self care

What is self-care? that was a question I didn’t have an answer to just a couple of years ago. I never knew how to provide myself with self-care without the feeling of guilt attached to it.

I have learned much about self-care in therapy, and my therapist is really good about guiding me towards my own self care, and I have learned (at a snail’s pace) how to accept that.

I have gotten better about taking time for myself in the middle of the week, and maybe taking a day of the weekend to just take care of me, but I fall short many times in the middle of the busyness of my life.

My therapist is doing “Male Survivor” this weekend in North GA, and he will be gone the rest of this week and the weekend.

When he does these small little breaks, I also clear my schedule and give myself a break.

Therapy and healing is hard hard work, and sometimes I need a couple of days to break myself down, and then put myself together with a fresh coat of paint.

I have come to realize over the years of therapy that I need to take advantage of these small breaks when they come up, and I am finding more and more that I enjoy it.

Years and years ago when I first began therapy I would almost freak out when my therapist took a vacation or went away on these mal survivor retreats for a couple of days because I was afraid he would forget where I was in my healing, or maybe the young part of me was afraid he wouldn’t come back. I wasn’t dependent on HIM, I was dependent on the healing, and was afraid all my hard work would go away and I would have to start over.

Here I am 6 years later and I look forward to the small breaks, and that is so different from where I was just a couple of years ago.

I have not only grown to “trust” the process, but I have also grown to give myself the self-care that I need, and to trust that it’s OK to take time out for me.

Self care is never an easy thing to do, because naturally I put others before myself. Self-care for me in the past was about self survival, not the kind of self-care that holds love for myself.

I will take this Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday and clear my whole schedule. NO Dr appointments, no errands to run, no driving the boys around.. just time out for me in doing whatever it is that helps me “self-care”

My therapist offered to stay connected the time he was up gone in the next couple days (by him texting and checking in or me emailing), but you know what? maybe that is an offer I would have taken in the past, but I said to him “no you go and do what you need to do, and I am going to take some time to just reflect and refresh” and he respected me for that, and I respected myself for stating what it was that I needed and good for me for taking on that self-care.

I am not sure how much I will write in my blog the next couple of days, but if I do, I will write with no agenda.

I look forward to the next couple of days, and when we both return to therapy Tuesday, my healing is still there, my hard work still awaits me — but for now I just BREATHE and enjoy the self-care that also awaits me — however that looks

Like I said in my blog post yesterday — healing is a continuous journey, even when you take time to sit for a couple of days.