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1 - greyhound gal
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Self Care
I thought we could share a few tips here on self care? I've been seriously neglecting myself recently. Working too hard and trying to everything at home that two of us did. I have totally worn myself out trying to clean, garden, and keep up a cheerful facade as well.
So today I am going to do some yoga, maybe have a bath later and definitely a snooze!
What do you all do?
- OutofHisCloset
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Re: Self Care
I think your idea to do some yoga, and have a bath and a snooze are just the ticket. To me, self care means doing the things that make us feel valued and that help us remember we have value. We have all been taken advantage of, deceived, imposed on, devalued, and discarded. If we've lived with TGT or TTT (the trans thing), whether we've known about it or not, whether they've flaunted it or hidden it, whether we experienced it as a bomb drop or breath-stealing discovery, we've blamed ourselves, cut ourselves down, and learned to devalue ourselves. Self care is a way to nurture ourselves and regain our self-esteem
I cut myself a break. I don't expect myself to keep to my same expectations of productiveness. I try not to expect myself to have expectations of myself. I'm just trying to cut myself some slack. I tell myself that a temporary relaxation of my expectations of myself doesn't mean I will wallow in degeneracy and sloth for the rest of my life. I remind myself that my feelings of grief and anger and sadness and relief at the ending of my marriage are normal and necessary, and that this period of time is only a season in my life.
After having been devalued by him (and discarded), I'm working hard at re-valuing myself. I've been reconnecting with the parts of me that I have repressed or had gotten squashed and quashed from the stress of living with my stbx and his disorder--his abnormal sexuality and his warped personality.
Practically, in terms of actual things I have been doing in the now seven weeks I've been living in my new place:
If I don't feel like cooking I don't cook. If I want to eat what normally I would forbid myself to eat (in the name of healthy eating), I allow it. When I do feel like cooking, I revel in all the sensory beauty of shopping, cooking, and eating, and I remind myself that not only do I find cooking and eating pleasurable, I am also nurturing myself.
I buy myself flowers. I bought myself a beautiful bouquet of iris for Mother's Day, because my stbx never once gave me flowers for a special occasion or "just because," even though he knew I loved having them; the only time I ever got flowers from him was last year when he thought I might "out" him.
I bought myself a gas grill, something I don't strictly need. It took me several days to convince myself I could spend this money on myself for something I wanted. When I did buy it, I realized that I am having to work at accepting that I have value in and of myself, and am worth spending a little money on to gratify my desires (and not just my needs).
The outdoors and the natural world have always been my refuges, and I'm reconnecting with this need and pleasure. I've taken several wildflower walks in the woods. I've been walking around a little lake near where I live. When I'm home, I eat meals or read outside on my porch.
I've recommitted to regular exercise, formal and informal. I work out on machines, but I also walk and dance.
I listen to music.
I am being deliberate about engaging socially. I have made an effort to get to know my new neighbors. I have been making dates with colleagues and friends. I'm not waiting to hear from them, I'm calling them and asking them to come over or go out for coffee, a drink, lunch, a walk. I've gone out to see a friend play music. I make sure to ensure I have "dates" with friends for the week ahead of the one I'm in, so I know I have something to look forward to. I realize that when I engage with others, and help them out or focus on them, I get out of myself and the situation with my stbx recedes. Extra bonus: I know that I'm building the new and satisfying life I want for myself.
I have seen and accepted that for at least some part of every day I will have periods of sadness. Sometimes I wake up sad; sometimes it comes on me out of the blue when I'm reminded of something in my former life or that "we" used to do; sometimes at the end of the day I'm overwhelmed.
I am trying to gain some perspective and be alert to my moods/triggers. I write in my journal in the mornings (a longstanding habit). I have realized that late afternoon and evening is the hardest for me, because I always made sure to arrive home first, and I cooked, and while I cooked I anticipated his arrival home. Apart from my own enjoyment of cooking, making meals was I way I showed my love and cared for my stbx (and family, when my child lived at home).
- Abby
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Re: Self Care
For me self-care means accepting my body and my sexuality. I began by getting rid of the white bras and panties I'd settled into and getting underwired push up bras and a couple of packs of solid color and print panties. The panties were low-rise: no more granny panties! The bras improved my posture and made me ready to face the world.
I began getting my hair cut at a beauty school rather than at a chain that advertised its cheap prices and did short cuts on women my age. I have thick hair and I grew it out. I went blond and let it grow long. I experimented with foundation makeup to try to find some that had sunscreen, did not make my face break out and didn't cake in my wrinkles. I was liking what I was seeing and I was getting positive feedback.
You need to find yourself as you find other people. Redecorate yourself as well as your home. You're never too old.
Try Gardening. It'll keep you grounded.
- Lena
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Re: Self Care
I changed my haircut that gives me completely different look and got a positive feedback.
I joined yoga. It is not just healthy body stretch, but takes my mind away from my situation.
I have been always active, but lately I enjoy long walks. When kids are with my GHIDSD,instead of going to sleep to forget about all of this mess as I used to do, I walk a lot. It is very therapeutic to me.
I listen to motivational speeches how to leave that bitterness and embrace life in more positive way. Not always succesful, but I ve been working on that.
I connect more with people and try to laugh a lot. I organize a lot of activities for my kids and myself. I have been in a mission with myself to show I can control, plan and organize my life by myself just fine.
E-hugs to all of you.
And Happy Mother's Day😘
- OutofHisCloset
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Re: Self Care
Abby,
I'm so glad you brought up accepting our bodies and re-claiming our sexuality and ourselves as sexual beings. I think I have only begun to be able to think about that, mostly in the form of reclaiming the right and the ability and the desire to be feminine. My agp/c'dressing/trans stbx appropriated femininity in our house, and his exaggerated and stereotypical mimicry of it turned me off--to him, but also to femininity, even as I mourned my loss of it. I do notice that when clothes shopping I find that I am deliberately choosing more feminine colors and patterns, and doing it with a certain feeling of "in your face-ness."
- Scrupulous
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Re: Self Care
Wine
Massage
Botox
Hair
Wax
Meditate
Wine
Whine (to friends)
Facial
Kickbox
Stretch
Comedy
Here
Wine
Beach
Tennis
Surf
GOD
Research
Love
Learn
Wine
Whine (again to friends)
Wine
Think about sex with a straight man...
Sleep.
Lol
But of course not necessary in that order.
Priorities rule in the list.
Wishing you all a very CONTENT day..as Mothers/Wifes/Friends
XOXO
Life is like phases of the moon.... We really only see it when it's beautiful, full and in our face.
- greyhound gal
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Re: Self Care
I am really enjoying your replies!
So far I have- shaved my legs, lol.
Waxed my tash.
Walked on the beach with the dog.
Called my Mum.
Cleaned the car.
Had 2 afternoon naps.
Meditated.
Done 35 minutes of yoga.
Watched 2 hours of Poirot uninterrupted.
NOT watched Eurovision- for the first time in 27 years!
Drunk some lovely red wine.
Organised a widow cleaner and a gardener- life is too short.
Next on the list- a weekend away with my daughter.
Growing my hair- its been short forever.
More naps- they are my saviour.
I really need to get out more though. Not good at asking but must try harder.
I think about sex a lot. I really miss it. Not just the sex but the intimacy. That being said I am in no way ready to date or anything. Its too early days and I have serious trust issues as I suspect most of us have.
Keep em coming ladies. I've been very low this weekend and this thread is giving me lots of ideas.
Thanks. Big hugs xxx
Last edited by greyhound gal (May 14, 2018 3:01 am)
- •
Thread Starter- Leah
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Re: Self Care
Self care basics started with really just eating regularly and getting out of the house....
As I’ve gotten stronger I see that self care of the body is the first step, but really it was my mind that was in a twist. I meditated and did tai chi and yoga, but it seemed that those are not enough. I walked out of a yoga class last week as I realized I was just too tired. I just needed a nap and to switch off.
Talking to friends
Talking to family
Talking to my therapist who keeps telling me that I need to really let go of my GIDX which is the tough one.
Sleeping
Reading
Movies
Getting outside for walks in the sun (when available!)
Really I think writing has helped me a lot. I don’t post here as much, but writing as if I were helps. I may start to now again, but for a time it felt like being retraumatized by hearing how bad it is for some of us.
Sending strength to all!
- OutofHisCloset
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Re: Self Care
Greyhound Gal, thanks for starting this thread, and Abby, thanks again for bringing up the body and sexuality.
Greyhound Gal, I know what you mean about wanting not just sex but intimacy. Throughout the ordeal with my stbx, who rejected his maleness and always wanted to act out or feel sexually in what he (mistakenly) thought was the way a woman does/feels (but was really taken straight out of the way porn meant for heterosexual males represents women, either sexually submissive to the point of masochism or a caricature of lesbian sex--in that it is meant for a male gaze), I missed our two bodies talking together in the intimate way that happens in penis-in-vagina sex. Because he denied me this act, and rejected it, I always felt a profound rejection.
I don't mean to be pornographic here, but it was a devastating blow that my husband repudiated and hated his maleness, and not only refused me penis-in-vagina sex, but was offended and insulted and angered and hurt by any expression of mine of a desire for it. I wasn't lacking a means of orgasm, either; I had plenty of those, by plenty of other means/methods.
But what was missing was the intimate talk two bodies engage in when our two organs--his penis, my vagina--would move in their ways and then respond to each other. You feel one another there, inside, and that intimacy is expressed and matched outside: we cry out, sigh, moan, gasp, laugh because of what's being "said" inside. I couldn't just cut out this part of our sex life, or replace it with sex toys (a sex toy can't talk to another's body in this way). I think one of the wonders of a woman's anatomy is that we are shaped to make possible this intimate, inner communication, hidden from view, felt only by the two people engaged in the act/talk (matched by the male's anatomy--not trying to discount your role/bodies, men!). I wanted that connection desperately, and he not only rejected it, but ridiculed it, as if were a laughable throwback to less enlightened times and modes of sexual expression. In so doing, he devalued me, denied me the opportunity to express my own (hetero)sexuality, and turned me into an instrument for his sexual pleasure, which dehumanized me.
Well, after reading this thread yesterday, I went to sleep last night and had an erotic dream, one in which I had exactly the kind of sex my stbx refused to engage in any longer. It feels to me like I have taken back, or have given myself back, my sexuality and my validity as a heterosexual person.
Sorry if I've offended anyone, but this was a deep hurt dealt to me by my stbx, and as Leah says, it feels healing to write these things out.
Last edited by OutofHisCloset (May 14, 2018 6:48 am)