Anxiety, Parenting, postpartum, Self-Care

Self-care… What does that even mean??

“Self-Care” has become a buzz word. It can mean so many different things. I have seen some people talk about spa days being self-care, and others talking about deeper self-care, like finding freedom from old ways of thinking or healing from past trauma as self care. 

As a therapist, my perspective is that self-care is all about asking for what you need. It’s about learning to show up fully in your life and not let other’s agenda, expectations, or your own people pleasing get in the way of you living a full and joyful life. I have created a step by step guide to self-care that dives into habits, scripts for how to ask for what you need, and even a visual activity that helps you think about those relationships in your life that are restorative and those that are draining. 

Download it below!

Download the Self-Care PDF

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Anxiety, Kids Mental Health, Parenting, Relationships, Uncategorized

The Holiday Overload

The tinsel, the lights, the wrapping of gifts, the overload of food and cheersing ourselves into oblivion. 

 If ever there is a time of sensory overload it is the holidays. 

Too much to take in with our eyes:  the lights, the wish lists, decorations in every spare space.

With our ears: holiday songs on repeat, kids screeching excitedly or fully melting down, dogs howling at the fireworks

With our noses: heavy holiday foods, holiday candles of every possible concoction including winter sweater and Christmas sugar cookie, fire… did I leave something in the oven or is that just the fireplace?

With our mouths: sugary treats, savory delights, candy being offered to us and our kids at every turn, holiday greetings hoping we remembered to ask about the right things and people and didn’t step in it by asking about the boyfriend who didn’t make it past thanksgiving! 

With our hands: checking off lists, baking, wrapping gifts, shopping. Judging which sweater is just the right weight for her, wiping tears off cheeks, soothing disappointed kids, and grieving loved ones. Carefully cleaning up broken ornaments, hot candle wax dripping onto our hands as we try to stop and remember the sacred in the midst of the chaotic.

After all of this, it seems as though a rest might be in order but instead our culture demands we set aside our noise makers and glasses of champagne and decide our goals for the new year: GET FIT! GET ORGANIZED! GET THAT PROMOTION! THIS IS YOUR YEAR!

This may be your year to truly hustle and get all those goals accomplished before the calendar turns to February, but maybe you, like me, need to slow down and re-group before you start crushing your goals.

Maybe for you January looks like:

-Slowly take down all your holiday decorations and let things be a little barer around your home than it is the rest of the year, to give your eyes a rest. 

-Spending time in silence, either as a spiritual practice or just giving your mind and ears a rest. Instead of listening to a podcast on your way to work or kid music in the morning, maybe it would help to make space for silence. 

-Eating simple meals made at home to enjoy more slowly and to have less clean up. 

-Consider putting some of your gifts away out of sight until you can use them. If you got several books for Christmas but only put the one you’re reading on your nightstand and put the rest away. Or if you got a new candle but the one on the side of your tub still has a lot of life in it, put the new one in the cabinet and it will be a fun treat later in the year. Rotating toys, some in the closet, some in the toybox can make playing more enjoyable for kids, even though it may be hard on the front end. 

-Lastly, make a list of the things that help you feel rested and add some of them into your January. These things might be: Sunday afternoon naps, Family movie night, having your home professionally cleaned twice a month, walks by the lake, reading books regularly. Take some time in January to figure out what you and your family need to feel rested and then set clear goals for the new year.

Wishing you and yours a calm and contented 2023.

Depression, Relationships, Self-Care, Self-doubt, Trauma, Uncategorized

It Wasn’t That Bad

Some days you might look at your symptoms and triggers and think to yourself, “I’ve been through so much it’s overwhelming!”

Trauma feels like the perfect word to describe it. But then the next day or even the next hour rolls around, and you find yourself thinking the total opposite: “I’m making a big deal out of nothing.” After all, you can easily point to someone else who’s had it worse.  

You feel like a ping pong ball, going back and forth about what happened to you. At this point, you may assume that if you can’t settle on whether your experience was that bad, it must not be. Wouldn’t someone with real trauma feel certain about what happened to them?

Actually, no.

It’s very common for people who have experienced trauma – whether mild, moderate, or severe – to question whether anything significant really happened to them. Even those who have endured years of violence and abuse find themselves discounting their experiences.

In some ways, this is highly adaptive. Sometimes people develop a part of themselves that pretends nothing occurred so they can go on with normal life for a time. It’s too hard to feel grief, shame, or fear while you’re trying to work or study in school. Denying the trauma helps.

However, usually the person has another part of themselves that still feels all those difficult emotions, and even if that part is hidden away for a time, it never really goes away. The result can feel like an inner battle. One part of you functions well in day-to-day life by ignoring the trauma, and the other part feels crushed by the trauma and invalidated by your refusal to acknowledge it.

Whenever you’re feeling divided like that, take a moment to notice which side seems to be winning out and which side is getting stifled.

Try not to judge either one. Remind yourself that both parts have helped you in the past and it’s normal to have doubts. What feelings might you be avoiding? Are there other ways you can get through the day without invalidating the hurt you still feel? Lean into your support network while you focus on bridging the gap between the two sides.  

If you want to read more about how reconcile different parts of yourself in the aftermath of trauma, check out Janina Fisher’s book: “Healing the Fragmented Selves of Trauma Survivors: Overcoming Internal Self-Alienation.”

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