Are you kind to yourself? by Jewel Harris
Did you know that sleep can heal trauma? I found this amazing podcast by Dr. Bernardo Huberman called the Huberman Lab. One of the shows was titled, “Essentials: Understand and Use Dreams to Learn and Forget”. This podcast taught me that our bodies are able to undergo a series of healing, processing and learning during sleep, particularly during our REM cycle, and this process is essential to our mental health. My expectations with listening to this show were to learn how to use dreams to learn and forget, but what this episode gave me was far greater than I could have imagined, it gave me a whole new perspective on the struggle I experienced during my postpartum period with my daughter.
The early stages of sleep allow us to learn and store what we’ve learned about motor skills, like learning how to braid hair or practice esthetic massage techniques. When we get into a deeper phase of sleep, we learn more conceptual things like how to process tasksat work. It’s not that we learn new things during sleep, but the things that were learned throughout the day are internalized and saved into our memory bank. It’s like that movie Inside Out that highlighted how the young girl’s personality was developed through her memories and experiences.
Finally, it is important to sleep soundly enough to get REM sleep, or rapid eye movement sleep. This is when our brain attempts to heal our soul. We dream during REM sleep, and our brains are able to shut off the receptors used to process emotions attached to trauma such as inadequacy and sadness. Instead of being learned or stored like other experiences, these emotions and experiences get trashed and removed from our psyche. Without proper REM sleep, people tend to be irrational about life and expectations. It’s as if every little occurrence was the end of the world with no solution in sight.
Rest is extremely important to me. But for the first 9 days of my child’s life, I did not sleep more than 20 minutes at a time. Not by necessity, but by choice. I simply wanted to watch her every move. About 4 weeks in, I was not only able to sleep, but craved my sleep. At that point, I was so sleep deprived that there were times I actually got upset with her for waking me up. My immediate response from being woken was irritation, even while I attended to her needs. I felt bad because, how could I possibly be upset with my little nugget? All she wanted was some love and milk. My mental frustrations even influenced my milk supply and her ability to latch on to me. I felt as if we could never get past this phase of life. I felt as if I was a horrible mother in this world all alone. That initial honeymoon phase of spending every waking minute in awe of her seemed like a distant memory.
Now that I have this information about sleep, all of those irrational thoughts make so much sense. My postpartum anxiety and feelings of hopelessness intensified for me due to lack of sleep. I had assumed that my postpartum effects were caused by a hormonal imbalance, so I started taking extra vitamins and creating meal plans and workout routines. But it wasn’t until I created a more routine structure, that provided me with more sleep, that my mental health received the reprieve it so desperately needed.
My little one adopted a habit of having longer naps throughout the day and going to bed at 11:30PM! For me to be able to tackle my self care needs and be in bed by 1:00AM was detrimental to my mental health. She now has a nighttime routine that has her in bed by 9:00PM, leaving me plenty of time to wind down for the day and prepare for the next day.
When my little one would go to bed at 11:30PM, I tried waking up at 4AM to give myself
enough time in the morning to align my thoughts for the day before she woke up. That simply was not enough rest for my body or brain to be fueled for the day ahead. I don’t need 8 hours of sleep, but at least 6 hours of quality sleep is vital. Now, I wake up at about 6AM and allow my little one to sleep in until about 8:30AM. I started to flood my mind with more positive thoughts by listening to affirmations before bed and when I wake in the morning. Throughout the day I listen to podcasts, TedTalks and audiobooks to keep intrusive thoughts at bay. That proper sleep and catering to my mind has significantly improved my outlook on life, my relationship with my child and my overall well being.
It is important that we learn to be kind to ourselves and understand the needs of our physical self. We can’t force ourselves to be okay when we feel far from actually being okay. Listen to your body. Listen to how you speak to yourself. Be more intentional and kind to yourself.