I’m taking a bit of a break between episodes of Shiny Happy People. I started editing the second episode reaction post but had to stop and focus on something more low-key and tedious, like optimizing the older posts. The second episode post should still be published “on schedule” whatever that is. I did say that they’d come out every couple days and I think today marks day 1 so I got time. At least that’s what I’m telling myself. In the meantime, I feel like it would be helpful to all of us to take a moment and learn some self-care and grounding techniques. The inspiration for this post is hidden. I’m trying to do a reverse recipe post where the boring personal stuff is still upfront, but you have to click on this paragraph to read the fluff.
This little hiatus didn’t really have anything to do with my mental health initially but today it sure does! I’m blessed to have summers off and my wife works from home on Mondays so she let me sleep in a little today. I woke up in a weird depressive funk where I didn’t want to get out of bed but I wasn’t really a sad sack like I normally feel when depressed. I felt like nothing was holding me back but yet, I just couldn’t get up.
Finally, I decided that a good shower and some coffee may kick my butt in gear so I rolled out of bed, took two steps only to collapse into bed again. Bless my wife, she had been slaving away at her desk with nothing but my snoring to listen to. She’s a podcast girlie and my sleep noises are probably terrible content.
Anyways, I collapsed and my mind took me back to campus and replayed scene after scene of getting shot at with paint balls. I had a phenomenal cry as my wife consoled me with a blanket and head rubs. I eventually remarked that I have no idea where this came from.
So, what is self-care?
To me, self-care is taking a moment to make sure that your needs are being met. Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs is a fairly well-known concept typically found in any intro to psychology class at university. In the education world, the buzzword “Maslow’s before Bloom’s” crops up a lot in professional development. Bloom has a taxonomy of educational objectives (students will remember, analyze, evaluate, blah blah blah) and teachers are reminded that it’s really hard for kids to learn when they are hungry, sleepy, feel like their environment is not safe, and so on. In other words, we can only really operate in self-actualization (of which learning is included) when all of the previous needs are met.
Self-care is critical when life seems to get out of control. I don’t know about you, but I’ve felt like life has been out of control for years. We live in crazy times so it’s not hard for us to get thrown off our groove. For example, my summer arc was supposed to be all about getting projects done around the house and in my classroom. Since the docuseries came out, I haven’t been able to fall asleep before 1 AM and I am eating only one meal a day. It’s almost 1 PM when I’m writing this and I still haven’t eaten today. To contrast, I religiously go to bed around 10 PM and eat 3 meals a day.
As for techniques, I have a great image and some potential links, but I’m waiting to hear back from the creator so I can get permission for the image. I’ll update soon. In the meantime:
Grounding
I should make a post about the traumatized brain. It is truly remarkable what happens to our brains when we are traumatized. We’ve all experienced anxiety, intense anger, and stress at some point in our lives. When we experience these emotions strongly, our brains can shut down. My university instructors would describe it as getting stuck in our medulla oblongata or our lizard brain. Our fight/flight/freeze response triggers and we can go into some sort of auto-pilot looking to get our physiological and safety needs met. We say that we are escalated when we’re in this zone. The dangers here are that we can lose sight of where who and where we are. We feel lost, adrift with no lifeline, or stuck in some sort of tunnel.
The opposite of escalation is getting our brains operating in the pre-frontal cortex. The pre-frontal cortex is responsible for higher, abstract thinking. It is critical for critical thinking and it is what helps us assess the situation and make wise decisions. This part of our brain doesn’t start developing until we are around 16 years old but doesn’t finish developing until our mid-twenties. Going back to Maslow, the pre-frontal cortex operates more in the esteem and actualization levels. When we’re escalated, our neurons don’t engage the pre-frontal cortex. The point of grounding is to get our amygdala (it controls the fight/flight) to relinquish control and get us back to thinking in our pre-frontal cortex.
Grounding Techniques
One commentor offered what has worked for them over the years.
Here are some grounding techniques that have worked well for me over the years…
1. Holding an ice cube in my hand
2. Laying down on the floor
3. Placing a hand over my heart and telling myself out loud “it’s okay, you’re safe now”
4. 4-7-8 breathing (inhaling for 4 counts, holding at the top for 7 counts, exhaling for 8 counts
The counseling department in my high school has a poster that offers a pretty good countdown for grounding and getting you back in tune with your surroundings.
Hopefully these tips help. What are some things you’ve found successful in grounding yourself?