What a year it has been!
2020 has been a hell of a year with the health pandemic, too many COVID-related deaths, business closures, massive unemployment and pending evictions. Black and brown lives continue to matter as protests broke out in all 50 states to seek justice for George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery and too many others. Rioting and/or looting followed in some states.
And we’re only in June.
Introducing WRAP
What do we need to do to stay sane so we can keep going? When there is so much hurt going on, we have less tolerance for more things to go wrong. Adapting from the model of Wellness Recovery Action Plan (WRAP), we can all use a wellness toolbox right now. Initially, WRAP was developed to help people with mental health struggles to live full, meaningful lives. It has since been adapted to help people with all kinds of physical and emotional challenges.
And if we are honest with ourselves, current circumstances are most certainly challenging all of us physically, emotionally and socially right now.
You may be thinking that self-care and wellness rituals only make it easier to hide from or turn a blind eye to the troubles around us. The opposite is true: do these things to help you maintain from day-to-day, so you can go out (or stay in) and continue to contribute to your life, your family, your community in the best way you know how.
The elements of WRAP
Develop a wellness toolbox
List everything you can think of that helps you feel better. Here are a sample from my list:
Draw
Watch a movie
Go out for a walk
Connect with my friends and family
Travel
And the list goes on. List as many things as you can think of, big and small. Even ones you can’t do right now in quarantine can spark other creative ideas. Keep going until you run out of ideas.
Describe yourself when you’re well
Sometimes it’s hard to remember what you’re like when you’re feeling well. This is especially the case when you’re overwhelmed and a “hot mess”. Here is how I’d describe myself when I’m having a good enough day:
Loving
Focused
Funny
Patient
Thoughtful
It doesn’t have to be your best day, but when you’re feeling relatively well, how would you describe yourself? Write those down. You don’t have to stop at just five qualities. Keep going.
Make a daily maintenance list
From your wellness toolbox, pick tools to put on your daily maintenance list to help you stay as well as possible. Think about these as being your absolute necessities: things you need to do everyday to help you maintain. Here are mine:
Get at least 7.5 hours of sleep
Eat healthy homemade meals at least two out of three meals
Hug and kiss my husband
Have my morning cup of coffee
Vary my working position between sitting and standing
While these items are not the ones previously listed, they’re definitely in my wellness toolbox. I’m simply putting down different items to show you the variety. There are no right or wrong answers, only the tools that work for you. Your daily maintenance list needs to be your non-negotiables: If a day or two goes by without doing items on this list, you’ll feel it.
Make a weekly maintenance list
Deviating from the WRAP model for a moment, I’m going to add a weekly maintenance list. There are simply some things that don’t need to be done daily, but if you wait too long to get to them, the impact is greater than the activity itself. Here’s what’s on my weekly maintenance list, ideas still generated from my wellness toolbox:
Do a cardio workout 3x a week
Date night
Cook 2-3x a week
Do 1-2 loads of laundry
Get a sushi takeout
While it’s possible to go on to list my monthly maintenance list which would involve a lot of bill payments, you get the idea. Especially during a global crisis when the day feels long and the month feels short, planning for what you’d need in the short-term can help you function better.
Identify your triggers
In a recent post, I noted what’s really going on when we’re emotionally triggered. Here’s a short video of me summarizing the same ideas:
Within WRAP, you might not be identifying all the elements of your emotional triggers. However, it still helps to know when something might be upsetting you. Do you know what gets you stressed out and emotionally riled up? Here’s my list:
A sink full of dishes on the night I’m scheduled to cook (it’s true)
Videos and articles of injustice against black and brown people
Comments by POTUS deliberately trying to cause division and chaos within our country and in opposition to the rest of the world
Self-comparison with others, even though where they are or what they have are not even things I care for
Small quarrels with people I care about
Triggers are often unexpected, but they can also be the result of us spending too much time on social media, reading the news, or otherwise surpassing a threshold of an activity that is no longer healthy for us. Take some time to notice what your triggers are. Write them down.
Notice your early warning signs
When triggered and you find yourself feeling worse and worse, it helps to know all the early warning signs that you’re not doing well. It’s one thing to be triggered and to bounce back from it; it’s another to spiral downward and for a bad mood to linger much longer. Here are my early warning signs when I’m not doing so well:
I get more emotional
I default to my old ways
I frequent the snack table
I’m more short with my husband
I keep to myself more
Since the pandemic, my post about A Life Worth Living: What to do When Faced with Thoughts of Suicide became the 3rd most frequented page on our website. For some people, early warning signs include thoughts of suicide. If that’s you, please get help. Tell somebody. Reach out. There are other options. We all have early warning signs that things are getting out of hand. What are yours? Take some time with that.
Make a plan to recover
When you’re losing it, the tools you use will need to be different from the ones on your daily maintenance plan. Think about the things that will help you get through these tough times. This is often the opportunity to involve people around you, if you haven’t done so already. Since the pandemic, I’ve needed to tap into my own recovery plan. I learned a few things about myself along the way:
Ask my friends for a card or a care package
Be honest about my needs and wants
Allow myself the space to cry
Talk to my therapist
Get help from my mentors
Refer back to the earlier descriptions of you when you’re well. What’s going to help you get back to the place of feeling like yourself again? Even if you’ve slept it off but you’re feeling more or less better, I’d still encourage you to work down the list on your recovery plan. Just because you’re feeling better in a moment does not mean you can sustain it. All the dominos that led to you spiraling will not go away on their own. We need to proactively take extra good care of you. Consider this mental health first aid.
The rest of WRAP
The WRAP model goes on to encourage people to formulate a crisis plan if you can’t take care of yourself, which could include hospitalization to keep you or other people safe. There’s also a component about a post-crisis plan to help you return home safely and how to stay safe. These last elements are beyond the scope of this blog and require a conversation with a trained mental health professional.
Please, if you’re feeling suicidal, consider the following resources:
National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: (800) 273-TALK (8255) or text CONNECT to 741741 in the United States.
TrevorLifeline for the LGBTQ community: (866) 488-7386 or text START to 678678 in the United States.
Teen Link is a confidential and anonymous hotline in WA staffed by teen volunteers trained to talk to other teens who are going through a tough time: call or text (866) 833-6546.
Now Matters Now has many videos to help people deal with suicidal thoughts
International Association for Suicide Prevention has a list of resources for people living outside of the US
If you need help building your Wellness Toolbox
Life isn’t always kind, especially now. If you need help building your Wellness Toolbox, we’ve got trained counselors who can help you through this difficult time. Don’t wait until you’re at the end of your rope to get help.
Ada Pang is the owner of People Bloom Counseling, a Redmond psychotherapy practice. She helps unhappy couples find safety and connection in their relationship. She also helps cancer thrivers and their caregivers integrate cancer into their life stories. A newer item in her wellness toolbox has been drawing, more specifically, drawing her dish rack.