(see Part One: Steel yourself, look away from the belly button and cut some cords)
3. Express gratitude.
When you consciously count your blessings (I mean daily), you reset your focus to looking for the good in the world. This is not a one-way ticket to Pollyanna-ville, people. It's retraining your attitude. The world can throw its worst possible ever crap at you, and you can't control that. But you CAN control how to deal with it. And attitude is how that happens.
Take a journal (or make a digital journal) and spend 5-10 minutes a night sharing what you are grateful for. Need prompts? I have included a list of prompts below. We often forget all the awesome things that we encounter in the course of a day; a short list makes these easier to recall.
List of Gratitude prompts (feel free to cut and paste onto a sheet of paper and insert into your journal)
- Identify people who made me smile or laugh or feel great today... and share why
- Describe something beautiful you encountered in nature today
- Did you notice any "missing" symptoms or side effects today? Celebrate them here!
- What or who inspired you today?
- What sensory experiences were pleasurable for you today? Food, fragrance, touch, music, imagery, textures, sounds, spoken word
- What media experiences were pleasurable for you today? Movies, television, podcasts, online activities, games
- What social experiences were pleasurable for you today? Face time with friends, silliness online, family togetherness, special occasion or holiday, interaction at work, conversations with perfect strangers
- What physical experiences were pleasurable for you today? Physical therapy, walking, trip to the gym, yoga class, bicycle ride, dancing, work
- What soulful experiences were pleasurable for you today? Meditation, creative expression, attending a holy place, chanting, prayer
- What terrible things have happened elsewhere that have made you grateful for what you have today?
- What did you do today that made someone else happy?
- What did you make today that was original? Cooking, artistic composition, gardening, construction
- What places did you visit today which inspired or nurtured you?
- Name one simple pleasure or success you encountered today... could be a "good hair" day or hitting all green lights on the way to an appointment or seeing the trees budding for the first time
- What parts of your body, mind or soul worked extremely well today?
- What relaxation activities helped you today... could be yoga or listening to music or taking a lavender bath or even having a martini or going to a comedy club, as long as it left you feeling better afterward
- What do you like about your house today? your neighborhood? your town? your region? your state? your country?
- What animals left a positive impression on you today?
- What do you have today that you cannot live without?
- What gifts were given or received by you today?
- What challenges today gave you insight into your inner strength?
- If you had a really rough day, try to find one good thing that happened all day. Big or small, write it down and tell it "Thank You."
- What activity did you do today that you feel you are not good at, but you enjoyed anyway?
- What challenged you today and how did you overcome that challenge (if not completely, then partially... making an effort and failing is STILL progress, after all)
- Did you experience a triumph over some aspect of your MS today? What was it?
4. Go outside and play.
Great advice NOT ONLY for children. Fresh air, sunlight, even the diffuse light that presses through overcast skies is nurturing for your mental health. Dress for bad weather. Just do it. Even if only for 5 minutes. Or if you can't go out in it, drive in it. Ride in it. The point is to leave your house, even if you just go sit on your back porch.
Being out in nature daily (or even just leaving your house to go to the store!) is really crucial to keeping positive. It's a huge mood booster. It means that we might have to clean up, make ourselves presentable, which also has the impact of making us feel more put together, like a good hair day. If you're having a good hair day, do you stay inside? No! You go out and show it off!
I always used to cringe at the quote that a woman need only put on lipstick to feel better, but now I know the inherent truth behind that idea: if you prepare to go out into the world, you WILL go out into the world. If you hang around in pajamas all day, what are the chances? Next to nil.
Related to this are two other dynamic options for MSers:
EXERCISING is hard when you are fatigued and/or in pain. Find even the lightest exercise possible and just do that. It's still better than not exercising at all. If you find yourself sitting all day or laying on the couch, and you have mobility, get up and walk around. Break up your idleness with trips to the laundry room to do a load or two, a trip to the kitchen to put some dishes away, or a trip to the bedroom to make the bed and put stuff away in your closet, or a trip to the mailbox, or a trip to the backyard to pull up some carrots. Find an activity and DO IT. I would rather do any activity with earbuds crammed into my head, listening to comedy podcasts, so that's one way I get myself going.
The point is to mix things up so you aren't prone and bedridden unnecessarily. Many MSers cannot move about, for sure, but many CAN, yet don't. They are afraid to, because they anticipate pain, discomfort or unpleasant side effects getting in the way. I know I hate to imagine going for a fast walk where there isn't a bathroom nearby. I've been stuck out in the middle of nowhere with a major urge before, and so I either walk in parks or downtown where I know of public restrooms, or I go to the woods and walk and, well, pretend that I'm a bear when nature calls and go off trail. (Haven't been caught yet.) Fanny packs, however unfashionable, are useful for preparing for this, by the way.
I'm not asking you to go out and run a marathon here. I'm saying, okay, if you feel like you need to stay where you are because you have digestive problems, then walk up and down the stairs every hour. Do some spinal twists. Practice some breathing exercises. Lift some canned goods like weights while sitting and watching TV. Go out in the garage and jump rope, counting as high as you can until you can't jump anymore.
JUST. DO. SOMETHING.
PLAYING GAMES is a better way to view activity for me. I hate exercise and the idea of the gym, but I love games. I'm more likely to exercise if I'm playing volleyball or trying jumprope tricks or challenging myself with Wii yoga or going for a swim at the beach or meeting my husband at the pickleball court. I'm headed to Hawaii soon and think I will give paddleboarding a shot.
Other kinds of games matter, as well. Board games. Game shows. Brain games played on your iPhone. Jigsaw puzzles, crosswords, Sudoku, card games. Yard games like lawn bowling or bean bag toss or badminton. They could be social games or solo games. They could be games that take forever or are ongoing, like Dungeons & Dragons, or they could be quick dice games played at a local coffee shop while you wait for someone to join you.
Games are about having fun, testing your skills, flirting with chance, overcoming obstacles, creative problem solving, laughing and achieving escape.
5. Shut up and get out of the way.
Sometimes we can be our own worst enemies. Try to notice any negative self-talk you engage in. It could be something you mutter under your breath, or it could be a self-deprecating comment you make in jest before a group of friends, or it could be a "voice" in your head telling you that you aren't good enough, healthy enough, smart enough, worthy enough, etc. Stop doing this. Consciously, even vocally, express it like this: "Stop it!" Don't judge yourself, don't feel bad if if happens. Just acknowledge it's there, then tell it to leave. You will, eventually, stop the negative self-talk once you are aware of it.
Getting out of your own way is a similar activity. We often stand in our own way, mostly out of fear. We decide that we can't exercise because it will hurt, for example, or we decide we are too old to learn something new, or we decide we aren't the best at something, so we quit doing it altogether. What we need to do is just do it anyway. Go to the gym anyway or take that walk. Go lightly. Don't overdo it. Just do it. Or... take a beginning foreign language class or start playing a new instrument. Expect failure. Expect to learn differently from your younger counterparts. Just do it. Or... learn to accept that we can't be perfect at anything and remember that it's the journey and not the destination that matters. Do your best at a task, and practice admiration for others who do it better. Share what you know with someone who is not as good at you.
Every day, you can decide you aren't strong enough or smart enough to go after something you want. What's stopping you? Well... you! Tell the hesitant You to move out of the way and just go for it anyway. Expect to make mistakes. Laugh at yourself if you do. Give yourself a brownie button later, regardless whether your efforts are met with success. Trying matters.
Inertia is a huge part of passive living, and it's often accompanied by fear. If there's something you are afraid to do, write it down. In example, write: I AM AFRAID TO ASK FOR HELP. Then, speak it out loud: "I am afraid to ask for help." Then write: I AM GOING TO ASK FOR HELP ANYWAY. Then, speak it out loud. "I am going to ask for help anyway." Do this enough times and you will find you are less and less afraid to ask for help and more and more comfortable with actually doing so.
I love the Paradoxical Commandments, which are related to this idea that we should just look askance at fear and do the things we are driven to do anyway. Check them out here.
6. Let go of the Old You, embrace the New You
The pre-diagnosis You is no longer You, it is a figment of your past experience which may lend great wisdom to things you do now or will do in the future. However, it is no longer You. You are a new person, reborn with a new reality.
No, you didn't get to pick the reality, but so what? When someone loses a loved one, they are also a new person, and they didn't choose that either. This is LIFE. There are lots of things that happen to people unexpectedly, and they can all either SUCK or they can be life defining in a way that can be made positive, as long as you embrace the opportunities inherent in any kind of change.
MS is not an excuse to just wallow in the past and not move forward. Instead, you need to look at what this New You has to offer. Not just as a worker-bee or fulfilling any other role to any other person or organization. You very likely have had to step out of these arenas and/or roles partially or completely. But the New You has valuable insights, experience, ideas, talents that can still be applied toward making the world a better place.
Sometimes someone will say that an MS diagnosis can really be thought of as a gift. And when someone says that in an MS forum, they are sometimes shot down by others who think it's ridiculous that any kind of diagnosis for any kind of chronic health condition could ever possibly be considered a gift.
But I do think that change is about opportunity as much as it's about loss. Yes, I have grieved over the idea that many of my life's dreams might be wiped out by this diagnosis, because that is what you do when you grieve. You let loss and impermanence roll around in your heart a while until something comes and flushes it out and then you move on. That something is usually an amalgamation of the highest of concepts: hope. Hope does return after loss, and if you can nab some, you need to stitch it to your soul so as not forget that it's always there, just in case.
Hope and dreams... these are not just abstractions, they are the seeds of anything we can aim for, goals, a horizon we build for our life's path. We just have to harvest them wherever we can and plant them when the time is right... usually after a period of fallow grief.
Why not embark on your life's path by making yourself a revised Bucket List of things you want to do or experience, places you want to visit, people you want to meet or spend more time with? You'll be surprised to find that the vast majority of things on this Bucket List are still achievable even if you have MS. Maybe some will not be 100% attainable--like, say, climbing a mountain--but you might take a training course in how to do this, or you might shoot for a similar goal, like hiking in the mountains overnight. Wouldn't it still be cool to hike in the mountains overnight, even if you couldn't climb the mountains outright? I think so.
The act of surrendering to a new reality can be challenging, I know. But once you realize that holding on to the past doesn't change the present, you'll encounter a sense of liberation. Clinging to the Old You is rather like tossing yourself into a huge bonfire, eating up all your energy, leaving only a few pathetic ashes to witness you were ever there. Don't do that to yourself. Step away from that fire, hold on to the flames that are perpetually kindled in your heart, your mind, your gut... you have everything you need within you to use these little flames to inspire new directions for the New You. It might mean getting some help from a counselor or therapist, but so be it. If you can arm yourself with the powers that the New You holds, you can live a ginormously enriching life.
Coming tomorrow, Part 3: Worry, uncertainty, permission to be grumpy and choosing the life you want
