Self-Care Success

This journey to create new habits is personal, and my hope in sharing this here is both a record to look back on for myself, but also to hopefully inspire you to make changes in your own life if you find yourself complacent or unhappy, even when you look around you see so many blessings. Like I've shared, 2017 left me angry and confused, when I wished it (and thought it should have) left me joyful and grateful. 

We wrapped up our Whole30, as well as our reintroduction, in February (which I still hope to post a final recap, favorite people to follow, and our favorite recipes of it all after I finish Food Freedom Forever), and while I had initially thought I would JUST focus on my phone "addiction" (but #srslytho), I found my method to be somewhat ineffective and decided to adjust a bit for February by not just TAKING AWAY, but ADDING and CREATING new healthier habits. 

That first week after I installed the app "Moment", I was like a rebellious teenager trying to beat the average person's daily time on my phone. Not really, but that's kind of what it felt like was happening. I was feeling discouraged by my own attitude and inability to change, but I wasn't giving up just yet. I think my phone addiction also goes hand-in-hand with my anxiety about something horrible happening to someone I love, and me not knowing about it for hours, because that happened the night of Thanksgiving with my brother being rushed to the emergency room and the horrible discovery of the brain tumor. As I worry throughout the day, I reach for my phone as a reassurance that everyone is okay, then I get sucked into social media, which then I get sucked into not feeling as good about myself as I compare the pretty pictures there with my own life or abilities, or see a sad story that breaks my heart, and the spiral just continues downward from there. So my phone use is a complicated thing, but also an unhealthy thing.

I had also begun to feel some positive benefits to taking time to care for myself here and there in January, by just doing something I loved rather than something I had to do. So, I adjusted a bit and decided to focus on DECREASING my phone usage by FILLING a part of my day with something I enjoy so much that I used my phone less.

February started with some upcoming challenges and I knew there would be some of them, so I tried to remind myself to give a little more grace. Ellie had gotten the flu and I was simply surviving because Chris was traveling so much, and then I got the flu too. It was feeling a little reminiscent of 2017, but the difference was that I now had more tools to deal with my emotions rather than just eat them or stare ay my phone to numb them. And I was having some small successes like using my phone 30 minutes less each day on average! But I knew there was still more work to do.

So then the final two weeks of the month, I signed up for one of "Moment's" boot camps, which gave me a simple task each day to make me think about my phone usage like "no phone in the bathroom" or "delete one unused app". I was able to decrease my daily phone usage by 30 more minutes, making my total average one hour less! ANNND I pickup my phone 100 less times a day! That "extra" hour I have now, I have been using for self care, and my goodness...it has made such a huge difference in my level of cray cray. 

Another HUGE part of feeling healthier mentally so far this year is that I begun counseling this month, and I am so grateful that I get to go every other week. It is incredible what a difference it has made for someone outside of my life to look in and help me find the reasons why I do the things I do, and how I can change the things I do that I do not like or that is not healthy. I leave feeling like a big boulder has been tossed off the mountain I've carried so much of my life, and given me a greater understanding of healthier ways to handle situations in life that are sometimes just so hard. My counselor speaks truth and reason to me, and I know I am becoming a better version of myself for me and for my family.

I feel a greater sense of calm, and therefore have a greater ability to have patience with my children, which is really the why of how this whole thing began anyways. I was taking out my sadness, anger, uncertainty, and anxiety on them, and I knew it was so wrong and so unfair. Like with my new habits I am creating, I also know there is more work to do here and everyday is still not "easy peasy", but I feel strongly that I can better manage my emotions because I take time to feel and understand and write down those emotions, instead of just numbing them. It has trickled into every other areas of my life too, and given my brain space to think and organize and remember important things, rather than just feel like I am simply surviving.

And lastly, for March I want to spend more intentional time with my children. I am with them all day everyday, and in the past several months, the actual care of them depletes me, leaving nothing left for playing or doing fun things together. And then my mind always wanders to all the things I SHOULD be doing or what I need to do next to stay one step ahead...Anyone else?!? Part of me wanted to feel guilty about not putting time with them as my first healthier habit in January, but I also know (especially now), that if I can pour into myself, I will have more to give to others. I've been testing the waters on this over the past week or so, and I have found that I really enjoy intentional time with them more than I have in a long time, and it is expounded upon when I see the joy it brings to them. More than once recently, Ellie has exclaimed, "This is the BEST DAY EVER!", and it's just because we were spending that extra time together. 

I've learned that these new habits are all intertwining and connected, and while I "complete" a month of changes, there is not only no exact start and end, there is also still work to be done daily with them. Trying something and it not working the exact way I think it will is not a failure, but just an opportunity to learn. These first two months of 2018 have been some hard work, but have already brought about some great change in my life, and have given me a better perspective about so many things. I'm grateful to be here, and I'm excited to see what's next. Thanks for reading friends!