media use more effectively.
it’s ridiculous that a woman of my age, a grown adult, is having to go back to basics, to look after herself, really. I think the world and the pressure we put on ourselves and the pressure others put on us, combined with our lifestyles, is making us ill, and making us put ourselves and our needs at the back of the queue in our life. Mind has some helpful thoughts on self-care that I have been reading this week. Some of it is basic common sense, but we do seem to need to be reminded.
I have a bad cold and throat infection so I am not starting on a new regime until after the weekend but I’ve had a kick up the bum this week from several quarters, from friends who keep gently reminding me I need to look after me, my husband making space for me but then getting frustrated when it ends up being filled with other people’s needs, and my therapist who takes no-nonsense and doesn’t care about me trying to fix other people’s problems when she’s being paid to help me sort mine!
I am going to write about each area, share where I am at with each, and why. Starting next week with the big one, my favorite topic… Sleep.
I am going to be talking about my sleep habits, the good (not much) the bad (a lot) and the ugly (even more) and asking for tips and advice and what other people do to get better sleep. From bedding to banning screens, to sleeping away from their partner if that helps most. Sleeping tablets or not?
I will do the same for the other areas.
I got a fright this week, when something small, that normally wouldn’t phase me, triggered a mild panic attack. I also attended therapy this week and an event about self-care, as well as having several tough love conversations with people in my life who care.
Basically, “sort yourself out girl, or else”
I don’t want to face the “or else”.
Time to take this seriously.