Five Things I Remembered About Rest and Self-Care While Recovering from Covid
I have spent the past eight days recovering from Covid, resting on my couch, and spending a lot of time alone with my own brain. Physically, I have been getting tons of rest. Mentally, my brain felt like it was on FIRE, especially for the first couple of days.
I was blaming myself for getting Covid by not wearing a brand new mask last week, worrying about the safety of my husband and friends whom I potentially infected, worrying about the uncertainty around my upcoming travel plans, being sad about missing a friend’s birthday, getting angry about missing a conference where I was scheduled to speak, going on a deep dive of Google searches about long Covid and the elevated risk of heart disease and blood clots. In other words, not being super chill AT ALL.
But, I have also been able to support myself by reminding myself that it is incredibly normal for my brain to be freaking out when I am going through something scary and uncertain. And by remembering that my body is strong and amazing and able to do really cool stuff such as fight off annoying viruses (and that I have given it so much love and support by vaccinating it, hydrating it, and healing my relationships with food, movement, and rest to keep it in its best fighting shape!)
Of course, I didn’t go to 0% anxiety by doing that. But I did get to a place where I had anxiety some of the time AND peace some of the time. Which is pretty amazing and for sure beats pure and uninterrupted panic.
Here are five other things I was reminded of during this experience:
1. Physical Rest Is Not Enough
A racing mind and an overstimulated nervous system feel very UN-restful, even when our bodies are physically resting a ton. Real rest comes from us learning how to regulate our own emotions and calm our own nervous systems. That does not mean brains won’t be brains and won’t sometimes freak out about stuff. But it does mean we can have our brains freaking out AND the ability to take care of ourselves during those freak-outs.
2. Having Coping Tools is Essential
I am super grateful for all of the self-awareness work that I’ve done over the past few years and all of the self-coaching tools that I have learned and practiced. Of course, no amount of self-awareness makes us immune to pain or fear, but having those tools and that awareness alleviates a lot of the additional suffering that would otherwise accompany some of those tougher human experiences.
3. Self-Care Requires More Than Buying a Nice Candle
Real self-care comes from taking care of our emotional well-being and taking care of our own brains and nervous systems. The things that are usually marketed as self-care to us (like getting a pedicure or buying some cool candles) can certainly play a role in that but can never be sufficient without the deeper emotional work.
4. We All Need Someone to Help Us With Our Thinking
Even coaches need coaching. We all sometimes need some external help when it comes to working through the stuff going in our own heads, because we all can see things a lot more clearly when they are not pertaining to us or happening in our own brains. That’s why having someone else to help sort through what is happening in our brains can be incredibly helpful and grounding. I did that yesterday with my own coach and it was amazing, and super restorative!
5. Having an Emotional Support System is the Best
Having an emotional support system is incredible and I am so grateful for mine! Having the love and support of family & friends over the past week was unbelievably helpful! As was having my husband around so we can take care of each other.
Alright, that is it for now. I’m going back to watching some really trashy disaster movies because that’s what feels fun and restorative today.
Is there anything that feels fun and restorative to you? You have my permission (and active encouragement) to go do it!
If you need help giving yourself that permission, let’s talk!
