Posted on February 15, 2020
January was tough. A lot of difficult things happened. Normally, I wouldn’t do a monthly round up but there were several things this month that I didn’t think would get properly acknowledged (in my yearly review or otherwise) if I didn’t. So here’s January 2020 and it’s highs and lows…
(Luce Barka performing ‘Be More Kind’ – a very beautiful, meaningful song.)
“I’m so, so excited to announce that the music video for ‘Clarity’ will be coming out Friday 7th February! @rsandersonphoto and I had such so much fun shooting this and there’s a pretty cool surprise in there so we hope you love it as much as we do!” (x)
So that was January. Yeah, 2020 – the new decade – began on a very stressful and sad note. I’m thankful for the moments of light.
Category: animals, anxiety, death, emotions, event, favourites, food, mental health, music, university, writing Tagged: 30 day challenge, 30dayfeb, asd, assessment, assessments, autism, autism spectrum disorder, baby loss, baby loss awareness, bad night, bbc introducing, bbc introducing south, befries, bereavement, cheer, clarity, clarity music video, disabled student allowance, dog, dsa, dsa assessment, election, england, exams, favourite music, friend, friends, gig, grammys, grammys 2020, halsey, honest, honest ep, loss, lover, luce barka, luce barka music, manic, masters, masters degree, masters degree in songwriting, meltdown, meltdowns, mindfulness, my music, natalie hemby, netflix, origami, pet, presentation, radio, richard marc, richard marc music, sara bareilles, she used to be mine, show, songwriting, spotify, stress, taylor swift, tommy's, track of the day, uk, waitress the musical, wellbeing
Posted on August 4, 2018
Within an hour or so of waking up, I knew I needed a self care day.
I’d started the day at the gym, swimming in the outdoor pool. It felt good to do but by the time I got out, I was feeling really anxious and fragile. I thought about it and talked to my Mum and decided that I needed a day to look after myself. I needed a little break from life, from all the big, hard stuff.
It was never going to be a particularly busy day. I had planned to do a couple of things in town but there was nothing urgent and I felt really low on social energy. Sometimes it’s worth pushing through, worth practicing opposite action, but sometimes it just makes more sense to focus your energies elsewhere. So I cancelled that stuff and headed home.
On my way, I popped into the supermarket and bought some treats for myself. I’ve been pretty good about eating healthily recently, which I’m really proud of given my issues with food. But we all need unhealthy stuff sometimes and that day was one of those days. I also bought some new notebooks, which always cheers me up.
Once I was home, I headed to the living room and drew the curtains. I’ve never had white curtains before but I absolutely love it: you can draw the curtains and shut out the world but there’s still good natural light. It’s a little bubble in which I feel safe. I changed into my favourite T-shirt, put on a Harry Potter film for background noise, and got to work on the emails I’ve been avoiding. I was avoiding them because they were stressful but ignoring them only created more stress so I needed to address that. I just needed the right environment – a calm environment – to feel able to do that. And I felt SO much better afterwards. I also got caught up with my diary and my photo albums, both of which are my self care staples.
Another thing I was really worried about was my cat. She was spayed not that long ago and I just had this anxiety that the wound wasn’t healing properly. My Mum was taking our dog to the vet so I asked her to take Lucy with her. I have serious anxiety about going to the vet (probably from when we had to have my previous cat put down) which does need addressing but that wasn’t going to happen in a day and I didn’t want Lucy to suffer because of it. The vet checked her out and gave her a clean bill of health, much to my relief.
It’s also a really good time to try and practice good habits, healthy habits. I’m trying to build several things into my daily routine (not that I really have a daily routine), including drinking the recommended amount of water, practicing my instruments, and making sure I do something creative. Without a day to stop and take stock of my life, it’s easy to get into a really frenetic cycle that just gets faster and faster until I inevitably crash. So, for me, it’s important to stop.
So there you have it. This is what I do in a self care day. Obviously it’s different each time because of what’s happening in my life but, for me, a self care day involves several things:
Sometimes that means curling up in bed with my cats and my favourite TV show and sometimes it’s replying to all my emails and so on that have built up. Sometimes it’s like an aesthetic instagram post with fluffy socks and candles and sometimes it’s ugly with tears and frustration. We all do it differently and we all do it differently each time. Self care is a very small title for a very big idea.
Category: animals, food, mental health, tips Tagged: advice, anxiety, cat, cats, depressed, depression, mental health awareness, mental illness, mental wellness, pets, self care, wellbeing
Hi! I’m Lauren Alex Hooper. Welcome to my little blog! I write about living with Autism Spectrum Disorder, as well as several mental health issues. I’m a singersongwriter (and currently studying for a Masters in songwriting) so I’ll probably write a bit about that too.
My first single, ‘Invisible,’ is now available on iTunes and Spotify, with all proceeds going to Young Minds.
I’m currently releasing my first EP, Honest, track by track and all five songs are now available on all major music platforms. However, there’s still more content to come…