It is very easy as a mother/parent to neglect one’s own self-care. The competing demands of tending to our children, while also juggling the countless other roles and responsibilities inside our lives and careers, can leave hardly any time left over for self-care activities (or inactivities as the case might be). Self-care and self-nurturing are foundational to our well-being and effectiveness as mothers (and as human beings). We not only have our children to love and look after, and our partners where they exist, but additionally ourselves.
In many ways, we ultimately love and care for others, to the extent we love and look after ourselves. Many of you scanning this article are very proficient at being “other focused”, caring for the requirements of children, partners, aging parents, friends, neighbours, and perhaps also clients, patients and students if your projects in the world involves helping or supporting others. Again, www.markalpha.com/products/lipo-laser-cavitation-machine to which you are able to fully show up by yourself behalf, will be reflected in the distance you are able to support others to take in terms of their health and well-being- together with your children. A wise woman once thought to me, “we only take people so far as we’ve gone ourselves.” As mothers, we want to take children the great distance towards their health, well-being and happiness, hence a journey we are called to make ourselves.
Being a mother, may be the most complex, amazing, exhausting, and meaningful work that I have ever done in my life so far. All the tending, loving, giggling, clearing up, getting snacks, changing diapers, running baths, reading stories, teaching, sleepless nights, adjusting, evolving, coordinating, learning and growing is truly mind boggling. I used to believe the toughest job I ever endured was as a child welfare social worker, than I worked in the emergency department of a hospital and thought that was up there in the “that is challenging work” category. Onward to key note speeches and facilitating training programs before hundreds of people, where my heart would pound loudly in my own ears when i was introduced, seconds away from having to say something brilliant (or at the very least not foolish) to individuals sitting at round tables with their name tags on. I QUICKLY became a mother and fell to my knees in the humility of the all consuming, miracle of motherhood. Now THIS is hard work! Motherhood, in my experience, is hard, easy, natural, challenging, joyful, soulful and frequently invisible work.
Self-care has a totally new meaning now since how well I care for myself will determine, for some reason, how well I look after my children. That being said, I also notice the more we care for others, the harder it is to maintain self-care – there may be so many competing imperatives on our time. With deep respect and compassion for this reality, below are a few tips for prioritiizing your own self-care as a mother/parent (if you are not a parent – I am hoping you find value in these pointers as you honour your self-care amid what is true that you experienced).
Do what you love – in the event that you only can create half an hour a day to deal with yourself – choose activities that you truly love to do (what really fills you up, inspires you, nurtures you, supports you – choose these exact things!) – it will make it easier to reach them. Yes, running 5 kms would be good, but maybe you would rather have a bubble bath – so have the bath!
Think integration versus balance – balance might seem like a distant far fetched notion while you pack kids into the car, run back in the home to grab your car keys and the lunch bag you forgot on the counter, so let’s reframe balance into integration. Integration means that the really important elements of your life get some of one’s attention – which means you exercise, eat healthy, and make time for self reflection. But perhaps you can’t do many of these things every single day – but overall you tend to them in the course of a week, per month – this is integration.
Give yourself permission to put yourself first – there’s always more to accomplish – another load of laundry, more dishes – there is always something that can take you away from yourself! You need to give yourself permission, absolute endorsement, to care for yourself. This WILL mean walking away from other activities to claim this time on your own – this guilt free, essential time for yourself devoted to tending to your wellness and replenishment.
Ask for the thing you need and want – we are in need of support from our family, friends and colleagues to place self-care up front in our lives. One way to understand this support is to not leave it to chance or default, ask for it, be clear and specific in what you need from others to help you achieve your self-care goals. Be sure to also ask how you can support them to take care too – this creates a win-win environment for creating and sustaining healthy lifestyles inside our families and in our workplaces.
Create self-care routines and habits – when you have to always give a lot of thought and preparation to your self-care activities, you are much less more likely to actually follow through with getting right down to it. This can be a lot easier to have routines for the self-care – for example, you understand you go for a walk at lunchtime (period – you protect the time, you don’t have to find out when you are going to exercise, and while others are working through lunch, giving an answer to more email, etc. you’re moving your system and having a rest!)
Say YES to rest – most Moms I understand are tired – and for good reason. Getting some sleep and some rest is key to having the energy and frame of mind to have a tendency to other self-care activities. Should you be feeling depleted, run-down, exhausted – it really is OK to create rest your number 1 priority! Your energy will go up, you will feel much better by getting some rest. Based on how old your kids are, what stage of sleep deprivation you might be in as a parent, rest may need to be the ONLY think you are trying to do in effort to deal with yourself. It’s OK to possess just one thing on your own self-care “to do” list!