120. Mental Health Habits to Decrease Emotional Vulnerability & Sustain Recovery

 
 

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Today's solo episode is all about mental health habits! I discuss how the principles in James Clear's Atomic Habits can be applied to mental health, using habits to decrease emotional vulnerability, the PLEASE skill + investing in physical health to support your mental health, the nonnegotiable habits I do on a daily basis, the importance of habit tracking, and habits to break ASAP.

Mentioned In The Episode…

+ Atomic Habits

+ Atomic Habits summary

+ Atomic Habits summary 2

+ Lifestyle Habits and Mental Health in Light of the Two COVID-19 Pandemic Waves in Sweden, 2020

+ Morning Microdose

+ Ep. 106 feat. Dr. Judy Ho

SHOP GUEST RECOMMENDATIONS: https://amzn.to/3A69GOC

Episode Sponsor

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About She Persisted (formerly Nevertheless, She Persisted)

After a year and a half of intensive treatment for severe depression and anxiety, 18-year-old Sadie recounts her journey by interviewing family members, professionals, and fellow teens to offer self-improvement tips, DBT education, and personal experiences. She Persisted is the reminder that someone else has been there too and your inspiration to live your life worth living.



a note: this is an automated transcription so please ignore any accidental misspellings!

[00:00:00] Sadie: Welcome to She Persisted. I'm your host, Sadie Sutton, a 19 year old from the Bay Area studying psychology at the University of Penn. She Persisted is the Teen Mental Health Podcast made for teenagers by a teen. In each episode, I'll bring you authentic, accessible, and relatable conversations about every aspect of mental wellness.

[00:00:19] You can expect evidence-based, teen approved resources, coping skills, including lots of D B T insights and education in. Each piece of content you consume, she persisted, Offers you a safe space to feel validated and understood in your struggle, while encouraging you to take ownership of your journey and build your life worth living.

[00:00:37] So let's dive in this week on She persisted.

[00:00:42] Hello. Hello. Welcome back to She Persisted. I'm so excited for today's episode. You guys voted on Instagram and we're very excited to hear about today's topic, which is mental health habits.

[00:00:53] You've probably heard me say this before, but I really do firmly believe that a lot of what goes into having good mental health or being successful in your mental health journey is preventative work and laying a foundation and groundwork. That allows you to be successful, keeps you on a positive trajectory, and sets you up for success even when your mental health is at a lower point.

[00:01:17] I think , learning new skills and mastering new coping skills and behaviors and habits and ways of rewiring our thought patterns. All of these things we do to improve our mental health are great things, but they're very challenging to learn and implement when you are in crisis mode and when you are actively struggling.

[00:01:34] If we can learn these skills, when our mental health is in a better state, it makes things easier on us, and then we can implement them when we really do need them. So when our mental health is struggling, we really don't wanna be learning, mastering, and implementing skills at the same time, we wanna make things as easy for ourselves as possible which means making mental health habits and good mental health habits, really second nature. So you can just go into autopilot mode and do what you know works to get yourself out of a low point. And again, keep yourself on that upwards trajectory.

[00:02:07] We're starting today's episode with some little tidbits and pieces of wisdom from Atomic Habits, which if you haven't read before, I highly recommend, It's not necessarily a mental health book, but it is a book all about mastering habits and behaviors and routines. And I do feel like a lot of things related to mental health are related to shifting behaviors, shifting habits, and ways that we cope with things a lot of the times, our behaviors and habits.

[00:02:32] So whether that is thought patterns, whether that is urges. Whether that is the ways that we respond in relationships, whether that is things like self harm, disordered eating, and even healthier habits that we are trying to implement, like a good sleep schedule or a balanced diet or being connected or staying on top of our self care use.

[00:02:51] Things are all habits, and so the scientific principles in this book apply there as well. So there are two quotes that I wanna give you from this book. I'm going to explain one principle that I think is super helpful to know, and then explain a really brief summary, the ideas, and then that will be the Atomic Habits portion.

[00:03:11] But I think it's a great foundation to have in this episode. So the first quote that I love is that habits are the compound interest of self-improvement. So the idea here is that the more you invest in yourself, the more you work on self-improvement, the growth compounds and it improves over time, and it truly just. Improves exponentially. And this is both objectively true with building a habit or mastering a skill like running a marathon. And subjectively true in things like coping with emotions that arise or challenging situations.

[00:03:42] And so there's a this really amazing chart within atomic habits that breaks down what would happen if you improve 1% every single day. If you were to get 1% better every single day for a year, you would be at 37.78% better. Because the compound interest is there, But if you were to get 1% worse every day for the entire year, you would be at 0.03%.

[00:04:08] So the goal is to make these baby steps, make these tiny shifts and changes so that you are on that upward trajectory and you are working towards the point that you wanna be short term, long term, and achieving your goals. So to summarize the book in three sentences, I would link the article that I got this from because while I have read this book, they summed this up so nicely.

[00:04:31] So I wanted to give you this little summary and I'll link the source in the show notes. So an atomic habit is a regular practice or routine that is not only small and easy to do, but is also the source of incredible power, a component of the system of compound growth. Bad habits repeat themselves again and again.

[00:04:49] Not because you don't want to change, but because you have the wrong system for change. I love that, especially for mental health. If you are feeling like you are at an absolute rut with your ability to. Think differently about situations and experience different emotions in response to challenges you're facing, or use different skills when you are presented with a difficult moment restructuring how you approach that and being like, I don't want to change enough, which probably isn't the case, but you don't have the system for change.

[00:05:20] You don't have the toolbox and the support system and the the knowledge to able to make those shifts in a way that is effective and sustainable. And the third sentence is changes that seem small and unimportant at first will compound into remarkable results if you're willing to stick with them for years. I know you're probably like years, like I know we're building habits, but that seems really long term, especially with regards to mental health

[00:05:43] And this is where I love to bring in the idea of thoughts and the way that you process through emotions, the way that you speak to yourself, if you can make small shifts in the way that you think about yourself and your self-esteem, and the way that you go about things. Whether you're approaching them from a more emotion, anxiety, fear, shame based perspective versus more logical problem solving, validating.

[00:06:09] Self-empowerment perspective. If you can make tiny shifts in your thoughts, think about how much of an impact that will have years from now, not only with how you speak to yourself and process through things, but also your self-esteem, the way you view yourself, the way you show up in relationships, your confidence.

[00:06:26] All of these things that we, we want to improve. So that is the book In three sentences, there are five big ideas within the book. The first habits are the compound interest of self-improvement. Second, if you want better results, then forget about setting goals, focus on your system.

[00:06:42] Third, the most effective way to change your habits is to focus not on what you want to achieve, but who you wish to become. So if your mental health goal was to have less panic attacks, you would kind of reframe that and be like, I would like to be the kind of person who handles my anxiety with confidence and a sense. Competency and I feel capable of handling and processing through and validating my emotions as they arise and not feeling like they control.

[00:07:11] Fourth, the four laws of behavior change are simple set rules we can use to build better habits. They are make it obvious, make it attractive, make it easy, and make it satisfying. So those have to be involved to make any great habit. We'll kind of break that down more, but those are essential in creating a new habit.

[00:07:29] And fourth environment is the invisible hand that shapes human behavior. We'll talk a lot more about environment in this episode, but I also like to add here not only your physical environment, Like if your goal is to get in bed earlier, maybe you put your phone in a different room and you make your bed a really amazing calming place, and you put a book that you like to read next to your beds, you're motivated to get into bed.

[00:07:52] That's one example of an environment. But we can also think of our mental environment or our emotional environment or our social media environments. All of these things could also be defined as environments, and you can use that to shape and turn your behavior. So the last kind of outside source that I want to mention as context here of why habits are so important and what an impact they can have on mental health is a study that was done in 2020 in Sweden.

[00:08:16] They looked at the two different covid 19 surges. And this is a little piece from their abstract, they said negative changes in lifestyle habits and more time in a mentally passive state sitting at home. Were associated with higher odds of mental ill health, including health anxiety regarding one's own, and relative's health, generalized anxiety and depression symptoms and concerns regarding employment and economy.

[00:08:40] These results emphasize the need to support healthy lifestyle habits, to strengthen the resilience of in vulnerable groups.

[00:08:46] And I think that was really cool to highlight. Obviously this is a different vulnerable population. People that are struggling with Covid are more at risk, but I think if we think about this from a mental health perspective, people that are at risk for experiencing mental health issues or have a history of mental health issues, were currently experiencing mental health challenges.

[00:09:04] or an at risk vulnerable group. And so if we can use healthy habits and a healthy lifestyle to decrease that vulnerability, increase that resilience, that can be a really powerful shift to make and a a somewhat simple one. So I have touched on this a little bit, but I like to include thoughts, urges, and coping skills as habits.

[00:09:25] I did an episode talking about suicidal ideation and how every time you're engaging in that thought or that urge, you are building that habit and reinforcing the relationship of stress and kind of like self soothing yourself with that outlet. And so I think that's a very relevant, interesting perspective to add into this episode is that, We can think of thoughts and urges and coping skills, which a lot of the times are things that really do impact our mental health in a very direct way as habits. And every time we engage in a negative thought or we engage in an urge that is an ineffective coping skill, or we use a healthy way of coping to navigate an emotional situation, you're either building a habit or breaking a habit, and so you could be building a healthy habit. You could be strengthening an unhealthy habit, which means it's harder to move away from having that thought or engaging in that urge, or using that unhealthy coping skill. Or you could be engaging in a healthy habit and at the same time breaking that reinforced unhealthy coping scale thought urge, et cetera.

[00:10:27] And that is something that helps me with shifting behaviors when I'm struggling with the motivation. I think a good example here is like exercise. If I'm like, I don't wanna go to the gym, like I just don't want to. It's a lot of work. It's a lot of energy. There are two different ways to frame it that I've found to be effective.

[00:10:43] One is what we mentioned, which is thinking about the type of person you want to be instead of thinking about the goal you want to pursue. So it's like I wanna be the kind of person that feels healthy and happy and motivated and exercises and has a healthy lifestyle. And then the other thing is reminding myself if I go to the gym, I'm building this healthy habit of exercising.

[00:11:04] I'm breaking the habit of not exercising or if I don't go to the gym, I'm building the habit and making it more difficult to, in the future exercise. So I like kind of think of it as adding tallies to two different columns. Am I reinforcing a good habit or am I reinforcing a bad habit?

[00:11:20] And either way, you are impacting those trajectories.

[00:11:23] I know that so many of you guys are high school and college students, you're probably in peak midterm season right now, which means you have to be as productive and focused as possible to get the best use of your time because your schedules are probably insane, and I totally get it. My biggest hack has been Magic Mind.

[00:11:39] You might have heard me talk about them before. But it's great because I can get the energy and focus that I need without having like six cups of coffee and being overwhelmed with anxiety. It has a ton of natural ingredients. My favorite is maa. I have never been able to get myself to drink Maha Lattes.

[00:11:56] I know they're better for you. I know your body absorbs maa. Better than it does coffee. I know that it adds less anxiety, but I just cannot get over the taste, and that's why I love Magic Mind because it's like a little juice shot. So rather than drinking an entire giant cup of maa or going through the whole process of making that, every morning you drink a magic mind shot with your normal cup of coffee, and you get the benefits of the added energy focused productivity without multiple cups or sources of caffeine.

[00:12:23] So if you're looking for that boost of energy to help you get through finals and midterm season and just all of the work that we are all balancing, you should definitely check out Magic Mind. You can go to magic mind.co/, She persisted a.

[00:12:34] Or use code. She persisted at checkout to get 40% off your subscription for the next 10 days. Again, that is 40% off your subscription for the next 10 days with code, she persisted.

[00:12:47] So from A D B T perspective, and if you've never heard that before, it stands for dialectical behavioral therapy, and that is the kind of therapy that I did a lot of during my time in treatment.

[00:12:56] I found it super helpful and the biggest part of D B T I would say is the skills education. There's all these skills to help you navigate any and every challenge you could experience with regards to your mental health. One of the habits in the emotion regulation module is the police skill and to boil it down, you are taking care of your mind by taking care of your body.

[00:13:17] And to take it a step further, I think the police skill really works to decrease your emotional vulnerability. And if you're not familiar with emotional vulnerability, it's things like not sleeping well and being really grumpy. It is being hangry. It is things like having an argument with someone and then trying to go into another interaction. It's already being anxious or depressed or exhausted, and then trying to show up to a situation.

[00:13:43] It's kind of. Your emotional capacity to navigate a situation and when we're not sleeping well, when we're not eating, when we're having relationship challenges, when we ourselves are struggling with our mental health, our emotional capacity is impacted, and therefore our emotional vulnerability is increased.

[00:13:59] You're more vulnerable to experiencing these intense emotions and having a more difficult time coping with them. The Please Skill is an acronym, but it's not a perfect acronym. Like, Please, the PL is physical Illness. It's not perfect, but it's a good acronym and the rest of it is perfect.

[00:14:18] So if you're like, that was not the correct number of letters that match up with the words, that's the disclaimer. So the first thing, treat physical illness. You are taking your meds, you are going to the doctor if you are sick, you are taking rest when you need to. You're not going and like pushing through final season and studying like crazy when you're also sick and like not at your best.

[00:14:42] The next part of the skill is balanced eating. So this means that you are staying on a balanced diet.

[00:14:49] You are getting all the nutrients that you need, You are eating regularly, you are not restricting or overeating, and you are avoiding things like being hangry, which can also impact your emotional vulnerability. The A is avoiding mood altering substances, obviously we know that certain substances impact our mood.

[00:15:05] One that I like to remind people of here, which they don't always think of, is caffeine. Caffeine impacts our mood, and especially for me very early on in my mental health journey, whenever I would like have even one cup of coffee, it'd be so much more anxious, my thoughts would be racing. Difficult to kind of stay on top of that anxiety.

[00:15:22] So being mindful of what different substances impact your mood and how they impact your mood and how that might be impacting your emotional vulnerability. For example, you have a really big test that you're super anxious about and you know that it's the first thing in the morning. Maybe you won't have a double shot latte, maybe you won't have a latte with like double espresso because you're gonna be already anxious and then adding a.

[00:15:49] Huge amount of caffeine probably won't help that. You'll be super jittery and overwhelmed and again anxious. The S is for sleep. This means getting seven to nine hours of sleep a night and making sure that you are sticking to your sleep hygiene protocol. If you're not familiar with that.

[00:16:05] It's just a very fancy way of saying having good habits surrounding your sleep. So trying to go to sleep around the same time every night, getting up at the same time every day within one or two hours of that, that time that you decide to get up. It means unplugging before bed, which I of course struggle to do.

[00:16:21] It means not napping for extensive amounts of time during the day, not drinking caffeine, super late at night. Having a night routine and a morning routine that kind of help you get ready for bed and then wake up in the morning and like signal to your body, like, Okay, time to get up. This is time to be alert and energetic and not sleepy.

[00:16:40] So that is sleep. For me, this has been the most important factor with regards to my emotional vulnerability. My sleep has been quite the journey. I did a sleep study this summer. I'm just now kind of starting to get to a point where I'm feeling really good about my sleep routine for the first time in a couple of years, and when I was in residential at Three East, which is the D B T program, I went to.

[00:17:01] I noticed an intense in scene shift when I was not sleeping well and napping throughout the day and staying up all night, versus when I was. Using all of my sleep hygiene protocol skills, doing as much as I could to fall asleep as early as possible, waking up at the same time every day, and then avoiding napping.

[00:17:23] It was like I went from being suicidally depressed and overwhelmed to then waking up in the morning and not immediately being depressed, which was night and day. It was a game changer, and it was all because of sleep, we know that there are so many studies on sleep about its impact with mental health and emotional vulnerability, and when you're sleep deprived for extended period of times, you develop different symptoms of mental illnesses and all of these different things.

[00:17:46] It's very, very important. And if there is anything that you're doing habit wise for your mental health, sleep is a great place to start the E in the police scale is getting exercise. I like to aim for some kind of movement every day, and that probably most days will mean walking. I am on my workout grind.

[00:18:04] Recently, I've been doing like three days of the gym a week, which was not an easy process to get to. This has been a New Year's resolution that I'm still like solidifying, but I'm very proud of that habit that I'm. But trying to get in some movement. We know that exercising releases endorphins. It'll make it easier for you to sleep.

[00:18:22] It'll boost your mood. So get walking, get outside, work out. If you can make it fun, go on walk with a friend. But that's another thing that can help improve your emotional vulnerability. So a lot of the parts of this acronym can be maintained and kind of put on autopilot, if you will, through habits.

[00:18:39] So if you have the same night routine every day, if you go to bed at the same time every day, if you wake up at the same time every day, if you have the same morning routine, if you then have the same cup of coffee and don't. Have too much caffeine after that. If you do the same workout certain days of the week and are walking other days of the week, and you have a pretty consistent diet and eating schedule that you stick to, and you are really great about taking care of your physical health and taking breaks when you need it, like if all of those are s.

[00:19:03] Sustained habits that you are doing without a second thought. You are in a really great place with your mental health foundation. You're in a really great place and maintaining and reducing your emotional vulnerability. So I just wanna flag that. I wanna say that if you are at a loss of like, Okay, I wanna have a foundation of habits, I don't know where I'm currently.

[00:19:25] Look at the police scale. Where are you kind of, how are you showing up with regards to each of those pillars? Physical illness, eating, mood, altering substances, sleep and exercise. How can you improve that? And I truly do believe if you're staying on top of those things, you're in a really good spot. So now we're gonna kind of talk about what has worked for me.

[00:19:42] We're gonna talk about habits that I do every single day. We're then gonna talk about habits that I did in early recovery, like when I was still struggling with depression, when I was still struggling with anxiety, when I was just newly forming these habits. And then we're gonna talk about habits to work, to break, to improve your mental health.

[00:19:58] And we'll wrap up, but that's kind of the, the plan from here. So we have a lot. A foundation about why habits are important, what habits you can focus on, how they impact mental health and emotional vulnerability. And then now we're gonna talk about what's worked for me. So when I think about the habits that I do every single day, I tend to think about my morning and night routine.

[00:20:16] When I wake up in the. I probably snooze. That would be a habit I should break because I know it's not good for my sleep, but I just love snoozing. But I wake up, I get my alarm, I make my bed, which is a new habit I've built this year. I'm now a great bed maker. Every single day my bed is made. I'm so proud of that.

[00:20:32] So I make my bed. I put on my slippers. I wash my face, I brush my teeth, and then I will probably make my coffee. And depending on my class schedule, I will either make breakfast or I will plan to eat breakfast right after my first class. So after I make my breakfast, I come back into my room, I open my blinds to get sunlight, get a little bit of vitamin D.

[00:20:56] I then go ahead and do my skin care. I do my makeup. Maybe I'm doing my hair for the day. I'm getting dressed, I'm getting ready for class, and a lot of that routine is built around things that A, get me like up ready out of bed for the day so I'm not laying in bed all day sleeping. And b, it's things that he set me up to feel productive and in the mood to get things done, like getting dressed, doing my makeup. That means like, okay, I'm going to class. I'm going to get work done. I'm going somewhere. I'm not just sitting in my dorm room all. And it's also things that are very enjoyable and calming and almost like self soothing for me.

[00:21:30] So I love doing my skincare. I love doing my makeup. It's not something where I'm like stressed and like, Ugh, I just gotta get this done. Something like that. Be like a homework assignment. But no, I enjoy these things. Like I look forward to them. I finished my morning routine. I'm like, great. That was fun.

[00:21:45] I enjoyed that At certain times. I've done the five minute journal in the morning. That's something that I really enjoy doing. Sometimes I'll listen to music or a podcast. If you were listen, looking for a mini podcast to add into your morning routine. I love Morning Microdose By almost 30, it's like mini episodes from some of their favorite episodes that they've released.

[00:22:04] You get. So much amazing wisdom and insight, and it's like five, 10 minute episodes. I absolutely love those, but those, what I mentioned initially are the bare bones of my morning routine. It's like getting up, it's getting ready, it's getting dressed. It's coffee, it's making my bed, and then it's going somewhere for the day.

[00:22:23] Whether that is sitting at my desk, most of the time I'm going to class, maybe I'm going in a walk, but it's really like getting myself up to get ready to go somewhere and have that sense of purpose. And that again, was something in early recovery that was a big game changer, was having that shift from like, Okay, I'm getting up, but there's no reason.

[00:22:43] There's no purpose. Like maybe I was going to therapy or going to a group, but there was, wasn't really like I had something to do with my day versus now. And even in an early recovery also it, it's like, Okay, I'm getting up. I have to be at this place. These are the things I have to do these, this is the purpose and the function of my day.

[00:23:02] Some other habits that are incorporated throughout my week, but not consistently every day are exercise. So trying to get to the gym. I've kind of assigned days, which has been really helpful. So I say that days that I can fit in a workout are Tuesdays. I can do Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, but I probably only do like two or three days in the weekend.

[00:23:21] So I aim for three or four days, but I know that those days it's possible to fit into my schedule. Other things other habits that I incorporate on a regular basis is going through my email, which you're like, Well, okay, that is not very mental healthy, but it's something that I make sure to stay on top of, to avoid stress, long term to avoid feeling overwhelmed all the.

[00:23:41] And I also am really great about staying on top of my to-do list and my habit tracker. So I know that at some point every single day, most likely when I'm planning out my workload, I'll look at my to-do list. I'll see what I have to get done, and I'll also check off what habits I've done that day.

[00:23:58] And the habit tracking is another habit that I've built and finalized over the, that I have built and mastered since I started my therapy journey. And every single month I do a habit tracker in my bullet journal, and I'll tell you what I'm tracking this month.

[00:24:14] And these are things I would like to do every day. They're not gonna happen every day though. So I say read probably before bed, maybe for 12,000 steps every day. But I can tell you with a fact that is not happening. If I get above 7.5, I'm content. . I said meditating. I've done it zero days this month. But you know what we're, we're always trying.

[00:24:34] It's something that I would like to start doing, but it's not a solidified habit yet. I put on here Audible. I've been trying to listen to more audiobook rather than just like watching tv. So that's something I said workout, which again, I'm aiming for like three days a week, but I like to track it because I love checking things off.

[00:24:51] That's very reinforcing for me. So we talked about at the beginning, making them attractive, Making them satisfying, checking things off is very attractive and very satisfying for me. So if I'm working out, like I'm tracking it, I'm checking it off on my. Workout planner app.

[00:25:05] I'm checking it out on my daily schedule. It's being checked off on my habit tracker, like I'm just giving myself all the credit for this. I check off studying. I feel like it's helpful to kind of know how many days a week looking back, I'm studying and working on schoolwork. I have posting a TikTok or real, because always trying to get content out there, but it's something that I have to be intentional about.

[00:25:25] It's not something that totally comes natural. I have on here work again just like I track how many days I'm studying. I track how many days I'm working on podcast type work. I put on here, I have in here, get into bed by 1:00 AM and be up by 10:00 AM Those are like my goal.

[00:25:42] Bedtime and wake up times I have tidy. This is another thing where we talk about like small changes over time. When I was really struggling with anxiety and depression, I feel like it was very reflective in my room. It was messy, it was cluttered. There was a lot of things on the floor. I didn't really have like a motivation or the energy or the desire whatsoever to like put away laundry after it was cleaned or like, Clean, like there's just no desire whatsoever.

[00:26:10] Now I kind of have built tiny micro cleaning into my daily routine, so I'll like put something in the hamper if it's, if I'm not using it anymore, I'm like my bed every morning I put my, bake, my makeup back, and it's bin after I use it, That kind of stuff, so that it's less overwhelming and less stressful, and instead I'm just kind of putting things away as I'm using them.

[00:26:31] I put on here socializing again, being intentional about connection. All of these things that improve our emotional vulnerability. Just making sure that I'm checking all these boxes that I know make me feel good. I have on here, make bed, get ready, which is my morning routine. Use my skills and drink water.

[00:26:48] The skills one. I love having this on my habit. I love having this on my diary card. I think I mentioned this in the therapy episode. It's a freebie. We're always using scales. You can always check it off. So add it to your diary card, add it to your habit tracker, check it off every time. It's like a freebie on a bingo.

[00:27:03] So that is my habit tracker. That's a habit I've solidified, which is tracking these habits, but it's also a lot easier to stay on top of all of those things if you're reminded of them on a daily basis.

[00:27:13] I feel like there is an endless list of habits that I could give you with random things that I have to get like done every week for work Or podcast type things where I'm like, I know this day I have to post this story, or this day I have to put this YouTube video up.

[00:27:26] All these things that have gotten done over time. But with regards to my mental health, I feel like those are the ones that happen throughout the week. And then at night, the night routine that's been really helpful for me is that I shower, That is like my signal now to my brain, to my body that like I'm getting ready for bed.

[00:27:41] When I feel fresh and clean. I get into bed and it's time to. I then do my skin care. I make sure to take my meds. We're gonna touch on why that is so important and really hard habit to build. I brush my teeth and then I watch a TV show or read a book right before bed. And I, I love my night routine. I look forward to it.

[00:27:58] It's calming, it's relaxing, it's enjoyable. It's a great way to end the day. And I truly do feel like that baseline framework of my morning routine, those things I do throughout the day and the night routine, they keep me on a positive trajectory no matter what happens throughout the day. Like I feel like those keep me moving in the right direction. They helped me feel good. They helped me start and end my day in a positive mood and, and feeling good about myself and the day and life. So habits and early recovery, I feel like this is a whole different challenge to navigate. It's one thing to maintain habits or introduce a small habit into your routine, but at the beginning of recovery, you're probably breaking a lot of bad habits as well as trying to form brand new ones at the same time.

[00:28:38] So things that come to mind that I was trying to do in early recovery, the first one was a meal plan. I was really struggling with not eating balance, whether it was overeating, it sometimes restricting, just not eating in a healthy way. And so a meal plan was a really big one. And how I structured, this is not nutritional advice.

[00:28:54] I'm just telling you what I wrote down when I was at residential, I worked with a nutritionist and therapist on this, is I chose three meals for a breakfast that I liked, that it had nutrients. I chose three meals for lunch. Three meals for dinner and then three snack options. And every single day I would choose from those three breakfasts, three lunches, three dinners, three snacks, and it was really easy.

[00:29:13] I liked all the options. I was excited about eating all those things. I knew I had to eat a breakfast, I had to eat a lunch, and I had to eat a dinner. I had to have a snack, and the options were there. There was no question like, Oh, what should I eat here? Like, I guess it's breakfast time, but I don't know what to have.

[00:29:26] That was a tool that was really helpful in building that meal schedule habit and also, and also getting consistent with implementing that. The next habit that was so tough for me to work on was medications. One of my parents' biggest goals for me leaving treatment was like she is managing her mental health and part of that is taking her own meds and.

[00:29:50] If you have ever been in intensive treatment before, you know that you are not in charge of taking your own meds. You show up at the office every day, every morning, every night. They give you little medications and a cup. I remember I had an acne cream at one point, and I would like have to go to the office to get my little score of acne cream.

[00:30:05] It's like their controlled substances like an adult is handing them to you. And so building the habit of taking my own medications, remembering that I had to take them, building that into my routine was really tough because someone else had been reminding me to take my meds for a year and a half when I was at residential in a therapeutic boarding school.

[00:30:25] And if you have ever taken mental health medications, it's really important that you take them every day, otherwise they don't work. And so, This was something that I struggled with. I remember going on home visits and being like, Oh, I forgot to take my meds, or, I don't remember if I've taken them or not.

[00:30:38] I just couldn't remember. My parents would be reminding me it was a disaster. It was really difficult to build this habit, and mind you, I was like 15, 16, like, it's not like I'm like super old and it's like I can't master this thing. But again, I was still teen at this point.

[00:30:51] I had no experience with this habit, but it was pivotal that I did this every single. And so what I had found to be very helpful since going through that journey is to get a little pill organizer, and I have a giant one from cvs. You can see it if you're watching this video on YouTube. I have a two week schedulers that I only have to refill my organizer every two weeks, so it says morning and night, but I take them all at night.

[00:31:16] And what I do is every two weeks I put all of my meds in for those two weeks and every single night I open up the little compartment, I take my meds, and then if I'm ever like, Oh, did I take my meds or not? I check. Just like a birth control pack where there's none of this like, Oh, did I take this today?

[00:31:32] Did I not take this today? I can't remember. It's either there or it's not there. You've either taken it or you haven't taken it, and it sits right on my desk. It's right in my eye frame when I'm doing my skincare routine. I've gotten to the point now where I'm like, I can tell if I haven't taken my melatonin, but I also know that it's a part of my night routine.

[00:31:50] It's in my eyesight. It's easy, it's accessible, and there's this other second factor where it's not left up to guessing if you took your meds or not, because you're pulling them out of like a 30 day prescription bottle. It's like it's either taken outta that little compartment or it's not.

[00:32:04] So that has been really helpful for me. If you're struggling to take your meds, the third habit that I built early on in treatment that I feel like I'm always working towards, but especially then, was my coping skills. Things like asking for help, things like radical acceptance, regulating my emotions and opposite action were not things that came easily.

[00:32:24] It was the exact opposite of what I was used to doing, so I would never. Before treatment, I would never ask for help if I was feeling depressed or anxious or having an urge. It was like I internally dealt with that, or I internally felt all those emotions, or I engaged in the urge. Whereas in treatment, it was building that muscle, building that habit of when I feel this emotion arise, when I have this urge come up, when I have this behavior pop up, I ask for help and I talk to someone.

[00:32:50] Where I tell my parent that today's not a great day. And building that habit with that cue, which is the thought, behavior urge, et cetera, and the response, which is asking for help or utilizing a resource. You're like building that, that neural connection of rather, like, I feel depressed, I stay in bed.

[00:33:06] It's like I feel depressed. I do the opposite of what I want to do. I get up, I go outside, I go on a walk, I play with my dog, whatever it is. So you're, you're re, you're reworking those pathway. The other skills that I mentioned, there were radical acceptance. This was something that, again, was a very big departure from where I was at initially.

[00:33:25] I was very much in the mindset and in the, the way of functioning of like, this is not my fault. This is happening to me. This is other people's problems. It's not fair. This is just how it's supposed to be. I'm gonna struggle forever. And then trying to shift that and be like, Yes, I am in a position that I wish I wasn't, which is that I'm depressed, I'm anxious, I'm struggling.

[00:33:45] I, I have so many things to work on and I'm not where I wanna be. And it's possible for things to change. Like really truly accepting where I was at, accepting my role in that, accepting the power I had to make changes and accepting that no one was gonna do that work except. emotion regulation is a whole module in D B T, but learning to regulate my emotions rather than letting them kind of control me.

[00:34:08] So rather than having an anxiety attack and then just being completely overwhelmed for the rest of the day and going home from school and not being able to show up to a therapy appointment or whatever it is, having anxiety, using my skills, regulating that emotion, recovering from that emotional event, and then being able to continue on with what I'm.

[00:34:26] and that was a scale that had to be mastered. And then the last one is opposite action, which is when you are struggling with things like depression, anxiety, mental health struggles, a lot of the time, if it's gotten to a point where you need support and things aren't going well, it's because you are doing what, what your emotions and your urges are telling you to do.

[00:34:43] So like you're depressed, you isolate, you stay in bed, you don't engage in activities. Like that's what depression tells you to do. And when you do those, it makes it worse. Same thing with anxiety. Anxiety tell. To avoid. It tells you to run away. It tells you to ruminate. If you don't ruminate, if you distract yourself, if you go towards the thing that's making you anxious, if you expose yourself to it in small, safe, healthy amounts, you are able to overcome that anxiety.

[00:35:08] And if you, you get up, you go outside, you connect, you feel less depressed. And so building that muscle, building that habit of doing the opposite of what you feel like doing is a game changer with regards to your mental health, but it's also something that takes practice and doesn't come naturally. So my whole kind of synopsis for that coping skills habit is like you are rewiring your response to the emotional cue.

[00:35:31] Whether that's a thought, whether that's an urge, whether that's a behavior. When you feel anxious, when you feel depressed, when you have the thought that I'm so hopeless. I'm so alone, I'm so isolated, I don't know what to do. I, there's no solution. That's the cue. How are you gonna respond?

[00:35:46] And rather than engaging in an unhealthy coping mechanism, rather than isolating, rather than withdrawing, rather than ruminating about your everything, that's not going well for you, are you distracting yourself? Are you asking for help? Are you spending time with a friend? Are you going on a walk?

[00:36:02] Shifting that cue in response to a, a more effective way to cope. Okay. The last thing, which I'm just gonna like very briefly touch on, because I already walked you through lots of sleep hygiene and morning, night routine things, but sleep was the biggest habit that I shifted in early recovery. I saw that insane shift from feeling suicidally, depressed and hopeless and depressed every single minute of every single day to waking up and not feeling depressed first thing in the morning.

[00:36:27] Like that was so foreign and unheard of. Empowering for me to be like, Oh my God, like the day is at like a neutral point rather than like a today already sucks. I hate everything. So get your sleep, get your seven to nine hours, avoid naps if you can. I know it's so hard. I still struggle with that and really do your best to get up in the morning and go somewhere during the day.

[00:36:48] Having that sense of purpose does wonders for depression, especially. Okay. Habits to break that are probably not helping your mental health, but are probably very solidified in your lifestyle. First one is negative thought patterns, especially if you struggle with your mental health, whether it's self-esteem, whether it's the way you view yourself in relationships, whether it is the way you view your mental health, those thought patterns are habits. They've been reinforced over time, and shifting them can have really profound results. for me, the thought patterns that brought me the most suffering, if you will, was that I didn't believe I was de deserving of love from anyone.

[00:37:24] I didn't think that I was good enough for my parents, which made it very difficult to tell them when I needed help and be vulnerable and talk about what I was experie. I truly believe that I would be depressed and anxious for the rest of my life, and that nothing was ever gonna change.

[00:37:38] And so those thought patterns had been solidified and reinforced for years, and it took a long time to rewire those. But as I broke those habits Of going into any interaction and being like, I am not deserving of this friendship or this relationship, or love for my family and friends, and then being like, No, but I am a person that is deserving of love and care and respect and support just because I am a person and.

[00:38:02] Knowing that my parents loved and cared about me and supported me, and I could be vulnerable, I could ask for help when I needed it. They were a resource I could utilize. And that things would shift with regards to my mental health. It was possible. I was capable of making those shifts and it was fully realistic for me to feel happy and fulfilled and, and not hopeless and depressed and, and at a loss for how to proceed. So that's one ha. That's the first habit. Negative thought patterns, whether it's relating to your self-esteem, competence, body image, relationships, any and everything that probably is not helping your mental health.

[00:38:35] The second is how you approach emotionally challenging situations. There is a whole spectrum. But whatever your go-to is, whether it's avoiding, whether it is oversharing, whether it is self-sabotaging, we did an amazing episode on that with Dr. Judy Ho. Whatever it is that you are doing in emotionally challenging situation, that's probably like If it's unhealthy, it's probably too little or too much.

[00:38:57] So you're either probably like ruminating to an extreme amount or you are like completely avoiding suppressing emotions. Whatever you're doing, recognize that that has been a reinforced pattern and how can you start to slowly reverse that and experience your emotions in a healthy way, process through them in a way that allows them to be resolved and felt and not bottle up over time, or just consume everything.

[00:39:19] If you're ruminating. 

[00:39:20] Social media who we know it's bad for our mental health. I'm not telling you not to be on social media, but your habits with how you use social media can be shifted. What time of the day are you using TikTok? Are you going on at first thing in the morning and scrolling for two hours?

[00:39:34] Are you scrolling for three hours instead of sleeping at night? When you are on Instagram or TikTok or whatever it is, what emotions are coming up? Are you comparing yourself or if you feeling worse about yourself? Are you feeling overwhelmed? Are you using it as a way to self soothe and cope with emotions and avoid your problems?

[00:39:49] So shifting that relationship and instead when you. Cues to use these things to distract or avoid or use it in an unhealthy way, shifting to other coping skills and then using social media in moments where you're not trying to cope with an emotion or, or avoid something that you're supposed to be doing.

[00:40:06] All of that kind of stuff and. Another way to do that, which next week's episode all is all about, which is creating a healthy social media environment, following people that make you feel good. Following, make people that make you feel empowered and motivated and not having social media be such a negative experience when we're scrolling.

[00:40:23] And lastly, you guys have heard me say it so many times this episode, sleep. If you are staying up crazy late, if you are sleeping crazy late and napping all the time, if you are not sleeping at all or not sleeping enough, that breaking that habit and breaking those sleep cycles and getting into a healthy routine will do wonders for your mental health.

[00:40:41] I. Promise, it's, it's not an easy thing. I totally get that. It's difficult because I'm constantly trying to improve your my sleep, but it is something your body needs to do. Your body is wired to sleep every night, and so it's something that can feel kind of natural to get back on track. It's a simpler step to take with regards to your mental health journey, and it has profound results, so, That is all of my thoughts on mental health habits.

[00:41:08] I hope this episode was helpful. I know it was kind of all over the place, but I really do hope that there were a couple of habits and approaches and different ways of thinking about things that you can implement and use in your own life to improve your mental health. If you liked this episode, as always, make sure to leave review.

[00:41:24] Subscribe, share with a friend or family member. It helps so much and it really does mean the world to me, and I'm always looking for more ideas from you guys for what you wanna hear for solo episodes. So feel free to DM me, send me an email, any of the things. Let me know what you want to hear on she persisted.

[00:41:41] So with that, see you on Tuesday.

[00:41:43] Thank you so much for listening to this week's episode of she persisted. If you enjoyed, make sure to share with a friend or family member, it really helps out the podcast. And if you haven't already leave a review on apple podcasts or Spotify, you can also make sure to follow along at actually persisted podcast on both Instagram and Tik TOK, and check out all the bonus resources, content and information on my website.

[00:42:05] She persisted podcast.com. Thanks for supporting. Keep persisting and I'll see you next week.

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