In times of stress or distress, our relationships with our internal lives is affected – our basic functioning of sleeping, eating and mood/energy levels is profoundly affected. We may sleep/eat too much or too little. Our relationship with food has a long history and not is not something that just happened now during lockdown. How we relate to food or drink is passed down through families and cultures. Having an alcoholic drink or hot beverage is how many of us have learnt how to manage distress. Even Sheldon from Big Bang Theory knows that social decorum dictates that when someone is distressed you offer them a hot beverage.
Similarly with sleep – we may feel unsafe to sleep or afraid that "if I sleep and really relax, that I am letting people down, because I need to be the one on watch". Or we may feel that we don’t deserve a restful sleep as that is wrong under these circumstances, so we unconsciously fight sleep. We may be afraid to sleep due to the nightmares, so staying awake is preferable.
We may find ourselves to be restless and have too much energy or no energy at all.
If we have too much energy, it can be focused energy or it is unfocused and we start lots of things and then move to the next thing... kind of a headless chicken running around feeling stressed and needing to be busy…
Or we have no energy at all, feeling fatigued even though you have done nothing and have slept well. There is no right or wrong – this is how you are wired to react to how you perceive and experience lockdown to be.
Because we are distressed and in a poor relationship with ourselves, this will affect how we interact and engage with others. We may be too tired to engage or want engagement. We may want silence but then feel distressed not knowing what to do in the silence or how to cope with the silence. We may not know what we want or need. We may feel that we are a burden to those around us and that we are bringing them down, so this makes us feel guilty and therefore even less likely to want to engage.
Our distress also may manifest in finances – feeling stifled because we cant shop and make myself feel good by shopping or the opposite, not wanting to spend any money due to real or feared future financial difficulties.
Step One - give yourself permission to Stop
If you can stop what you are doing for a short while, please join Bhavna on the couch for some therapy or reflections.
For those privileged enough to be able to stop, this is about gifting yourself some me time. Some time to take a break from the demands of your “to do list” and demands from others and just sit. We are starting with self-care and caring for each other in this reflection session.
If you are sitting down, and want to close your eyes, that is ok. No matter what you are doing at this moment, can you gift yourself a few mindfulness breathes. Just focus on this one breath that you are taking – no judgement that it is too long or short, or that you are not breathing properly. Just welcome this breath into your body like a loving friend coming home. Allowing it to stay as long as it needs to and then bidding it farewell with peace. And then welcoming the next loving friend… in this way, you have lots of loving friends visiting you for a short while daily. They visit, nourish you and then leave, taking away what you don’t need.
Allow your body to relax a bit – just for now. If you are sitting, gift yourself this time by telling yourself that at this moment, there is no-where else that you need to be or nothing else than you need to be doing – just sitting and relaxing – that’s all.
Reflections
Now depending on whatever time frame you want to use – the last month or the last week. That will be the focus of the next few minutes. This will be what you will reflect on during the questions that I will be asking.
Starting with the basics
How have you been sleeping during this time? If sleep is great then that I wonderful as sleep is sooo essential to our life and brain functioning. Lack of sleep affects all aspects of our being – our mood, physical and mental health. If you are not sleeping well, try doing some relaxation techniques before going to bed. If you are feeling tensed and anxious, do some physical activity before bed, the burn off the anxiety. Try going through a wind down period before bedtime – simple activities, no screen time, reading a pleasant book not anything that gets the mind firing and thinking on trying to solve or understand. Try doing mindfulness practices in bed – some people swear by certain apps that help them to sleep. Be kind to yourself if you struggle to sleep. Don’t beat yourself up for being tensed and not being able to sleep.. Because that just makes you more tensed and less likely to fall asleep.
How do you wake up in the morning? Feeling rested and ready for the day ahead. Jump out of bed with a spring in your step. Great going. Reflect on what you have been doing during lockdown that has helped you to get out of bed feeling great and ready for the day – especially if this was not your usual pre-lockdown waking up pattern. What can you do to keep this healthy sleeping pattern going. You are not a victim to circumstances – your mind is within your power to control
Or maybe morning comes too early.. and you don’t want to get up. Why bother.
Again, be kind.. its okay to wake up and feel the way you do. If you are struggling, gently motivate or coerce yourself to get going. Kindly and gently. Not by shouting at yourself and demeaning yourself for being a failure.
With sleep, it is important that we have a routine – we are creatures of habit and routine gives us structure and safety. So go to bed and wake up around the same time each day of the week, weekends, you can change the routine. This way, our bodies learn how to sleep at night because it does not get to sleep at other times.
How has your appetite been during this period? Obviously, for the last month, it has been home cooked foods – but even then, we can still eat unhealthy meals. What have you been feeding yourself over this time? Healthy nutritious meals? Simple, what you can afford foods, or have you lived mostly on chippies, chocolates, cool drinks, etc.
If you have been eating relatively good home cooked foods, notice how the foods that you eat affect your mood, mental and physical health. Especially now that many of us are longing for take-ways meals. If you have lived in chippies, etc, then it is likely that your mood, motivation and energy levels have been low. This is because if our mind and bodies are not fuelled, then cant really go. Add fuel to your body and your mind, and then you will have more energy, motivation, etc. Years ago, they did research that showed that there is a strong link between mental distress and poor nutrition.
So again, be kind. You have only done what you needed to do to survive and cope. As we slowly start getting back to normal life, can you gently bring in healthier options into your life. Even if just for one meal a day – or have healthy snacks instead – nuts, seeds, etc. If before the lockdown, you ate mostly take-outs or convenience foods, notice how eating home food made you feel. As we gradually move down the levels, can you still keep the healthy eating going. What changes do you need to make to your routine to enable this to happen?
How has your mood been over this period? If you have had poor sleep and nutrition, then I am guessing that your mood has not been good either. There are numerous other factors that affect mood – the people in our bubble, the combines stresses, tension and worries about finances, life and the future. The tension of being stuck with each other and no escape. If this is you, again, be kind and gentle on yourself in that this is the mood that can come out of the that situation. You are just human and reacting as a human does. As the situation starts to change as we move down levels, maybe there is more option for you to find ways of finding peace, stillness within the chaos. Start small – even just for one breath a day, or each time you go to the toilet, breathe out and allow yourself to be calm and relaxed, just for that moment. Or when you are in the garden – that is your space to feel connected and safe. Start where you are, and start with what is easy. Yes, your mood is dictated by your environment, and you have the power to the change your mood and attitude.
If your mood has been great over this period, that is wonderful to hear. How can you keep that going into the new life as we come out of levels. What has contributed to your positive mood that you can still do in level 0. How would you know when your mood is dropping and what can you do to bring it back to great.
Socially, how have you engaged with your bubble? Depending on the size of your bubble, have you had any physical contact. If you were in a solo bubble, you didn’t get any physical contact. Touching is essential to our wellbeing and sense of being connected. Or maybe your bubble is not the hugging kind, so even though you were surrounded by people you had no physical contact. And maybe you prefer not having any physical contact. No judgement on right or wrong.
For some being at home with your bubble would have been a breeze, a joy to reconnect with loved ones, to really play with and connect with your children. How do you keep this sense of family going as you get back to work and the children return to school and later sports? What changes can you adopt to stay connected with your bubble, stay interested in your bubble?
For others, being at home with your bubble was probably the hardest part of lockdown. Being in a dysfunctional home, not having the energy or ability to connect with your children, and feeling that you are letting them down. For many parents, you have been so used to be being on automatic and that your needs don’t matter, it is just what the children need, that this is what you did during the last month or forever. Again, whatever you did or did not do, be kind to yourself in that you were doing the best that you could during this time with the tools, skills and resources at hand. What was the one thing that you did with your bubble that you enjoyed or it was okay? Focus on that one thing and see if you can keep that as we move to greater social freedoms.
For many people, what family means or how family interacts is handed down generationally. We learnt this from our parents who learnt it from their parents. Some people have decided to change what they learnt from their upbringings and to be different type of partners at home and different type of parents to their children. My hat off to you if you have changed or broken the dysfunctional pattern or attempted to break to pattern.
What about extended socialising? Yes we have been in our bubbles and not allowed to engage physically with others, but that does not mean that were not able to connect with others. How did you engage? Who did you engage with? Did the engaging with others bring you joy, happiness or add to your burdens and distress? This is about fact gathering in terms of what socialising fills your cup and what drains your cup. This way you can prioritise interactions that fill you when you feeling that your cup is getting low. Or ensure that you do not lose these connections with life gets back to being busy.
Financially, how have coped with lockdown? Finance is not just about the money we have for living, it is also our relationship with money. Obviously, if you are struggling to pay the rent and put food on the table, this is a very scary time. It is about basic survival and that takes priority.
If you are one of those who have lost their job or income, then finances are a massive concern as is when can you go back to looking for a job and what kind of job will you be able to do. This again is about survival for you and your bubble.
If you are one of the fortunate people who have been able to work during the lockdown and have a secure income, then it is noticing your relationship with finances. Are you itching to buy things now that we are in level 3? Does shopping give you a buzz and make you feel alive? Or is shopping just a necessity for you? Again, notice your relationship with spending money or shopping or saving money. If it works for you, great, keep doing it. If you feel that it does not work for you, then what can you do to change it.
To recap
This article and reflection was about stopping and taking stock of where you are psychologically and noticing which areas you are doing well and which areas you want to make changes in. It was able to noticing what worked well for you and your bubble during lockdown and how to take those things forward.
I would like to stress the importance of self-care at all levels of this current crisis and in life in general.