Self care: What it is, and what it isn’t…

Whenever the phrase ‘self care’ gets mentioned, I feel like many people use it to justify unhealthy habits, because it makes them feel good in the moment. How many times have you gone to the shops, browsed the chocolate section and thought ‘Oh I’ll treat myself’. That, dear reader, is not self care.

My point highlighted by this skit I remember watching years ago on YouTube…

Self care, particularly for those who have mental health difficulties, is something more basic. As someone who has gone through depressive episodes themselves, in particularly bad spots I would not shower for days at a time, and a lack of appetite would leave me starving myself in bed. In that instant, self care was about doing the basic human things that most of us do on any given day…

In my opinion, and it is only my opinion so please feel free to disagree/agree in the comments below, self care is about doing right by you. If you’re introverted, self care is about taking time to be with yourself to recharge your human batteries. If you’re someone with a long-term condition, that results in aches and pains, maybe self care is regularly taking hot baths to ease those symptoms. You are taking care of yourself. Period.

This isn’t to say that people should not treat themselves every once in a while! Being kind to yourself, especially if you’ve been working hard or going through a rough patch lately, is something we should all do. However, it’s when that ‘treat mentality’ becomes an excuse to avoid work, or to justify doing damage to yourself for the sake of hedonistic, impulsive recklessness, that I disagree with.