Inhabiting My Body
A note to the reader: This post contains references to and descriptions of my struggle with mental health issues, chronic illness, and surgery. Some readers may find this content upsetting.
Dear friend,
My body is not always a comfortable place to inhabit.
Ever since I had my first panic attack at around the age of 7, I have struggled to feel safe in my own skin. Since then I have battled chronic illnesses and various mental health issues.
When I really think about it, I can’t remember the last time I felt truly well.
I always want to laugh when someone asks me how I am for the sake of making small talk. I want to laugh because I’m tempted to be honest, and I know that most people I interact with in my daily life don’t want to hear the truth. Still, it’s rare that I meet this innocent and well-meaning question with a big smile and a resounding, “Great!”.
Instead, I say that I’m “OK”. Because I am OK. I’m alive, and I am doing my best.
Over the years, I feel as though I have become more and more disconnected from my body. I have shunned my body, verbally abused it, wished for a different one. I have felt ugly, small, broken. So often I find myself huddled into the small corners of my body, trying—often unconsciously—to escape. There’s something so vulnerable about just existing.
During the summer of 2021, in the midst of a major depressive episode, I underwent a long-awaited surgery that turned out to be the most traumatic experience of my life. I was sent home from the hospital in Boston without the proper instructions or supplies to care for myself. For an entire week I experienced one panic attack after another. I was convinced that I was going to die. When I finally healed, I found that the surgery had not accomplished what the doctors hoped it would. The autoimmune disorder the surgery was trying to correct has had a significant effect on my mental health for the past several years, and the heartbreak of coming out on the other side of this surgery only to feel like I endured all that pain and fear for nothing was unspeakable.
This (ongoing) experience showed me that mental health and physical health are completely intertwined. Any doctor will tell you: Take care of yourself physically, and your mental health will improve.
But what about those of us who cannot heal ourselves with a healthy lifestyle? We eat the “right” foods, we exercise often, we take every opportunity to breathe fresh air and soak up sunlight. But still, we are sick. Still, we are depressed and anxious.
I’m 27 years old. I still want my mother every day. On the days when I am feeling my worst, I want her to come over and take care of me and hug me and tell me that everything will be okay. But my mother cannot always be here for me.
I am incredibly lucky to have a mother who answers the phone when I call, who makes me laugh, who drives me to Boston for my medical appointments. But the biggest challenge of my life has been figuring out how to care for myself in the way she cared for me when I was younger. Constant hugs, words of encouragement, gentle patience. We often assume that these things can only be given to us by someone else. It’s very easy to forget how to care for ourselves beyond getting out of bed in the morning, feeding ourselves, remembering to call the dentist.
Self-care is something we can do every single minute of every single day, whether we are in a work meeting or shopping for groceries or winding down to go to bed. You don’t have to book a massage or a spa day. Self-care can be incredibly simple and cost nothing at all. There are a million and one ways to implement small self-care practices into your daily routine. Really, what it all comes down to is what you need (or want) in any given moment. Give it to yourself. Heck, self-care can be (and often is, for me) french fries! Listen to your body. What does it need? What would make it (and you) happy right now?
I’m still learning how to nurture myself through dark moments. Self-care is a skill that we might spend our entire lives practicing and yet never master. Our society does not value self-care. It actively thwarts our attempts to tune into our bodies and practice gentle self-compassion. We are swept along in the current of daily life: Work harder in order to pay the bills in order to survive. We work to live and live to work. I often wonder what the world would look like if we could have our basic needs met for free. A roof over our heads, food on the table. Radical, right? Some might even say, unreasonable. Certainly the world would be a brighter, more colorful place. There would be more time to make art and foster human connections. But wouldn’t we all be a little healthier, too? If we could slow down?
In this series, I will be sharing some practices that are at the heart of my self-care practice. I am not a therapist or doctor. I am not a “self-care expert” (and I doubt there’s any such thing!). I’m just a woman who has experienced the lowest of lows and has—somehow—come out on the other side.
As we make our way through the holiday season towards a new year, I hope that sharing my experience and my own practice will help you build a self-care practice that works for you. Three specific (albeit challenging) practices have been vital to my own self-care journey:
Learning to inhabit my body,
slowing down, and
letting go.
This three step plan is only the beginning of a life’s work, and it may not be a good fit for everyone. Remember to do what feels right for you. You know best.
In this series, I will only touch the surface of my struggle with chronic illness and mental health. It’s a deeply personal journey that I do not share with everyone I meet. I also cannot share the full extent of my self-care practice—because there are so many little things I do for myself from one day to the next (and some of them are just plain silly!). But I hope you will follow along with me as I practice, at your own speed, modifying as needed. I’d love to hear what works for you!
The first step—one I need to revisit several times every single day—is embodiment. Being conscious of every muscle, every nerve ending, from my fingertips to my toes. Grounding myself within my body, and to the earth. Just existing, as I am. It’s an important precursor to what we will be practicing in the coming weeks.
I want to note that, while I do suffer from chronic illness, I am able-bodied. As you read on, please keep in mind that I can only speak to my experience as an able-bodied person.
Here are some ways I inhabit my body when I am feeling distanced from it:
A full-body stretch, from the crown of the head to the tips of the fingers and toes. Feel the space within. Make yourself as tall and as wide as you can. If you’re my sister, this will probably be accompanied by a pterodactyl screech (sorry, Sissy!).
“Wringing out” my arms and legs. Give yourself a firm massage, as if you are squeezing water out of yourself. This is very grounding and gets the blood circulating.
Breathing exercises. Square breathing is great for anxiety. More on this in the next post…
Drinking hot tea. You know this one!
Soaking my feet. Fill a basin with the hottest water you can stand (or the coldest!) and some nice, sudsy bath soap. Soak your feet for an hour. Afterwards, massage your feet with lotion and slip into some very warm socks.
Holding myself. A big part of my self-care practice is holding space for my inner child, for her traumas and wounds, and for her lingering fears. I won’t delve into inner child work here, because this practice is different for everyone, and because it deserves its own blog post–and perhaps its own blog series–but this practice of holding oneself in a gentle, warm way is so powerful. Child’s pose is great for this exercise. Hold yourself as if you were a small child or a cuddly pet. Squeeze tight–but allow yourself to breathe!--and feel the warmth spread from your chest throughout your arms and legs. It might feel good to rock back and forth, whisper kind words to yourself, or simply tell yourself, “Everything is going to be okay. You are doing the best you can.” (This is also a good time to cry, if you need to.)
Guess what? Everything is going to be okay. You are doing the best you can. What do you need right now? Maybe you need to curl up in bed with your cat and rewatch your favorite movie. Go ahead! That’s self-care.
My body is a place I inhabit. It’s not who I am, but it’s part of me. I want to learn to exist within it, with compassion.
If we can learn to exist fully within our bodies, maybe we can begin to look after ourselves in ways that will help us heal physically and emotionally.
Little by little.
Gently.
Until next time,
Take care.
