Episode Details

Would you like to add to your self-care toolkit by managing life's stresses with more compassion for yourself and others? This new episode is for you.

Full transcript

We can internalise shame about not handling the situation with more grace, and even when it is extreme pressure. Stress can be a good thing. Think about a coal turning into a diamond, or think about a toddler, no one is yelling at that toddler, ‘Toddle! Walk!’ There's that inherent drive within all of us that we want to grow, we want to evolve, we want to learn, we want to develop. And when we're under a good stress, that eustress, that is what's happening, but where it's more distress, as in not de-stressing, but di-stress, it can be really damaging for not just the nervous system, but inflammation conditions and immunity.

Welcome to episode 55 of The Feel Better Every Day Podcast.

I'm your host and producer, Eve Menezes Cunningham, and every Tuesday there's a new episode to help with trauma-informed and VAST / ADHD-friendly Self and self-care ideas to help you connect with that highest, wisest, truest, wildest, most joyful, brilliant, and miraculous part of yourself, and to create a life you don't need to retreat from.

This week we're looking at Stress Awareness Month. As I was reflecting on stress awareness (if you would like to, you can access loads of free resources at selfcarecoaching.net/home/ stress, and they'll support you with stress, helping you understand more about it. There's also a lot in the book, 365 Ways to Feel Better: Self-care Ideas for Embodied Wellbeing, and of course other podcast episodes), I realised that while it's one of my areas of expertise for over two decades, it's especially important for sensitive nervous systems when we're dealing with VAST, also known as ADHD, and trauma recovery.

And there's room for improvement in my own life, even now, and there's, I think we just live in stressful times, it's a completely normal thing.

I realised a few days ago… I'm a BACP media spokesperson, and they'd asked me to contribute some self-care advice for young people navigating stress at work, and as I was writing my answers, advising young people, I was thinking, ‘49 Year Old Me is benefiting from this advice, too!’ Because one of the work projects I'm involved with has been very stressful for a very long time.

As always, I am and remain my first client, and when I realised I was talking to myself as well, it's like, ‘Of course!’ And it makes sense when I think about the ADHD, when I think about the trauma history, when I think about being an immigrant myself, when I think about being the daughter of immigrants, being the granddaughter of immigrants: We can know in our bones that something is too much pressure for someone, anyone else, but somehow when it's us, we can internalise shame about not handling the situation with more grace, and even when it is extreme pressure.

Stress can be a good thing. Think about a coal turning into a diamond, or think about a toddler, no one is yelling at that toddler, ‘Toddle! Walk!’ There's that inherent drive within all of us that we want to grow, we want to evolve, we want to learn, we want to develop. And when we're under a good stress, that eustress, that is what's happening, but where it's more distress, as in not de-stressing, but di-stress, it can be really damaging for not just the nervous system, but inflammation conditions and immunity.

I've got the tail end of a cold, and it's like really funny, because I was thinking to myself, ‘My immunity is great! Because I'm taking really good care of myself!’ And then I came down with this bug. But it is another sign of stress. The body takes too much, and then it goes into needing that time for recovery.

We know from Polyvagal Theory that we're wired to thrive when we feel safe, welcome, and loved. Asking yourself if there’s any situation in your life, or any rela