Lutgard Musiime

Uncle Google describes self care as any activity that we do deliberately in order to take care of our mental, emotional, and physical health. Good self–care is key to improved mood and reduced anxiety.

Day 6 of the #UgBlog Month required me to write what I do for self care and because this COVID thing has got to me, I will not limit my self care to these times of the pandemic.

So what do I do deliberately to take care of my mental, emotional and physical health? If you have not noticed yet, the key word here is deliberate. First and fore most one of my parents gave us a very important (in my eyes) strain in our DNA. My brothers and I have the capability to block out issues as long as we decide to. We shall be in the middle of the ‘fire’ and as long as we have told our brain not to feel the heat, life will go on as usual. Now in my self care routine, this is something I use the most. If I sense even the slightest indication of a stressful event happening or about to happen, I will BLOCK it out. Sometimes I also worry if that doesn’t make me insensitive but I use it a lot to protect my mental or emotional health.

Anyone here loves to journal? I have done my best to promote journaling among all my close friends. Sometimes I have to catch myself because I find myself preaching the same gospel to the same people I already promoted the exercise to. I do not know whether it is because I live by myself or because I love to talk (write) and I end up doing this with the pen and paper. Slightly different from keeping a diary and writing the step by step events of the day, I usually journal as a form of communication to God. So as I pray, I will tell Him about some outrageous idea I thought about, something that made me so happy, a thing that upset me or disappointed me and so on. This is most probably the safest thing I feel I do because it is the one place I am not worried about being judged. In addition to this, I make use of my own company. If you secretly trailed me, you may find me laughing out loud in my house. No! not because I read or watched something funny on social media or a book or because I have company with me but because I am talking to me and having fun with myself. Sometimes I believe my neighbors think I am a little nuts.

The other thing I more than often do for self care is enjoy good food. What better self care is there other rewarding one’s taste buds? So it is not news when you find me digging into a sumptuous dish. Naturally I am a very slow eater so for my self care I have to get a time when I am not rushing or being rushed to go somewhere or do something. This will be in the company of a good friend and more than likely a beer or whisky will not be far off.

Exercising is a new addition to my self care. Thank God it was made compulsory at my place of work and surprisingly I am one of the people who had not exactly vouched for it, yet I am one of the biggest beneficiaries now. It is one of the the things that has kept me above the waters in these times of confinement. It has been proved over time that constant exercise increases productivity and mental focus and I have lived to taste this.

I am tempted to add laughing to the things I do for self care. I love to ‘teeth’ a lot and I doubt there is a single day that will pass without me displaying my denture. This will be because of something I have read, watched, heard or even thought. I always have to find an opportunity to laugh as this is such a soothing therapy for me. And as a bonus, I love the look of my denture so I do not mind displaying it anytime, any day.

Given these times at hand where personal hygiene has been promoted more than ever, that is something I do not flinch about. Even before this happened, I am a sucker for cleanliness. I will be late for something but if something is not as clean or neat as I want it to be, I will not care to be late. Whether that is a sign of having OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder) I do not know, all I care about is being tidy and being in an environment that is. Sorry I am not sorry.

If you do not have clear ways of what you do for self care, better define them for yourself because guess what? This is going to increase your productivity, improve your resistance to disease, enhance your self esteem, increase self knowledge among others.