self care – Turbulent Mind

February 5, 2021February 7, 2021

Productivity Shame

2020 was a rough year for a lot of people. A lot of us experienced disruptions in our professional and personal lives. This disruption has forced so many people to work in their homes. It’s also forced people out of their jobs. While I was lucky to not experience much of either of these things, I have recently caught myself in a negative feedback loop. In this loop, I constantly berate myself for a lack of “productivity.” This lack of productivity I’ve been experiencing has been through an active choice to embrace stillness by taking a school term off before jumping into a new job at a new school here in Daegu, South Korea.

I started out 2021 thinking of all of the changes that I have experienced in the last year. I thought about how many things I have completely turned around and I was able to give myself a few pats on the back. But why did I still end up feeling so shitty on most days? Why was I constantly feeling shame for not “doing enough” during my days?

I feel that the reason I am able to clearly see the mechanism in which productivity shaming truly brings a person down is due to the fact that I simply don’t have many obligations at this moment in time. Therefore, any “productiveness” that I perceive is necessary is actually not necessary at all. I literally have nothing that I have to do besides eat, walk the dogs, feed the dogs and cat, and clean the cat’s litter box. Technically, if I wanted to lay in bed all day and sleep, I had no obligations to stop me. Yet, I found myself feeling tired, hopeless, and full of self hatred.

I began to go into productivity overdrive a few weeks back. I scheduled every hour of my day to include some kind of activity. I started working out, studying Korean, walking the dogs 5 times a day, and reading. I even planned out exactly when I was going to prepare my meals and how long my meals must take. The first day was great. I finished everything. I felt this little high off of my accomplishments. I proceeded to try to pack the next day in the same way. While I succeeded, I found myself absolutely drained and exhausted from all of the hours I was devoting to studying and working out.

Ten or so days passed and I woke up this past Wednesday and felt absolutely hopeless. I was doing so many things, but I didn’t want to do any of them that day. I let my alerts on my watch and phone ring. Every time I swiped them away, I felt like a piece of crap. Feeling exhausted was getting to me. My insomnia was and still has been out of control. I was running on 4 hours of sleep every day and not allowing myself to rest was catching up to me. Yet, that Wednesday was not restful. I laid in bed, awake, frustrated and full of self-hate. Why couldn’t I just get my lazy ass up and do the stuff I’ve been doing every day?

I had completely depleted myself and instead of allowing myself to take a break on reaching these expectations, I mentally berated myself for being a “failure.” The guilt and the belief that you are not enough can be extremely taxing. That Wednesday stretched onto Thursday. Somewhere between Thursday and today, I finally figured out why I was “stuck” in this loop. I was setting expectations and goals that were so specific and grueling that I was setting myself up for failure.

You see, productivity shaming is an internal battle you fight with your perfectionist self. The self that sets these goals doesn’t have “happy, healthy, balanced” you in mind. It has the “cracked out, stressed, gotta survive” you in mind. It pushes you to the limit because perfectionist you was created under extreme scrutiny and stress. Your perfectionist self has served you well, and has likely helped you in many of your successes. However, the reality is that we can’t always be in “perfectionist” or “go, go, go” mode.

On Wednesday, when I woke up with the “fuck this and everything on the list” feeling, my mind and body was telling me, “Girl, it’s time to go easy on yourself today.” The checklists and reminders from perfectionist me were there to remind me of how I continue to set unrealistic goals for myself despite how badly I feel when I don’t meet them.

So, between Thursday and this moment, I’ve been working out how I can reconcile these parts of me. I reminded myself that it’s ok to not do everything on my checklist down to the amount of time I have allotted. I began to adjust my tasks from having allotted time slots to simply being a loose list of things that I’ll attempt during the day. I also broke down my list into “obligations” and “desires.” The obligations were simply to get out of the house twice a day for at least 30 minutes each time to walk the dogs. I tried to keep each of the lists manageable.

On Friday, I woke up in a pain flare-up from a condition I was diagnosed with a few years back. It’s called interstitial cystitis, which causes bladder pain/UTI-like symptoms in the absence of any actual infection. There’s limited knowledge on the condition and after many tests and scans, I was diagnosed with it based off of the fact that I was not diagnosed with other conditions that exhibit similar symptoms. I often have pain flare-ups during especially depressive/anxious times, and it’s just icing on the cake. I remember thinking to myself, “Wow, is my body trying to tell me something?”

I recently saw a quote on Instagram that said something along the lies of, “If you’re guilting and shaming yourself while you are resting, then it isn’t really rest. If you feel exhausted after resting, then that’s a sign that you weren’t truly resting at all.” It’s definitely not the exact quote, but the gist of it is there. My body was telling me, “Girl, you aren’t resting enough. You aren’t giving your body what it needs while you can and your mind is making yourself feel like shit while you’re telling yourself to rest.”

If anyone else can relate to a chronic feeling of not “doing enough” please reach out. I’d love your insight on how you deal with this never-ending feeling that you should be busy with something at all times. How do I embrace stillness and rest? How do I get the most out of it when my mind/body seems to reject simple acts of rest such as sleep?

April 8, 2020

Mental Health Challenge – Day 7

Day 7 – Clean our your social media feed

I did this a few weeks ago when the COVID19 situation was at its peak here in Korea. I was getting so much negative news, so much dismissal from people back home in the US. “Stop spreading panic, you’re young and you’re going to be fine.” My social media was flooded with racist, Asians eating bats, and anti-Chinese “jokes.” It hurt.

As an Asian-American currently living in Asia, I am not experiencing the first hand discrimination that my fellow Asian-Americans must be feeling back home. I am very thankful the government here acted upon the outbreak immediately, and that people are mostly cooperative in the social distancing movement.

Back to social media. I have completely cut Facebook out, and I use only the Messenger function. I stick to Instagram and have begun to really narrow my feed down to people, things, and topics I truly enjoy. It has truly helped my mental health and helped me keep myself in a mostly good headspace. It wasn’t really challenging, just sort of sad. Even with Instagram, I’ve been trying to limit the endless scrolling. I know that during this time of lockdown, it’s hard not to dive deeply into the Internet and scroll through other people’s lives endlessly… but taking a look at what type of information you follow can help make that scrolling a more uplifting experience.

April 7, 2020

Mental Health Challenge – Day 6

Day 6 – Take a relaxing bath or hot shower

This is one of the things that I never skip out on doing. No matter how shitty or sad I feel, I always spend time taking a hot shower. I upgraded the existing shower head in my bathroom for one that gives me a little more water pressure. I’m also one of those people that takes scalding hot showers. The type of showers that probably aren’t great for my skin. I take a few of them a day, but the one at the end of a long work day (first day back at the office after weeks of working from home) with my lavender body wash from Lush that actually helps me feel relaxed was a great way to end the night. No I’m not getting paid by Lush to advertise their products. I just really like them. I really wish I had a place with a bath tub. Maybe that can be a goal of mine to work toward. But with currency currently being so unstable, I think it will be a good long while before I can make that goal a reality.

In addition to taking a shower yesterday, I went ahead and did my nails. Which I do on an almost weekly basis anyways with my lazy girl press on manicures. Taking care of yourself feels good. During a time like this, even when I’m not going anywhere or trying to impress anyone, having pretty nails to look down at remind me that taking care of myself and doing little things for myself is still ok during this time.

Hang in there world. Sorry for the late post 🙂

April 2, 2020

Mental Health Challenge – Day 2

**Day 2 – Fill in your calendar and set aside time for self-care**

So far, so good, April. Day 2. I went to bed at around 2AM last night. This is a time that I like to call, “early.” It wasn’t. But I had a lot on my mind. Despite listing out positive things about myself and trying to get into a good headspace for everything, I ended up breaking my own promise of no contact with my former partner. They say week 2 is a hard week because it’s the week you realize that this is your new normal. I barely made it through week 2, and I felt like a failure. Banging my head on the wall, telling myself I was stupid. Stupid for not letting time do its time thing. Stupid for believing that maybe they still want me in their life. Stupid. It was a sick April Fools Day joke I played on myself. After a day like that, I told myself, “Yo girl, forget the rest of everything, go to bed. Sleep and nourish your body.” I popped my prescribed sleepy time anxiety and sedatives, apparently ordered myself a McDonald’s breakfast combo, and passed out. SELF CARE. I’m kidding. I should really eat healthier.

Which brings me to the challenging task for Day 2. Filling in my calendar and setting aside time for self-care. Due to the COVID-19 outbreak here, school has been cancelled for over a week, and our academy shut down for 2. It was a really difficult time, for the country, and we’re kind of scrambling to make schedules for make-up lessons and to keep our term schedules on track. I somehow managed to pop up at 7:30AM this morning fraught with anxiety… and created my calendar. Still not perfect. Still “penciled” in a lot of work things, but I managed to set goals for myself/challenges of self-care. I want this month, not to be too much of a challenge, but to be a bit of a step in the right direction. My physical health has deteriorated from mid-March until now, and I have not been the healthiest in terms of eating or exercise due to weakness from being sick. But I’m feeling stronger and stronger, and less and less fatigued every day. I’m ready to put myself back on the #1 spot on my list.

As you can see, my calendar is FILLED with obligations. Work obligations…. financial obligations… self-obligations. Fitting in self-care focused activities were hard. While I don’t put in every self-care activity that I do on my calendar, I did put in some goals and blocked out days to just let myself sleep, rest, and feel things. I want to cuddle with the dogs and just be with them. Days that used to be date days, I marked them as me days. Days for me to be me with no obligations whatsoever. I guess, it’s a day for me to go on a date with me.

As the month progresses, I’d like to start building strength in exercise and incorporating my older habits of meal prep and cooking. I want to alternate yoga with just spending extra time with the dogs every night. As the weather warms, my dogs deserve to be outside for longer as well.

Here are some other activities that I do regularly that are considered my self-care that I want to get back into doing more regularly. Having depression hit me like a truck and then being sick for two full weeks afterwards was not what I needed for the month of March, but it has definitely left me with a sense of needing to focus on my own things.

Doing my nails – I’m a lazy person, but I also have a nasty habit of picking at and chewing my actual nails. At least once a week I use a gel manicure set and do press-on gel nail tips. They cost under $10, a pack can last up to 2-3 weeks, and the shape of the nail tips fit onto my nails really well 🙂
Showers – I’m one of those people that love luxurious, long, hot showers. I have way too many shower products and hair products to use, and I also take probably 2 or 3 a day. I use this time to really pamper my skin, my face, my hair, and also to cry. Why cry? Because it’s healthy to cry and let it out. And I want to keep it hygienic and not constantly be crying on my pillow, you know?
Cleaning my apartment – I love a clean and organized apartment. It rejuvenates me to be in a space where I organized and rearranged everything by myself. I’ve really been letting this go to hell, recently, but, I want to make that my Saturday night activity. To just maintain cleanliness of my apartment.
Walking the dogs – as much as it is the responsible dog mom thing to do, it is also an act of self care. I walk with friends for socialization, but I also love walking alone. I like listening to the sounds of the night, and feeling the breeze as I listen to the pitter patter of the dog’s little feet. I’ve always loved walking the dogs, and I can’t wait for my strength to come back, so I can go outdoors more often.
Phone calls with friends – I never really realized how hard it is to fit in just casual communication with people. I also have made a big realization that I really would like to make friends that also will help me here, in Korea. I have friends, far and wide, but I stick close to my circle here.

Self-care is super important, and I want to build in more time and make more moments to communicate with my friends that all live in different places. I know that self-quarantine in the States are hitting my friends hard. My current break-up and emotional situation isn’t great, and I’ve been trying hard not to shut out other people. When I’m ready, after healing, I want to get out there, experience the world and meet people with similar hobbies and interests.

January 27, 2020January 27, 2020

One day at a time…

Today has been a little bit of a journey for me. I’ve been feeling very physically ill, and terrified that it was the Wuhan Coronavirus. I know, I know… health anxiety is a real thing and I should stop Googling symptoms. I stopped by the hospital to get checked, and they don’t seem to concerned. Of course, that’s not how anxiety works. I’m still terrified.

Aside from taking care of myself, I have also been sorting through a lot of thoughts this evening. I had planned on doing this, as I mentioned in my last post. It’s my last day of a long holiday weekend and I have been thinking and sorting through a lot of the anxiety, sadness, and fears that I’ve been setting aside because I have been too tired, overwhelmed and anxious to deal with my stuff. Here are some things I’ve sorted through, and some things that I have realized through the last few weeks.

The winter months are packed full of holidays, and I’ve been experiencing some serious sadness and loneliness on an almost monthly basis. Thanksgiving, Christmas, Lunar New Year are all holidays I enjoy spending with my family and friends. I missed out on so many things and I know it’s my own damn fault. I chose to come out here, why? Why did I choose to come out here if I get so sad when I can’t be with people that I love on important days. My anxiety kind of overflows during this time, as my family and loved ones are too busy to communicate and update me. I feel like their lives are flying by while my life is sitting at a standstill waiting for news and updates about their lives. I am justifiably sad/down in the dumps. Even though I have been feeling a little bit sad about things like missing my family, significant other, and friends. I understand that being far apart doesn’t mean that I am not loved and not important. Realizing this and working through the rationalizing has helped me feel a lot less anguished.

Another feeling I’ve been working through is absolute exhaustion from work. It’s really hard to stop myself from criticizing my decisions to come back to a job that does get extremely busy during the winter and summer seasons. There is a fine line between being extremely busy and burnt out. I could feel everyone around me slowly cross that line and enter “burnt out.” And, to be honest, I was getting secondhand burnout and anxiety. “Did I make the right choice to come back?” and “Is this a toxic environment for me?” are thoughts that I actively tried to avoid thinking about during the busy times for self preservation. I know that I enjoy my work immensely. Seeing the kids learn makes me happy. The environment can be what I make it, and I can choose to let the energy of others ruin the experience for me, or I can choose to focus on my own emotions and how I feel.

There have been a lot of days where I did not want to wake up in the morning. I go to bed hoping that I won’t have to wake up the next day. I think about all of the other days to follow and I’m overwhelmed by the weight of the future. I think about all of the things I want to do but haven’t. Before I have even begun the day, I’ve already set myself up for failure. I’ve already set myself up for a day of hopelessness and sadness.

Now that I’ve spent the entire day contemplating what to do with some of these negative and unhelpful emotions and thoughts, I definitely need an action plan to deal with some of the negative and intrusive anxious thoughts. Recently, I’ve been really enjoying a Podcast that brought me a lot of strength today. The Tablo Podcast has helped me see a lot of things about dealing with depression. I really need to take each day, one day at a time. I need to complete thought processes and dealing with my feelings one day at a time. As much as I’d like to just push some of the things off for an “easier” or another day, I really do need to address the day’s feelings on the day so that I don’t carry the day’s weight on me.

Through listening to the podcast I’ve felt a little less alone, as there have been so many moments of “Ahah! I’ve felt exactly the same!” As he describes moments in his life and his own struggle with depression.

A lot of things have been difficult these days, and I know that they can continue being a challenge, but I’m determined to make the best of things and to better my mental health. Every New Year, people make “New Years Resolutions” to be a better version of themselves. I’ve said before that setting a resolution for the year can often mean setting yourself up for failure. So, like Tablo says, I’m gonna make a day resolution for every day of something attainable.

For tomorrow, Tuesday, my resolution is to wake up at a decent hour and do some work around the house before heading to work. And each day, I will need to take all of the emotions and events of the day, and properly address them. No more putting it off for later.

January 7, 2020March 24, 2020

Setbacks – Because Progress isn’t Linear

One of the most discouraging things about this whole “recovery” process is how devastating a setback can feel. It can feel like nothing you did up to this point actually mattered. You still just end up back here with the thoughts that swirl around in your head. There could be absolutely no trigger. It could be something as simple as lack of sleep or just being a bit blue about saying good-bye to friends. Yesterday, it was both of those things that led me into some pretty dark territory. When I’m in the middle of a spin-out, my idea of my self worth isn’t very pretty. To be honest, sometimes it’s just my brain telling me things have been a little bit too okay for too long, and it’s about time that it stirs some shit up for me to overthink about.

On days like those, it’s really hard to see that path ahead of you. The path of healing seems to just be one of those track loops and you always end up in that rough spot again and again. Starting to feel hopeless that things never will work out. Or feeling like no matter what I do, I will always have this is one of the many discouraging and distressful thoughts that swirl around in my head during a spin out. Amidst my spin out, I knew that self soothing techniques wouldn’t work, and the longer I wait until I reached out to someone to talk about what’s going on, the deeper I’ll fall. In order to combat spin-outs and getting stuck in a loop, my therapist and I have actually devised a “plan” of sorts to help me sort through those emotions. I’m hoping that this can help someone out there who is also stuck in a negative feedback loop. Here are the steps I take when I feel myself spinning out of control with myself.

Behavioral Activation – If at all possible, engage in a behavior activating activity. These activities are any activity that can get you closer to feeling a sense of accomplishment by setting and working toward a goal. Sometimes, if I notice the signs that I am falling into a slump or into an overthinking loop, I give myself a task to complete in order to further myself away from the negative feelings of being in the slump and to distract the overthinking. Some tasks include walking my dogs, cleaning, organizing my desk or doing small administrative tasks for work.
Rationalizing – Often times, anxiety attacks/slumps come about due to a negative perspective or idea of yourself. Rationalizing that it is unrealistic to expect perfection from yourself. Or questioning any intrusive thoughts by asking what solid evidence do I have to support this irrational belief is very helpful in making disruptive thoughts less distressing.
Grounding Techniques – If the behavioral activation is no longer effective, this usually means that I am at a point where I will not benefit from setting a goal or thinking about “future me” is setting off my panic. Grounding works miraculously in helping calm the physiological sensations of panic and anxiety. Grounding techniques could include deep breathing exercises, body scan meditation, or just checking in with your senses.
Reach out to a friend – I always put this last, because I am trying to train myself to be self-sufficient. Sometimes things are so messed up and you’re so deep inside the spiral that you need another person to help you. Whether it be to just keep you company, to talk about the issue at hand, or just to get your mind off of things, another person can really help improve the mood.
Self Care – The feeling of hunger and anxiety are both very similar for me. Realizing that I may be spinning out because it’s my body’s way of telling me that I need to eat or I won’t be well was pretty useful yesterday. I often forget about meals because my depression has made it hard to recognize what is hunger and what is anxiety.

I’m hoping this post can help those that have been trying their best to live the best way they can while dealing with the effects of anxiety and depression. For now, I will celebrate that I got through today despite yesterday being difficult. I got through today and I will continue to make my way through the days. Remember, one of the acts of self-care and behavior activation is to make sure you reward yourself, even if it’s just a little bit, for making it through another day and another struggle.