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10 Top Tips For Surviving ‘The Breakup!’

Being in your 40's, Emotional Health, Love, Recovery, Relationships

After spending an evening this week with yet another friend who is recovering from the awful experience of being in a ‘happy’ marriage that ends within half hour, always commencing with “It’s not you, it’s me” (The Mid Life Crisis) or “I think this is really it, she’s the ‘one’ for me”  (The Affair and The Mid-Life Crisis) or “I never meant to hurt you but I need some space” (The Affair), I decided that a survival plan, laced with a little humour, was probably called for! For the male readers, this blog is entirely from a woman’s perspective, but please feel free to add your own recovery pointers onto the comments section….

  1. Get yourself a good Multi Vitamin. Oh yes….my all-time favourite from my very sturdy and practical friend, in or out of emotional pain! She is right of course, as your immune system will be low and your food intake will be bizarre so this will keep you vaguely balanced on a nutritional front.
  2. Read a self-help book, a good self-help book and preferably a funny one. My absolute favourite while sobbing all over the house during my own ‘the breakup’ was perfectly titled “It’s Called a Breakup Not A Breakdown.”  In other words, you’ll get over it!
  3. Learn everything you can about who you are. Know who you are and what you like and don’t like, because you will be a different person from the person you were before you were together and different from the person that you became in the marriage/relationship. This is a great part of the journey, so try and enjoy it.
  4. You will either eat yourself stupid or you won’t be able to eat at all. In any circumstance, you’ll need ice cream, good quality expensive ice cream, that contains chocolate, cookie dough, nuts, etc. Essential for vague nutrition and comfort.
  5. Get your toe nails painted. One of my ‘favourite’ memories of the darkest days was sitting in the conservatory, eating chocolate and sobbing, while a friend painted my nails for me. Recovery, girlie stylie!
  6. I’ve heard it said that the best ways for a woman to get over a man is to get underneath another one. It isn’t. Really. It isn’t. Go back to number 4 and get the ice cream out of the freezer again!
  7. Understand the Story of Creation from Eve’s Perspective. This will help a lot.
  8. Don’t be on his Facebook page for a moment longer. You don’t want to know. Trust me on this one. You really don’t want to know.
  9. Go and buy lots of good quality wooden hangers and reorganise your clothing through the whole double wardrobe to replicate Jigsaw. You will now have space in between your clothes as they hang like ‘pieces’ from the rail as opposed to squashed together as if his clothes and yours were having their own private row as they fought for space in a wardrobe that just wasn’t big enough!
  10. On a more serious note, the pain will stop and if you allow yourself the much needed recovery time, you will learn to love your life as a single woman safe in the knowledge that one day, you will be annoyed again by the toilet seat being left up! So this time is your time. Now is the time to enjoy….

What is Wellness?

Emotional Health, Love, Personal Development, Physical Health, Recovery, Relationships, Spiritual Health

In a recent blog, I explored Holistic Health and what I mean when I use that term; the way I understand it and the way I believe it is understood. A natural progression on from that seemed to me to be an exploration of what wellness is and how we understand it.

What I do know is that we all have the power within us to have a feeling of wellness. A feeling of happiness, of enthusiasm for life and a sense of energy is something that we can all work towards and experience. How?

  • Understand yourself holistically as a whole person with many areas of your life that need to be balanced.  You are not ‘stress’ or ‘lethargy’ or ‘a bad back’, you are a person operating in society in a relationships at work and at home. You have your spiritual, physical, emotional and mental aspects of yourself to keep in check. See where the imbalance may be and that will give you a lot of information to help you work through whatever is presenting as the problem.
  • Self-esteem and self-love is everything or as Louise Hay taught me, the cornerstone to everything. Without it, there is nothing because there is no connection with yourself. If this aspect of yourself is poor, work on it and work on it hard. The use of daily affirmations, positive loving relationships, eating wholesome food and allowing yourself some time to reflect in solitude so as to improve your relationship with yourself and connect spiritually, are all a good start.
  • Take personal responsibility. When you are wrong, say sorry, learn and move on. Don’t say yes when you mean no.  Don’t relive scenarios over and over again punishing yourself for the past and concerning yourself with the future. Keep your side of the street clean so that you can look at yourself in the mirror every day. Forgive yourself….often. Perfectionism is just another form of self-loathing.
  • Live consciously! Value the food you eat, the trees you pass, the people you smile at. Photography is a great way of living in the moment and seeing something from a different angle. It’s a conscious activity. Care for your environment. Care for the people around you. Turn off the TV and sing or dance or bake a cake. Come alive and stop getting lost in the misery of soap operas…..created I believe to quieten the masses.
  • Enjoy yourself. Enjoy your sense of connectedness to yourself, the Universe and all people. Have fun. We are here for such a short time. Make your goal that of making a difference to the world, to the people around you.

Your wellness is your responsibility. No-one is going to bring it to you, fix what’s broken, give you a magic pill to ‘make it all better’. The power to do that is within you and no-one else. You can choose this right now. You can choose to take a continuing series of short steps one day at a time and give yourself the life you deserve, being the very best that you can be.

My Recovery…

Emotional Health, Love, Mental Health, Personal Development, Recovery, Spiritual Health

I have recently found myself in the position whereby I felt the need to evaluate and crystallise what it means for me to say that I am Recovering Alcoholic. It can be a pretty emotive statement for some and I sometimes find a defensiveness about it as people almost run to look at their own behaviour and go about the business of either defending it or shirking away from talking about it for fear of ‘catching’ this god awful dis-ease. Usually there is a lack of understanding about what it means and there is definitely confusion around what is in fact a heavy drinker as opposed to an alcoholic.

If you read my blog regularly, you’ll know that I walked into my first AA meeting at the grand old age of 20 after an incredibly distressing seven year period. It was at 10pm in the basement of a hall on a road just off the Kings Road in Chelsea and I still stank of the booze from the night before. It was 1990 and there was a very lively pub on the corner that had to be negotiated before the meeting was reached. I felt grey, I felt alone, I felt misunderstood and I felt like I didn’t deserve the gift of life. A 10pm AA meeting is a pretty hard core meeting, even for a one in Chelsea. It was not for the fainthearted but, one day at a time, I haven’t had a drink since that first meeting and I will be grateful beyond measure for that, for every minute of every day.

I lived in meetings for about 2 years, sometimes three a day, substituting drinking with tobacco and coffee until I learnt that it didn’t actually matter what your substance of choice is, at some point you’re going to have to feel the pain. You’re going to have to confront what is left. You’re going to have to stare long and hard at yourself and get real, and there is nothing real about being in an AA meeting three times a day, in coffee shops with other meeting goers, drinking coffee until 1am in the morning, smoking endlessly!

When I talk about ‘recovery’, it is this process of being real, every 24 hour period, that I mean. It’s the daily process of reflection, self-comprehension and a self-honesty that most people would avoid at any cost. It is taking responsibility for my actions and being true to myself. It is a daily acknowledgment of what I have in my wonderful life – self-pity and gratitude cannot live side by side. It is impossible.

There is a saying in AA that goes, if you keeping going to the Barbers shop, you’re going to get a haircut. If I hang around dis-ease, heavy drinking, endless smoking and a disconnect from all that is beautiful, I am at risk of having a haircut. I don’t metaphorically go to the barbers very much at all, as these are not the circles I hang around in, but a difficult situation has presented itself to me and I have swiftly removed myself.

For me, my recovery is everything, because it is my life, literally. I am not here to judge other people and the choices that they make. I only know, with all my heart, however uncomfortable that might make you feel, that I cannot put myself at risk because I am worth sobriety. I am worth being well. I am worthy and that is why self-love and my spiritual connection, will always, always be, the cornerstone to absolutely everything.

Seasonal Emotions….

Emotional Health, Love, Massage in Witney, News, Personal Development, Recovery

As I become more mindful through actively seeking to do so and the passing of the years bringing a more conscious connection with myself and my environment, I have become deeply aware of the Emotions of The Seasons. I’m sure we all feel this in different ways as we reflect on the moment and I find each season brings with it a whole heap of emotional baggage, hope, and excitement in equal measure.

In Spring, I love the newness, the flowers bursting open, life almost tentatively creeping out from behind the trees craving to have some time in the light. I love that feeling of gaining an extra day in every day as the evenings become filled with activity in the light again when the clocks change. If this season had a soundtrack, it would be Jimmy Cliff singing I Can See Clearly Now….

Summer’s soundtrack would be Long Hot Summer by The Style Council with it’s sense of being free and young and warm and barefoot and kissing a boy called Graham in Battersea Park.  Memories and anticipation of fun and happiness and beaches and BBQs and flowers and trees in abundance all gently swirl around my presence.

Intrinsically linked to the commencing of the school year, Autumn’s September has a sense of knuckling down, crisp new books, reading lists and focus. I loved being a student and I loved getting a new reading list as the new year began, believing with every bone in my body that I would in fact go and get all of the books, reading each one crisp page by crisp page. It was such a feeling of utter engagement that would barely make it to the first half term. I almost yearn for the gorgeous colours of the leaves in Autumn, singing and dancing their way off the trees in a cool breeze making the statement that they make every single year providing comfort in the predictability of a yearly ritual. My favourite memory of this time is the sun low, piercing it’s way through the windscreen, with my music playing and the heating on driving to work in the morning (even though I have long since finished commuting into a workplace). The soundtrack of Autumn goes to Van Morrison, Moondance.

But Winter….If all the seasons bring memories of different points in my life, Winter seems to have the saddest emotional memories than any other season.

Watching people scraping ice off the car this morning I remember that sound from childhood. I remember the first time my ex-husband did it for me and I was dismayed that anyone would stand in the cold and clear my car for me. A lovely memory tinged with the sadness of what followed. Christmas looming and that feeling of being squeezed of everything , the TV placing images of life that I cannot connect with. The elderly being cold, my Gran dying and being broke in January all spring to mind. I think of break ups and make-ups and dishing out food to the freezing homeless on The Strand thrown out by supermarkets on Xmas Eve. Working as a social worker with young people who have left care knowing that they spent Christmas Day staring at the TV alone, almost banging down our door on the first working day back looking for money for food and desperately needing human contact and reassurance that this living hell would soon be over, the first sale advert being a Xmas gift unashamedly stating, it’s over. Normality will be resumed shortly.

For me, this is not a time of year to think of yourself aside from a short burst of reflection from time to time against the backdrop of a cosy night in. This is a time to think about being useful and helpful. I think more and more people will suffer the Winter harshly this year with the current economic situation and there are so many people for whom this is the season to ‘get through’ somehow.

My biggest tool this season is knowledge. I have learnt that self-pity and gratitude cannot sit side by side each other. It’s just impossible. I know that by focusing on what I can do for other people stops the self-absorption that this season brings and all of the dis-ease that comes with it. My soundtrack for Winter is Queen, A Winter’s Tale.

While writing, I thought I could have A Little Competition. Do you struggle with Winter? How do you get through this time? In the spirit of the season, I will offer a FREE one hour treatment here in Witney, to the best suggestion/top tip/story ….please comment below. x

The Invitation

Emotional Health, Love, Mental Health, Personal Development, Recovery, Relationships, Spiritual Health

This has to be one of my very favourite poems….it is such a gift.

The Invitation
Oriah Mountain Dreamer
Canadian Teacher and Author

It doesn't interest me what you do for a living
I want to know what you ache for
and if you dare to dream of meeting your heart's longing.

It doesn't interest me how old you are
I want to know if you will risk looking like a fool
for love
for your dreams
for the adventure of being alive.

It doesn't interest me what planets are squaring your moon...
I want to know if you have touched the center of your own sorrow
if you have been opened by life's betrayals
or have become shrivelled and closed
from fear of further pain.

I want to know if you can sit with pain
mine or your own
without moving to hide it
or fade it
or fix it.

I want to know if you can be with joy
mine or your own
if you can dance with wildness
and let the ecstasy fill you to the tips of your
fingers and toes
without cautioning us to
be careful
be realistic
to remember the limitations of being human.

It doesn't interest me if the story you are telling me
is true.
I want to know if you can
disappoint another
to be true to yourself.
If you can bear the accusation of betrayal
and not betray your own soul.
If you can be faithless
and therefore trustworthy.

I want to know if you can see Beauty
even when it is not pretty
every day.
And if you can source your own life
from its presence.

I want to know if you can live with failure
yours and mine
and still stand on the edge of the lake
and shout to the silver of the full moon,
"Yes."

It doesn't interest me
to know where you live or how much money you have.
I want to know if you can get up
after a night of grief and despair
weary and bruised to the bone
and do what needs to be done
to feed the children.

It doesn't interest me who you know
or how you came to be here.
I want to know if you will stand
in the center of the fire
with me
and not shrink back.

It doesn't interest me where or what or with whom
you have studied.
I want to know what sustains you
from the inside
when all else falls away.

I want to know if you can be alone
with yourself
and if you truly like the company you keep
in the empty moments.

A Rule Book for Living…

Emotional Health, Love, Mental Health, News, Personal Development, Recovery, Relationships, Spiritual Health

Wish I’d had this years ago but here it is…

Desiderata

– written by Max Ehrmann in the 1920s –
Not “Found in Old St. Paul’s Church”! — see below

Go placidly amid the noise and the haste,
and remember what peace there may be in silence.

As far as possible, without surrender,
be on good terms with all persons.
Speak your truth quietly and clearly;
and listen to others,
even to the dull and the ignorant;
they too have their story.
Avoid loud and aggressive persons;
they are vexatious to the spirit.

If you compare yourself with others,
you may become vain or bitter,
for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.
Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans.
Keep interested in your own career, however humble;
it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.

Exercise caution in your business affairs,
for the world is full of trickery.
But let this not blind you to what virtue there is;
many persons strive for high ideals,
and everywhere life is full of heroism.
Be yourself. Especially do not feign affection.
Neither be cynical about love,
for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment,
it is as perennial as the grass.

Take kindly the counsel of the years,
gracefully surrendering the things of youth.
Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune.
But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings.
Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.

Beyond a wholesome discipline,
be gentle with yourself.
You are a child of the universe
no less than the trees and the stars;
you have a right to be here.
And whether or not it is clear to you,
no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.

Therefore be at peace with God,
whatever you conceive Him to be.
And whatever your labors and aspirations,
in the noisy confusion of life,
keep peace in your soul. 

With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams,
it is still a beautiful world.
Be cheerful. Strive to be happy.


What Do You Need?

Massage in Witney, Mental Health, News, Personal Development, Physical Health, Recovery, Spiritual Health

One of the first things I ask my clients is “what do you need today?” Such an important question that a lot of people don’t know how to answer. Such a simple question that in itself, can be very enlightening as to how a person is feeling in their life. They might not know what they need. They may not have ever thought about what they need. Some people are uncomfortable with the thought that they need anything at all. We all have needs and we all need to stop and rebalance ourselves sometimes because there are areas in our lives that have become unbalanced.

If you are coming to see me, you have a need that you have identified. Whether that need is for a better feeling of health and well-being, to improve poor sleeping patterns, or you are over tired needing an hour of self-focus. You may have stiff shoulders, or you are just plain old worn out with everything because life feels to much, we can work it out together.

This working with all areas of a person is known as an Integrative approach that looks at every aspect of ourselves.  By undergoing this exploration we often find that the symptom is not the cause! Within this process, you have an opportunity to think about where you are, a chance to reflect upon what’s going on for you in all areas of your life. By asking you what you might need, I can then create a bespoke treatment that will ultimately give the biggest benefits and results that continue for far longer than the hour we spend together.

We can explore what oils I might use dependent on whether you need to relax, be calmed and soothed or be invigorated. We can look at your emotional needs and establish whether you need to talk, be silent, or be in a deep state of relaxation.

We might do Reflexology to get the body back into a state of balance or a massage with all of it’s healing, soothing, and/or invigorating abilities with endless benefits in it’s own right. We can maybe use some Reiki in the treatment if the deepest relaxation and healing is needed. Or maybe Hot stones which are fantastic for loosening up stiff muscles with the heat itself being very comforting. The treatment incorporates whatever is right for you on the day you come and see me.

So spend some time thinking about what you need today. Whether it’s to make sure you get your appointment with me in the diary, or it’s 10 minutes reading or walking or doing a breathing mediation. Maybe you need to cook your favourite meal or see your best friend for an overdue catch up. Whatever it is, do it! Because if you come and see me for a treatment, I’ll only give you something lovely to do for yourself for Homework anyway!

Single Parenting….abroad!

Emotional Health, Love, Recovery, Relationships, Single parenting

I was recently privileged enough to be asked to co-ordinate a 42 strong group of single parent families for the holiday company Single With Kids. With only the tiniest trepidation, a smidgen of worry and a vague concern about group politics, I agreed. 

I don’t often write about being a single parent, yet it’s a subject I know a fair amount about. My family now nestles in it’s fourth generation of female led single parents, acquired through death, abandonment and sheer absence. I have brought up my children as a two parent family, a single parent family, a step family and as a single parent again. I have been a step child and a step parent. I have been the child of a single parent in the 1970’s with all of it’s condemnation, lack of emotional articulation and hidden and not so hidden social structures that isolated and excluded those who sat outside what was then perceived of as the norm. In my previous career, I have also worked extensively with families in distress, abandoned families and families so broken they are unlikely to ever mend.

The experiences of single parents are so often categorised as though we are one homogeneous group in society operating within the same frameworks and experiences, a ‘group’ identified usually for the purpose of blame, vilification and as scapegoats for societies ills and dysfunctions, popping up in Daily Mail headlines as and when required.

Spending some time in an entire group of men and women, who sit inside the single parent spectrum has been inspiring. Watching everyone getting up and getting on with it, smiling, enjoying, loving their children no matter how exhasuted they feel brings a sense of pride at the sheer strength possessed in order to do this incredibly mammoth task. Listening to all the different stories of hurt, joy, recovery and determination is an honour.

The people here have families with one, two and three children, mostly with sole repsonsibility for their children, some with 50/50. The ages of the children range from 2 years to nearly 15 years and all of us are hard working, dedicated and committed to the bringing up of the next generation.

In the lift on the way to write to this, I said to one of the parents I was on my way to go and do a little blogging about single parents. He asked me if I’d made any general observations and I replied yes I have, I think we’re all amazing!

Why write?

Emotional Health, Personal Development, Recovery

For those of you who know me well, you’ll know that I use writing for healing. When I’m sad, I write. When I’m happy, I write. When I’m confused, hurt, elated, I write. On the workshops I co-run with Kirsten at the Retreat, we talk about this as ‘journaling’, which essentially means carrying a blank book and a pen  around with you everywhere you go and writing in it whenever you have feelings, thoughts hopes and desires.  Getting these thoughts down on paper, wherever you may be, whenever you may want to, is well known for being beneficial for self-healing.

I can often be found in a shop leaning into my journal, pen in hand, scribbling while walking, trying not to drop my bags,  gazing into the air as I search for the words to explain whatever feelings or thoughts I have just identified within myself. Sometimes I am inspired by a lyric or sometimes by a book I’ve seen or a conversation I’ve just overheard. Sometimes I just become acutely aware of my own malady and need to try and make sense of it…

Why do we recommend journaling?

  • Measuring distance travelled. Writing is a great record of what you’ve dealt with and how far you’ve come.
  • Reduction of symptoms of depression.  Self-expression via a journal is a great aid for releasing pain, deepening understanding/gaining clarity and insight and clearing confusion.
  • It aids the process of the articulation of your emotional world, your feelings and therefore self-expression.
  • It can be a tool that enables us to learn how to be honest with ourselves and therefore others.
  • It unloads your thoughts which clears your mind.
  • It can reduce anxiety as the written word can allow a perspective to develop of the bigger picture as opposed to the whirring of negativity that can precipitate an anxiety attack.

Some people make space every day to write, like first thing in the morning before everyone is awake. Some people just write when the mood takes them. Some people write when they are distressed. It really matters not. All I can say, is that if you are on any kind of journey of awareness and you would like to heighten your understanding of where you at, have a record of how far you travel and enjoy some of the benefits mentioned, then go and buy a lovely journal, stick it in your bag, make sure you have a pen and start the process. Happy writing….

 

A tribute to Amy…

Alcoholism, Mental Health, News, Personal Development, Recovery, Relationships

I am in the business of personal development, self-development, self-awareness, recovery, whatever you want to call it, this is how I choose to live and it is also how I choose to make a living. We had an amazing day running a Get back Your Mojo return workshop where we have the privilege of seeing the distance that people have travelled since they attended the first workshop. It is humbling, empowering, learning and fills me with positivity and hope.

I got into this business of personal growth through my alcoholism, a double edged vehicle that takes us to wherever it takes us and it carted me right into an AA meeting over 20 years ago.  I not only haven’t had a drink or drug since, but I was lucky enough to be so completely destroyed by it all that I had to break my entire self down into little pieces and start all over again.

Today I arrived home to the news of Amy Winehouse, a woman who I distinctly remember saying to my son that if she carried on her path of addiction and continued to say no no no to rehab, she would be dead within a few years – that was a few months ago, and at the age of 27, she was today found dead on the floor of her flat, alone.

I cry for her as I have cried for everyone that I have lost through alcohol and drug addiction. When you go to AA, death from drinking and drugging unfortunately becomes something that inevitably happens, whether it’s suicide because life is to just unbearable for some or liver failure, it’s all the same thing. The unbearable pain of life numbed through addiction, oblivion and behaviour that justifies the madness.

As a Social Worker, I lost three young people I worked closely with to drug overdoses in one form or another across a  five year span. I cry for them too. As a friend, I lost someone I got sober with at the beginning of my recovery because he was so drunk, he thought he could dive from a cliff, except there was barely any water for him to jump in to. I cry for him.

It’s always so much more tragic I think watching someone publicly destroy themselves, watching someone want to die and show the world their pain through the eyes of a glass bottle. I loved Amy singing, I especially loved her singing on Jools Holland singing with Paul Weller, I heard It through The Grapevine.

Our modern day Billie Holiday maybe? I’m not sure that we can compare, but she was nevertheless in pain, unable to do ‘this thing called life’ like Billie who was heavily addicted to heroin but somehow made it to 44 years old. But as with a lot of public destructions that lie in front of us, baring all for us to see, we are left with something. Amy left us with some beautiful music. Thank you for dropping by this life and leaving us something special Amy and may you rest peacefully and safely….