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Hey Yall -
Last year around this time I had a bit of a breakdown. This year is even more stressful, so I'm taking some precautions to try and prevent that from happening again. I want to share some of those things here at the very least to encourage others to prep
Last year around this time I had a bit of a breakdown. This year is even more stressful, so I'm taking some precautions to try and prevent that from happening again. I want to share some of those things here at the very least to encourage others to prep
I am by NO means a therapist or an expert. I'm just a dude with depression and anxiety. So I'm not giving you a list of things to do, but more a list of shit that I'm doing. You should make your own list.
1) I'm increasing my therapy visits. Usually do every other week but I'm moving to weekly. Honestly, at the moment that may feel like overkill, but it's good to have that in practice before things go wrong.
2) I've got several "happy lights" at my desk. These are certainly not a silver bullet, but in a place like Michigan (it is grey outside from now until late march) it helps you feel somewhat normal.
3) I got out of frequent exercise practice during the summer (in part because of how often I was able to be outside moving around). I'm restarting a low stakes exercise schedule to make sure I'm scheduled to move around a lil bit daily and more strenuous a few times per week.
4) Cutting down my workload. Work is infinite. I work very hard. It's fine for me to scale back a little bit to rest up a bit. That means pretty firm start and stop times daily and no work on weekends.
5) Cutting down on caffeine. I LOVE coffee. Sometimes the only thing getting me out of bed. But it's also pretty clear it doesn't help with overall anxiety and depression. Cap at 2 cups a day.
6) Buying lots of microwave/quick meals. I love cooking, but the things I cook take time and when i'm down I often don't eat because I don't want to spend the time cooking. Nice to be able to just nuke a trader joes meal and eat that
7) I have a text loop of supportive folk that I check in with daily (like there's concern if I don't check in). That way I don't go very long spiraling alone if I spiral.
8) No phone in the bedroom. No doomscrolling at night.
9) Beefing up some of my hobbies. Writing more jokes, committing to more open mics, starting and hosting a trivia series, screenprinting. Things that I like doing that are fun and semi-public.
and 10) continuing to be open about how I'm feeling. Important both to break down barriers about discussions of mental health and to help me process.
That's it. Go make your own list of 10 things. Do it before the time changes!
