Living Your Best Life: Reducing Stress – Relieving Symptoms
Having been diagnosed with an autoimmune disease, or any other chronic disease, if you are like me, the next step is to figure out how to live your best life. Our quality of life is rarely thought about until something changes that quality. For me, the substantial change was not having the energy to do all I wanted and to find a way to deal with the relentless, generalized pain (feeling like I am coming down with the flu).
You can take one of the numerous routes available to help you live the life you want, feel better, and be happy despite autoimmune disease(s), or other chronic illnesses. There is no ‘one size fits all’ when it comes to our health and achieving our goals. In this article I am touching on one possibility: HeartMath (TM).
HeartMath (TM)
I don’t remember how I discovered HeartMath (TM), but I am grateful I did. I have been practicing HeartMath (TM) for several years and have found it beneficial to my physical, emotional, and mental well-being.
Being diagnosed with an autoimmune disease was not the reason I started practicing HeartMath techniques. I became a Certified HeartMath Mentor and Coach to help myself and others enhance their health and relieve stress. I have gotten valuable information and recently decided that sharing this information with those who have autoimmune diseases is long overdue. HeartMath helps us manage stress. Remember, stress can worsen the symptoms of autoimmune diseases.
What is Stress?
We all have stress; it is something we experience every day. We have big stressors i.e. illness, death, debt, and divorce that lead to negative emotions. But happy, positive events can also be stressful i.e. weddings, birthday parties, graduation, a new job, or other celebrations. The body doesn’t differentiate between big stress or little stress, or between happy stress, or troublesome stress. We experience stress many times during the day, and it all begins with a flow of 1400 biochemical events in our body. We don’t notice most of these because we get used to them e.g. traffic on the way to work, that one annoying person in the office, or the kids being kids. For me, technology problems often start me on a path of frustration (an indicator of stress), which often leads to anger (another indicator of stress). Stress takes a toll on your immune system, so take time to learn how to manage your stress – at least most of the time. Even if you don’t think you have much stress in your life, chances are you can decrease the negative effects on your body by practicing some simple techniques to put you in control. Unchecked stress will age you prematurely, your cognitive function will become impaired, your energy will be drained (I don’t need anything that drains my energy), and you will become less effective, and your clarity of thought will be impaired (https://www.heartmath.com/blog/health-and-wellness/how-stress-affects-the-body/
Effects of Unchecked Stress
premature aging
impaired cognitive function
decrease energy
impaired thought processes
Ideally, we will manage stress in the moment. There are techniques available to help with this. One that I especially like is Heart-Focused-Breathing and The Quick Coherence Technique(R). This is a simple technique that can be done anywhere, anytime. I recommend doing this twice a day, but initially do it more often so that it becomes an automatic response to stressful situations. Sometimes, I didn’t think this was doing much good, then I would miss a day and that was when I would notice the difference.
Identifying our stressors can be difficult because we have learned to just live with them. If you need additional work to uncover your stressors check out HeartMath’s Depletion to Renewal Grid(R) which is a good way to determine where your stress level is at any given time. For starters, I suggest you plot your stress one or more times a day for about a week – but longer if you would like. The goal is to be as close to centre as possible. However, remember that our lives are constantly changing and we want to embrace all the changes and ups and downs. We want to know that we can handle the tough parts as well as the up times.
If you are someone who meditates keep it up. The HeartMath(TM) experience is a bit different and you might want to do both. You don’t need to be on your own or in a quiet place to do Heart-Focused-Breathing(R). Take time to find ways to relax and restore your energy.
Self-Care
Self-care is not selfish; it is a must for health and well-being. If you are like me, you ignored self-care for many years by working hard, taking on more, and helping others, because you thought that was what you were supposed to do, or maybe a bit of FOMO (fear of missing out). But by not taking care of yourself you eventually wear out and are forced to slow down. That is something our autoimmune diseases have done to us – forced us to slow down. I was stubborn and didn’t slow down enough, or take the best care of myself until I developed cancer. By the time cancer set in I didn’t have a choice, I couldn’t do much, let alone too much.
Self-care involves nutrition, activity, sleep, managing your stress, having a support system, and embracing your spirituality. Self-care means looking after all of you. We cannot separate our physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual health – what happens to one affects all the others. This might sound overwhelming. You do not have to make big changes all at once. Start slow, with small changes, and keep going. You want to do what you need and be successful. With each success, you can celebrate and take the next step. Don’t let yourself become overwhelmed. Overwhelm can come on unexpectedly as we try to make changes to improve our health.
Make a point of taking some time for you every day. A few minutes of breathwork with the Quick Coherence Technique and Heart-Focused-Breathing can be good place to start. But if that doesn’t work for you find something that does work for you.
I found this “Self-Care Menu”. Give a few of these things a try during the week or the weekend. The suggestions are good for anyone, any time.
What’s Next
Watch for more blogs about other things you can try to live a better life, despite autoimmune disease. One step at a time, one day at a time. You deserve to be well and to have a beautiful life. Check out some of the Resources on my website for more information and options for improving your health.
You are in control!
