I'm not going to lie 2022 has felt more overwhelming at times than 2021 did!

Between the state of our climate and the world politically, and how overburdened our hospitals are. Changes are happening all around us. I definitely get overwhelmed by it all at times, as I'm sure many of you do.

So how do I cope? I turn to self-care first and here's why.

You can't fill up someone else's cup from an empty one. The same reasoning behind the rule of putting on your mask before someone else's mask when on a plane. When you aim to fill from the overflow, it allows you to give without depleting yourself. Chronic depletion leads to burnout. If you are here, I see you. Every journey begins with the first step. It's never too late to try again and take that first step.

Layer on your self-care practices involving more than 1 sense, because it magnifies the experience and heightens your cellular memory of the experience. This is game-changer because it helps your body remember to come back to it more often if it was a good experience overall. This helps us build resilience.

These are some of my favourite self-care practices that I turn to DAILY and especially when I'm feeling overwhelmed. They are also practices that are gentle and holistic, making them the perfect medicine for preventing overwhelm from rooting itself into us. I love how self-care can bring us back into our bodies but also helps us get ready to give to others from a more nourished state.

Self-care is a broad topic involving many, many aspects of ourselves and our lives. I won’t be going into all these right now, but know that it is definitely bigger than what you see here. There may be a specific practice that you love that isn't listed here and that's okay! If it makes you feel less overwhelmed and brings you back into your body, congratulations! Keep going!

My Top 5 self-care practices for overwhelm are:

1) Oil Hydration with Body Oiling

In Ayurveda, body oiling is called Abhyanga which translates to mean ‘to oil the body is to love the body’. It's very calming for the nervous system and nourishing for the skin and lymphatics. Oil hydration is just as important to our cells as water hydration. Oils are also essential for nerve cells to effectively fire messages to one another is dependent on lipids to allow the firing along our ganglion fibres running all through our body. When our oil hydration is low, it makes it harder for our nervous system to send messages around the body effectively. We can feel off, anxious, out of sorts, low in the self-love category, have trouble making decisions, or feel distracted.

Body oiling helps me calm my nervous system in a practice that encourages me to express my love to myself, feels sooo good! I wish I would have learned this years ago! It's so simple to sit down with yourself and a body of oil and give yourself a massage. No special or expensive equipment is required, making this a really low-cost thing you can do to support your health in profound ways. Just your hands, oil, and time. This practice can help us to tap into our bodies and how we are feeling at that moment. Helping us to bring softness to our tender areas. Break down that feeling of overwhelm or anxious feelings and replace it with calm and loving feelings with a sense of groundedness that can give you a sense of feeling back in your body.

How to oil?

Choose any oil that you are comfortable with. You can purchase a body oil, or simply start with an oil from your kitchen, such as extra-virgin olive oil, almond oil, or avocado oil to make a basic but effective and nourishing body oil. You can leave it unscented, or feel free to add some essential oils to enjoy the benefits of aromatherapy. You can also infuse herbs into the oil to amplify the benefits of the oil and makes the plant nutrients available to the skin. This is my preferred method for body oils. I make herbal infused oils from different herbs that have benefits for our Lymphatic, Skin, Immune, and Nervous system health, then I scent the oil with essential oils to amplify these benefits and create an enjoyable experience for my sense of smell too!

2) Salt Water Hydration

When you can't be in the ocean…bring the ocean to you and create a nourishing, mineral-rich salt bath!

Right beneath or skin, is most of our lymphatics, which is a salt-rich solution that works to protect the skin, acts as a highway for your immune system, and carries nutrients to your cells as well as takes toxins and waste away. Saltwater is naturally softening to the skin and rich in minerals. Salt actually helps our body absorb water more effectively hydrating us deeper into our tissues.

You may have spotted the instagram (IG) trend of sprinkling a little Himalayan Pink Salt into a glass of water to improve cellular hydration. It is true, it can help for sure. It's an ancient Ayurvedic practice to sprinkle a small pinch of Himalayan pink salt in water before you drink it. I shared on a past blog post about how to make your own electrolyte drink using pink salt, lemon juice, and honey, which is very refreshing. When we aren't making this, we add Nuun tabs to our drinks on hot days or after workouts, or when spending long stretches outside in the sun like when camping. I also find because of my Lymphedema, I am often lower in magnesium than the average person, so this helps me. The Nuun tabs replace the electrolytes without added sugar, which can be great for those avoiding sugar or who have diabetes.

Can’t or don’t want to have a full bath? No problem. Try a hand soak or foot soak instead. Salt softens the skin and helps protect it from infections as well. I love adding herbs and essential oils to my soaks to create sensul experiences and make them smell like a garden or like the forest! Inviting in the plant friends and the aroma is so soothing and grounding. Perfect for fall when we can feel ungrounded with the dry air, and need that extra hydration to protect and restore our skin from the elements.

A beautiful Ayurveda morning ritual is to self-massage with warm oil, let it soak in for 15 min if you can, then have a warm shower or bath (without soap). The water helps the oil soak in deeper. Another way to achieve this with less time on your hands is to add a little oil (1-2 tbsp.) to the salt soak tub and enjoy the benefits of both. Your skin will feel very soft, supple, and moisturized when you get out of the tub. Be careful. The addition of the oil can make the tub slippery!

3) Connect to nature

This can be as simple as appreciating a houseplant or herbs you are growing or finding some dandelions pushing through the cracks in the sidewalk, or going for a city walk and looking for nature on your route, and placing your hand on a nearby tree. Nature is all around us if we look for it. Taking a moment to be present with plants can bring us back into a whole state and reduce our anxiety. Forest bathing therapy, a health practice from Japan called shinrin-yoku, that started in the 1980s to encourage people to spend more time in nature, has been proven to help reduce stress levels, and improve calm, focus, and overall well-being. But the idea of spending time in nature to reduce stress has been a belefi held by our ancestors for many many generations. A quote I love from one of my favourite authors, Robin Wall Kimmerer who wrote the book: Braiding Sweetgrass said ‘the term for plants in many indigenous cultures translates to those who take care of us.’ When we remember to connect with nature, and engage compassionately and lovingly with plants seeing them, smelling them, and walking amongst them. They help fill up our cup within as well as mindful movement in nature is essential for lymphatic health. Go with the flow and create flow.

When there is no flow, there is no glow. Our light inside us literally dims when we are out of flow, stagnant in body or mind. When we feel stuck, anxious, or overwhelmed.

You know that glow you get when you feel happy and relaxed? It's your lymph moving and flowing, bringing fresh prana to your cells! Water is life my friend! Water is the medium of how Prana moves around our body, carrying our emotions and energy altogether.

4) Yoga and Meditation

Yoga is a philosophy with 8 limbs of practice. In the west, we tend to focus on the asanas, which is just 1 limb of the 8 limbs of philosophy. Fascinating, right? Yoga asanas encourage us to mindfully move our bodies in ways that connects our body, mind, and spirit together. It is something I really enjoy for the physical movement and mindful connection with myself. I find it improves my Lymphedema too! Before any yoga session, I take a moment and perform a self-massage sequence to open my Lymph channels and encourage drainage. This is a layering technique I have learned over the years that helps me get the most out of any form of exercise, whether it's a walk, bike ride, aquafit class, or time on my yoga mat.

5) Journaling

I know this practice helps so much, from all the evidence around it to trying it personally myself. But I have to admit, I have trouble sticking with it, or remembering, or making time like i'm sure many of you do.

This is especially true when I'm feeling overwhelmed, but it is often the thing that I need most at that moment that I resist! Have you ever found that? Does that happen to you too? I get on a good streak and then fall off again. I used to be so hard on myself when I broke my streak, but I'm working on practicing self-compassion and focusing on getting my streaks longer and not beating myself up when I break my streaks. I'm choosing to 'find the good' as I often tell my kids and I am practicing it here. When we give ourselves grace and space, it allows us the freedom to try again and love ourselves through it all.

The last month I’ve been on a good streak tracking my daily habits in a morning and evening self-care journal. I absolutely love it! It’s given me great insights into my whole self from moods, foods, impact of sleep, hydration, and stress that ultimately affect my lymphedema and my whole self. I’ve got some great ideas brewing on how to tweak the format to make it more inclusive of Lymphatic Wellness too! I think this could be a great tool for myself and maybe for others too!

I’m also hoping to read or listen to the audio version of James Clear’s Atomic Habits book over the Christmas Break! I’ve heard some of the quotes from it and it sounds like it might be very helpful in establishing and understanding how we create habits that work and ones we stick to. Would you like to join me in chatting about this book? Let me know!

Tell me which practice resonates with you. Which ones are you including in your daily/seasonal rhythms already?

Best, Amy

xo