When Self-Care isn’t Enough

“I’m doing everything I normally do for self-care and it still isn’t enough.” I’ve said some variation of this countless times in the last month.

My self-care game is normally really good. Through much trial and error, I’ve figured out what works for me and typically prioritize self-care. Even in this wretched year, I’ve managed to do both the self-care that requires effort (like daily walks, regular workouts, and a healthy diet—as long as migraine doesn’t interfere) and the smaller things that I can incorporate into everyday life. That kept me on a relatively even keel. Until about a month ago.

With the election and its aftermath and the surge in COVID cases, I’ve been a bundle of stress. Despite continuing all my self-care activities, it didn’t feel like enough. In fact, sometimes the self-care itself was stressful.

When I told my therapist that all I was doing wasn’t enough and that my self-care was adding stress, she steered me toward radical acceptance. That is, accepting what is for what it is. No matter how distressing it is, no matter how much I want things to be different, to remind myself that what is happening is happening and all the angsting in the world can’t change it. It’s such a simple concept and an incredibly difficult task.

Thinking about human behavior and puzzling through why people do the things they do is a fundamental part of who I am. And it has been working against me. Trying to understand people’s rationalizations and lack of critical thinking when it comes to politics and COVID hasn’t helped me understand the world in a constructive way. Instead, it has broken my heart.

So I’m practicing setting aside a part of what makes me who I am. Just for a while. Because I can’t radically accept what is happening if my mind is in a constant knot, trying to figure out why people are making decisions that I cannot fathom. And trying to fathom those decisions? I’m also working on not doing that.

Acceptance has been critical for me to cope with chronic migraine. And I’ve learned to apply it to many other situations in my life. But I hadn’t thought to apply it to 2020 even though it has the hallmarks of a situation where acceptance is essential—major, life-changing problems that I have almost no control over. (Note the “almost” in the previous sentence. Despite accepting that I have migraine, I never stopped trying to find relief. The same is true for social and political problems. Acceptance and working toward change can coexist.)

In the 10 days since I began working on radical acceptance of the current state of America, I’m doing better. My stress is lower, my angst is less, and even my migraine attacks are more typical. I’m still angry and sad, but I’m not overwhelmed. Right now, that feels like a win.