Self-Care is hard

So far my 25 minutes per day of writing has been going well. I’ve been writing during my lunch breaks. Since we are about done for the term at work, I don’t find myself working through my lunch breaks playing catch-up.

Created another savings account

I started creating a savings account for charities and donations. I decided to do an auto-save where I set aside some money to help contribute to causes. This past week I bought some toys for my friend’s homeless project. She’s been doing this for years where she makes gift baskets of comfort items and hygiene products for the homeless. I would like contribute to other causes more often. Ideally I would like volunteer my time, but I think for now contributing through donations is within my bandwidth. Having some money set aside for charities and donations won’t catch me off-guard when a relative is asking me buy something from their kid’s fundraising catalog for marching band because I’ll always have something to give.

Resting should be on my social calendar

Cutting it close with a couple of hours to go in Weekend Coffee Share.

This weekend has been busy we’re packing up for our trip for the following week. Initially, BIL was supposed to watch our dogs while we are out but this morning he said he isn’t able to watch them anymore because he’s going to visit his mom the following weekend. We thought what a weird reason to not take care of the dogs. Can’t he just take them along? MIL lives with SIL who has two dogs. *shakes my head* I don’t get it. We had to ask around to see who is able to take care of our dog. Thankfully one of our friends offered to care for them.

Building up my social calendar

On Saturday, we took Lana out for Trunk-or-Treating at a church. One of our friends invited us out to hang out. It was a lot of fun. And I would say this is Lana’s first trick-or-treat. Last year, we went to the mall and the stores gave out candy. I guess that kind of counts…but if anything we were at the mall for window shopping.

My friend told me that before coming to the Trunk-or-Treat event, she just came from the mall because Macy’s was giving out lego kits The following day, she was going to three Halloween community events. I said, “wow that’s five events in one weekend! You spend your weekends going to community events?!” She was telling me she finds out about the events through newsletters and Facebook groups.

For me, just thinking of her social calendar of it makes me tired. When I worked in senior living, I use to go to a lot of networking events and conferences. I was part of Toastmasters for my professional development. I work really hard in all these arenas and I made sure people recognized it. But then I stopped when I realized all the extra work I was doing was not getting me where I wanted to go. At the time I thought once I got to my destination (aka the promotion), I could finally pursue the “fun” stuff. COVID was a strange blessing for me. All these canceled in-person events allowed me to press the “reset” button on how I want to spend my time.

Don’t get me wrong. I enjoy in-person gatherings. I just want to go for the ones that are meaningful like going to the gym for taking care of myself. Or going to my kid’s dance class because she enjoys dancing. Or joining a parent-child soccer meet-up to see if my kid is interested in learning soccer. Or join a foreign language meetup to practice my foreign language skills. Or volunteer to give back to the community. Or a book club to chat about a book…but most of all, I enjoy rest. I think in order to have optimal energy to do all these things I listed above I would have to give up sugar.

Gifting dog toys

This week I am gifting dog toys to a local dog rescue group.

What I am loving lately? The Finch app.

I like to describe it as a tamogotchi or a nanopet — remember those? It’s a digital pet on a tiny handheld device that you care for through feeding, playing, and bathing. You can even discipline the pet too. Finch is a similar concept but you care for your pet by fulfilling daily self-care goals such as making your bed, organizing a self, donating an item you no longer use, chew food slower, etc. I am surprised how easy it is to keep it up. I do not complete all the daily goals. When I am unable to complete a goal, I simply select “skip goal” and the goal appears on another day. There’s no negative reinforcement in skipping a goal. For now, I am using the free version.

Tags: Weekend Coffee Share

Five things Friday: Self-care activities that make me feel like myself (Parenthood edition)

The other day my supervisor was talking about how she was looking forward to her first vacation with her family in 15 years. She tells me it’s better now that her kids are older — her youngest is a teenager and the other two are of college age. She laments about her time of early motherhood how she felt like she never had time to care for herself — maybe go out for a massage or get her nails done. It made me think about what are things I can do (or have done) to make me feel like myself. As a someone who has previously worked in senior care, it is just as important for the caregiver to take care of themselves. I’ll challenge myself to name five, so here it goes:

1. Going to an in-person exercise class – I know this is lame. A lot of people I know would prefer a massage or a facial, but I enjoy going to an in-person exercise class. I like to sweat it out. Nowadays I spend Monday to Friday exercising to videos at home. Going to an in-person exercise class was a frequent thing I enjoyed going to pre-pandemic and pre-motherhood because it is a place where I meet my friends and meet new ones and we bond over how much that exercise kicked our butts. But now with a kid, going to an in-person exercise class is nice weekend treat.

2. Shopping and window shopping too – I love walking through markets, farmer’s markets, malls, clothing stores, boutiques, etc. I don’t really shop until I drop, I just shop with my eyes. When it comes to having stuff, I try to be intentional as possible.

3. Walking around the neighborhood or a park – You see my self-care involves a lot of wandering. I like to pass by bakeries and restaurants and make lists in my head that I need to go try them out.

4. Working on creative projects – I have plenty of creative projects on the backburner. It’s ranging from re-arranging furniture in the house, doing a photo display around the house, writing on my journal and blog, working on a puzzle, trying a new recipe, etc. Pre-motherhood I would spend a good part of my weekends doing a bunch of small craft projects or trying a new cooking technique. Nowadays I would like to take on bigger (more like rather expensive) projects like working on my kid’s room so she can move out of our room…or making our patio a place to relax. You can never have too many places to lounge and read.

5. Hiring someone to assist with small tasks at home -I know this is more of a treat. I would hire the neighborhood gardener to help maintain and tidy my yard especially when there would be weeks where I can’t keep up.

Mothers, fathers, and other caregivers — what self-care activities do you do to make you feel more like yourself?