Self Care Routines ft. Steve and Kristen

Steve celebrates episode 175 by welcoming back his sober sibling, Kristen R, to discuss self care routines!

Topics discussed include:

• Our concepts and resentments about self-care before sobriety
• The important of routine in early sobriety
• Embracing new ideas and forms of self-care
• How much self-care is too much
• The perfect day
• And much more!

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Transcript

Steve: 0:54

Hi everyone, and welcome to Gay A, a podcast about sobriety for the queer community and our allies. I'm your host, Steve Bennett Martin. I'm an alcoholic and addict, and I am grateful for my self care routine. As of this recording, I am 963 days sober, and today we're welcoming back my sober sibling, Kristen, so that we can dive into our complicated relationships with our self care routines. Welcome back, Kristen! Thanks, Steve.

Kristen: 1:20

Thanks for having me. It's nice to be back.

Steve: 1:23

Yes, I was getting near a big round number of the 175 and I was like, that means it's been like 25 episodes since you've been on. So you have to come back.

Kristen: 1:32

Absolutely.

Steve: 1:34

Wow. What's been new with you the past 25 weeks? The past

Kristen: 1:38

25 weeks. Well, I've really perfected my self care routine. Yeah, it's been an intense five months. I got back to work. The strike ended. My dad has had some serious health problems. So that's been kind of a main thing that's been going on. And, yeah, it's been an intense five months. That was hard, but other than that, I'm doing pretty well. Meetings, work, friends, routine,

Steve: 2:01

you know. Yeah. It's been great helping you along the way and being there for each other since we're, sober siblings cause if I have 963 days, does that mean you have 960 days?

Kristen: 2:13

That's correct. I just checked it on my app since I knew you would ask or you would bring it. Yeah.

Steve: 2:19

And we've been talking on our own about our self care routines for a while now. What kind of prompted you to talk more, look into more of what your self care looked like?

Kristen: 2:33

Well, I feel like it was a conversation with you, right? Cause I did, I don't know if there's like crossover, but you helped me do a kind of start of the new year, assess where you are and where you want to go kind of thing. And it was really, and we drew, a map of our lot of our lives with sort of each aspect, like health and family and friends. And it was really. helpful. And it was also really clear to me that I'm putting in a lot of effort and energy and time into stuff like health and meditation and meetings and all this stuff that I would sort of call health care. I would call self care. But it's maybe a little bit disproportionate with somewhat less energy going into things like work and dating and that kind of stuff. And I didn't know, and we had an interesting conversation about it, like how you Is that right for where I am right now in sobriety in my life? Is it should I be trying to rearrange it? I don't know. So that was a really helpful conversation for me. And it got me thinking about self care and then we both compared how much time we spend every day doing what one might call self care and it is many hours.

Steve: 3:44

Yeah, and that's one thing that I've discovered as well. Doing my own self care as I realized that for so long so much of my sobriety between the podcast Being a chair of like a nightly home group Doing service with GSM like I was doing so much sobriety for other people That I wasn't really doing much sobriety stuff for me That was about me as well as just While I was also working a full time job at the time I wasn't really taking care of myself Or doing the things that made me happy as much and it showed after a while. So with my new lifestyle change I've also been taking care of myself more and I've learned though that when you Really lean into it and you let yourself take care of yourself And it feels really good that after a while it becomes a matter of is this enough self care? Is this too much self care? What is? It's too much self care and I guess that that's something that's different for everyone because maybe it's just the right amount of self care and it's just how much we need. So I figured that would be a good topic to talk about is like, what is the right amount of self care versus what might be more gluttonous or, you know, diving into the pleasure principles that we should be avoiding. I

Kristen: 4:51

mean, I think for me, one thing that's really different. And has started feeling different this year, especially in sobriety, is that for as long as I was an adult while I was drinking stuff, the things that people call self care didn't feel good. And it actually made me angry when people talk about self care, because cooking for myself, say, or cleaning my apartment or making myself food, or even buying myself new clothes, like, anything that involves sort of taking care of myself felt. dismal and uncomfortable and something that I was only doing because for some reason we were all supposed to, we'd all like, society had demanded that we have clean houses and that we brush our hair but like if I had my way I would be curled up in a bed drinking or zoned out in front of television. Do you know what I mean? So like when Even just the basics of waking up in the morning, right? Like when even the basics of stealth care started to feel internally rewarding instead of something that was getting forced on me by like guilt. It was so different and felt so amazing that I think it is easy then to just be like, wow, I heard people just doing this all the time. And then it just feels funny and it feels different because it is different. Different doesn't mean bad, but it is really the thing that I feel like has shifted the most for me internally. In sobriety is a totally different set of motivations and rewards. Yeah. What about you? Are you into self care before you got sober?

Steve: 6:31

I would spend hundreds of dollars on alcohol and drugs and say that I have no money to do things like get my hair cut by a professional Right. Or get a manicure or pedicure every once in a blue moon. Yeah. Like I would say I didn't have money for anything, but it's because all my money was going towards the things that I wanted to go to. And even in early recovery, all the money that I was saving went into Lego and then there was a while where, If a video game was on sale on the eShop or on the PlayStation Network that I would be buying these video games and I was like I'll play them eventually I got them while they're on sale, it's 80 percent off, so like that was me. And I was I would say it was self care, but after a while it led to just a library of things that I haven't played yet that might Maybe we'll, one day we'll be self care, but they're probably just going to collect dust because I needed that quick hit of buying something and feeling good over that. And having like the, like the little sounds that they give you when you make the purchase that make you feel really good.

Kristen: 7:28

Yeah. And it's like an important part of that phrase is routine, right? Like that's something that you do every day. Yeah. I loved, yeah, it was the same. I loved a one off splurge. I loved getting the massage or. yeah, buying myself something and that's what I understood as self care. It was none of the like boring kind of, or I thought at the time boring things you do every day. I didn't, anything like that. I was rushing through as fast as I could to get it

Steve: 7:58

over with. Yeah, even before recovery, I didn't know what routine was and even in early recovery, my routine was so structured almost because I needed that, like so structured that as I've needed less structure in my sobriety, like that's when I got dangerous for me was and I was like, okay, I have more room to do fun things. So like that, that's when the video game and the, like the purchasing kind of got out of hand was even in sobriety. But just because I was like, well, this is a fun way to feel good really quickly. And it was just different than when I've like learned and gotten to a routine and it's so funny for me at least The routine the things that I love most about my routine were things that I was feeling I had to do Or that I was forced myself to do at first like, for me, it was the gym. I was like, oh, I'll go once or twice a week for overall health and wellness because my doctor was mentioning that I would need to be on cholesterol medication if I didn't do some sort of physical activity, so it started off being a chore that I had to do, but then I started enjoying it and then I started going way more often than I said I would go and I was going like five or six days a week and I'm like, who needs rest days if you're just doing cardio on your rest days? It's still fun because it feels good and I've liked and enjoyed seeing the results that it's doing for my body and I got an alert on my body. Watch the other day that my resting heart rates gone down like nine beats per minute over the past two months. You know when I went to the doctor, she was like, no, you don't need to be on your cholesterol medication. But now it's not something that I'm doing because I have to it's something that I wake up and I'm excited to do and Yeah, I have to now Evaluate how much time is necessary at the gym for, maximal effect for self care versus what I realized I could spend two or three hours there just if there was a way to. Yeah. I was there two hours today, but that was because I did an hour of cardio and a half hour of weights and I did some tanning because I only do that once a week because I know that that's not the best for you, but it also makes me look very Florida.

Kristen: 9:58

Huh. You look very

Steve: 9:59

Florida. And then I had some time in the sauna afterwards just kind of sitting and closing my eyes and And relaxing and that's where I kind of get to like meditate for a few minutes. but all of a sudden, I left at seven and it was almost 10 30. So yeah, it's funny how the day goes by.

Kristen: 10:16

Yeah. Well, I think you're probably also wrestling with something that I've been wrestling with for a long time. Really my whole adult life. It's been very rare for me to have a full time job where someone else gets my schedule. Like I've always worked. freelance or grad school, in something where like the difficulty is you have to have so much self discipline. And often, I feel some of the guilt you're talking about, one of the things that's so hard is that it sometimes looks like a not that disciplined life. Do you know what I mean? If you have in your mind that Normal people go to the office at 8 and they stay there till 10, you know, or 10. I know how jobs

Steve: 10:57

work. Yeah, I know, I know what hourly wage is.

Kristen: 11:01

Whatever those people do. The point is that you're not, you're generally not working that much. But what you have to do is work at least some amount every day and not collapse into despair or total decrepitude. And it's actually really hard. And, I think. Not everyone can do it. And so I try not to beat myself up too much for just knowing that working from home and setting your own schedule is a skill. And so it sort of counts, no matter, even if in a way that going to an office doesn't require as much like executive function, do you know what I mean? Well, cause once it's done, I mean, it requires it, but like. Whatever. I feel like a mob of people with jobs are going to come and like yell at me. No, I don't think that that will happen. It's just a different set of challenges is what I'm saying. But in some ways I feel like I used to get a kind of high off of working. It was better than being alive. So it was distracting. Do you know what I mean? So I was just like, it was pretty easy for me to want to get really sucked into project. I know I lived the same life, but taking care of myself feels good. And I don't know. And you don't either because you're working and you're trying to figure out your new job. For me, it's all money. It's like if I had infinite resources, I would do my self care all day. Like, I mean, that's just what I would be doing right now. Do you know, and I would not even feel selfish about it because I can tell that I am a better and generous person. When I've done that, it's just, can I do that and pay my rent? Like obviously at least a few hours of that day has to be turned over to. Making money, but how little? I'm on a quest to find out.

Steve: 12:46

Yes, and that's kind of the challenge that I'm going through right now. And, in my coaching program, they went about like, when you're when you're hourly, very much as you're judged off of the amount of work that you do. And when you're an entrepreneur of sorts, or a creator of sorts, that it's the the quality of the work that you put out and how productive you are with the work that you're doing with that. And. that even surgeons, which is an art form in itself for smarty pants, they talk about, these surgeons who are like, Oh, well, I only do surgery on Monday and Thursday afternoons. And, other than that, I'm doing my self care routine. And it's okay.

Kristen: 13:21

My dad's a surgeon, I would be really surprised if there are surgeons who are doing self care routines ever, although maybe, but they certainly don't do surgery. You know what I mean? They have to do a lot of less demanding work.

Steve: 13:33

Okay, well then, now I'm going to have all the surgeons coming after me. I mean, look, if you're a surgeon

Kristen: 13:38

with a great self care routine, please definitely call into the podcast because everybody wants to hear from you. But I think the point is well taken, though. That, like, you can't perform at your, like, absolute best

Steve: 13:51

for eight hours a day. Eight hours a day. Yeah, and that's the thing that I've learned. And at the same time, Just because I'm doing self care doesn't mean that, I'm also not thinking about my work or what I'm going to be doing later as I zen out with some of my best ideas, like how I'm as I'm coming out of a meditation or as I'm running on the treadmill I was able to get home today and I knew exactly what I was going to do for the next 45 minutes of creative work because I already all had it like mapped out in my brain because it was while I was doing it. So, yeah,

Kristen: 14:17

no, I mean, I will delude myself into believing this for as long as I can, but it does feel true that I'm, writing much faster and better in a shorter amount of time. Not just since I've gotten sober, but since I've instituted this routine. I've always believed, and this is long before I was sober. Or was living my life in any kind of reasonable fashion, but I still think that was right, that the worst thing you can do when you're trying to make something creative happen is force yourself, to say, like, the second it starts to feel like, Oh, my God, if I, like, can't write this, I'm going to die, you'd get up and go for a walk, like, do not just sit there suffering, it will have a counter Effect. So, I believe in, I believe in getting ideas on the treadmill.

Steve: 15:09

Yeah. I mean, what does your self care routine look like on a perfect day? Oh my

Kristen: 15:13

god.

Steve: 15:16

Let's say, let's say even just like, let's say it's a day off. What is your ideal self care day off work

Kristen: 15:21

look like? I also don't really have days off. Like my perfect day actually involves an hour or two of work. So I'm always aiming for that, but two hours of work a day, like so yeah, my perfect day is I wake up at about seven 30. I read and I do my morning pages, so it's like journaling then I, and this is a lot is reason I should say because of the strike, I suddenly had all this time and I felt like I was losing it. So I created this like super powered routine and now I'm like, not willing to give up. So yeah, so yeah, I wake up, I drink my coffee, I write my morning pages. I do 10 minutes of morning yoga, then I took a voice class, ridiculous, but there's like a warm up exercises that you can do for your voice. So, also don't judge my voice, I've only taken one class, it's complicated, but I do that, do that, do those exercises, which do help you get into your body. Then I meditate. Then I shower and get dressed and kind of clean up a little and then I make, and I make breakfast and then, and usually I have this little keyboard that I've been playing and while the, like, egg is cooking, I like, play my, I practice piano, because heaven, I'm like a lady in the kitchen. Like an aristocratic lady in like in the 1800s. I play the piano, then I do my like AA readings and then I do Al Anon, so I have Al Anon readings too, and then I kind of ease into, I do the Artist's Way. Do you know the Artist's Way? Yeah oh my god, it's so good. Everybody who's listening to this should find the Artist's Way. It's essentially a 12 step program for creativity and writing. And so I finished that book, but I have a kind of Routine that I do connected to that, which involves I read a poem and I listened to a song I've never listened to before. Like I'm just so blissful. It's a perfect day. And then I write for a couple hours and then my work day is over and I try to make a phone call, go outside and do an errand. What comes next? I try to exercise. Honestly, exercise is like. the hardest. I haven't been able to get it fully into the routine. It's still fun. It feels like work and a lot of times it slides away. Then I go to a meeting, kick around for a while, do some evening yoga, call my sponsor, write my sentence up and go to bed. What a life. What a fucking life.

Steve: 18:07

Yeah, no, it is. And I don't see anything wrong with that. If you're able to get everything done and pay the bills while living that life, it's a beautiful life. I

Kristen: 18:16

mean, it's like, am I though? I don't know. I mean, I don't know. I haven't been living it that long. Lots of things often intervene. You know, there are many days when that can't be what I do. I have to have a bunch of meetings. I have to send a bunch of emails. I mean, there's like a million things, but I guess I do think it is nice to have an ideal day in your head that you're always kind of aiming for, even if many or even most times, life intervenes. And so that is my perfect day. That's the day I'm always trying to have whether or not basically. Yeah. What about

Steve: 18:48

you? It's just been interesting to see like how many never things that I'd like recently have been open to, now part of my weekly self care routine is going to church with my husband, which for both my husband and my and myself months ago would have been wild. But I also know that when I got sober and learned like the concept of a higher power of my understanding, I was open to finding the right church again, as long as it was inclusive and welcoming opening. But I also worked my previous job on Sundays. And so that was always my excuse of like, why not to go? Well, not necessarily an excuse, but also like, I could have also not worked every Sunday I chose to. So

Kristen: 19:31

it's hard if you can't. Routine is something you of. Yeah. And so if you can't predict your schedule, it is really hard to say.

Steve: 19:39

Yeah. But yeah, my first Sunday off, I was like, I'm going to church and he was like, you have fun. But I went to this one that he recommended. He's like, I hear that they're cool. And I went and I was like, nothing like that. I heard there was against anything that I learned about my higher power and my program and they were welcoming and I, you know. He came with me the next week and we're going out to dinner tonight with the pastor and his wife, which is again, like a phrase that I never thought I would ever say, but it's because I've learned that I can even, I like my perfect self care routine, getting kind of back to that. Like, I don't even know what it would be like six months or a year from now. Cause I'm learning that I'm open to more things than I ever. Thought that I was before I had even in sobriety at a lot of rules about myself and like how I need to live my life and how it should be and what I need to do and what I can and can't do. And as I'm learning, the more I don't follow like any rules and just like live myself, like it all feels like I'm on the right track and might not, Look that way on paper to some people and I'm sure on the outside. Some people have been like, is Steve okay? But like the answer is like, I'm also, yes, I'm okay. But I'm also like better than I ever have been before in a lot of ways, but it's because of a mix of just living my authentic life, but also just taking care of myself. That's self care. You know, if I can't do the gym in the morning because I'm working with clients, I'll do it at night. And then at night, like, there's Zumba classes and things like that, which again are fun, and I get to network at the same time with other people. And learning that I can also have my self care routine be flexible, and that just because you mess up one Part of something that you don't have to give up on your routine either.

Kristen: 21:15

Yeah. The number is a lesson I've really needed to take in and maybe haven't fully yet. I feel like I'm constantly afraid it's going to get taken away from me because they feel so much better than I did. Then I'm like, but it can't last. And what's going to happen when inevitably my life changes and I need to work harder and I can't do this. What am I going to feel the way I used to, instead of the way I feel now. And I think just having faith that, this routine evolved around my life as it currently is, which is the life, in some ways, I was so upset when there was the strike, and I wasn't working as much, and now I'm like, life is so amazing, now that I'm not working as much, of all, how terrible it will be if I got, like, a full time job and have to stop doing it, you know what I mean? So, like, I can just have a little bit of faith that I'll adapt to that, the way that I adapted. To what happened before, which didn't seem like a good thing the way my life changed to open up more time to move this way. And I talked to my therapist about it the other day too wondering, and I don't know the answer, but it's something I think about I definitely, in addition to sobriety and alcoholism, have some mental health stuff, and there was a point where it was really helpful to me to think about, Myself is working part time kind of on purpose with the idea that I was focusing on sobriety and meditation and therapy and all this other stuff. In the hopes that it would improve, that it would heal like a broken leg would heal. So that this fact that I need to do this much now doesn't mean that I need to do it in the future. But doing it right now will eventually save me time. And I think that there's a part of me, even hearing me say that, that makes me feel like, Oh yeah, I may I have just, like, the Protestant work ethic. Like, so grounded to me that I can't I don't really dare to believe that I'm being unproductive. I'm just saying, oh, I'll be more productive in the future if I can just rest now. Which like, maybe I could just not do that. And be like, it's okay to have other goals other than achieving things. But yeah, I don't know. Right. That's a lot of like words around something that honestly isn't a problem. It's going great. And so yeah, everything changes. But for right now, things

Steve: 23:32

are pretty good. Yeah, and I think we just have to be okay with things being okay, which can be the hardest part of sobriety is that I'm almost always like, all right When's the other shoe gonna drop because I can have my morning fitness and then I can have my like midday Checking in and texting fellows and things and I can have my nightly meetings and that could be a great routine to get me through and it's okay that that's maybe five hours of the day because I'm awake for like 15 16 hours and I do awesome amazing other things the rest of the day

Kristen: 24:03

too. And also, how much bullshit. I check my phone a lot on this. When I'm working like this. I still play some video games, but I play a lot less. it's just like the amount of bullshit that was built into my app, do the average day cannot really be overstated. And I don't think I'm the only person. Do you know what I mean? I think the crud of contemporary life. It's pretty profound. So, if you scrape that all away, there is actually a lot of time to Meditate and go to the gym.

Steve: 24:31

As you're saying that, I'm like, yeah, I've been playing a lot less video games, so chances are half of this time that I spend at the gym that I'm so worried about taking away from my work is probably time that I'm just spending instead of playing video games. So why am I beating myself up over it? I

Kristen: 24:45

know. I know

Steve: 24:48

that's what we needed. I had you come on just for this breakthrough for me. Thank you listeners for coming on my journey because I

Kristen: 24:55

really believe that it's true.

Steve: 24:58

So any final thoughts on self care?

Kristen: 25:03

No, I feel like you really closed it out perfectly with that realization. The guilt that like comes with spring in your ear, just it's. Who can say, maybe there's someone listening on this podcast who like, truly is sober and so self indulgent in the way that they're taking care of themselves that it's really a problem, but I bet not. I bet every single person who is listening to this, you should feel good about your self care. I

Steve: 25:32

was gonna say, cause yeah, I'm caring more for people right now than I normally do as I'm caring for myself more, so.

Kristen: 25:38

Exactly, like, whatever. Question, I guess I would just say. Question the other parts of your life first and if you've gone through all of it and there's no wasted time Then maybe go back and be like, oh, yeah, it's my self care that needs to get cut back. But if you're yeah still Spending three hours on the phone. Hello me or you know, or whatever you're good

Steve: 26:03

Well, thank you so much it's been a pleasure as always Kristen

Kristen: 26:07

Yeah. Thank you. It's a

Steve: 26:08

blast. Yes. And listeners, make sure you follow the podcast on Instagram at gayapodcast. And we also have a Facebook page that gets the same stuff that I put on Instagram. And for more time with Kristen and me, head on over to our Patreon page. Where we'll discuss something, a mystery surprise for all of you patrons. So head on over there and follow us wherever you're listening now before you leave so you can get new episodes every Thursday. Until next time, stay sober friends.