Self care, an essential service to yourself

HIGHLANDS NORTH – The centre offers holistic rehabilitation for the body, mind, and soul.

May 28, 2020

Content provided 1 minute read

Karen Griessel, a social worker at Johannesburg's Wedge Gardens Treatment Centre shares self-care tips. Photo: Supplied

Making time for yourself in today’s busy world is often a challenge. This is even worse for active addicts whose entire focus is on finding their next drink or hit.

Karen Griessel, a social worker at Johannesburg’s Wedge Gardens Treatment Centre, shared some insights. Based in Highlands North, the centre offers holistic rehabilitation for the body, mind and soul. Griessel said an addict’s life is consumed with not only finding and using their alcohol, drug or pill of choice, but with thoughts of getting clean.

“It is a continuous sick cycle that is their constant priority,” she said. She added that taking care of themselves falls by the wayside. “Once the recovery process has started, self-care becomes critical. Physical care, such as personal hygiene, is easy to achieve but emotional self-care is more complex. Let us be honest, all of us struggle to find the balance between looking after ourselves and getting through work, family, and community obligations,” said Griessel.

She said that the intrinsic characteristics of kindness, compassion, patience and forgiveness are vital when it comes to looking after yourself holistically. “Recovered addicts will have less chance of relapsing if they have a balanced lifestyle and a holistic sense of overall well-being: Emotionally, physically and psychologically. This will empower them to fight off depression and anxiety, maintain positivity and reduce triggers and cravings,” she said.

Self-care tips:

Practise mindfulness, which is the conscious awareness of experiences by staying present.
Stay connected and have a healthy support structure.
Look for interests, opportunities and ideas and follow your goals and dreams.
Keep active by exercising because this naturally increases happy hormones.
If you need medical or psychological care, do not procrastinate, just do it.
Get enough sleep and follow a healthy diet to reduce stress.
Be aware of your negative states, like being hungry, angry, lonely or tired.
Make sure to maintain healthy boundaries if you feel irritated or uneasy.
Have fun and laugh a little and make sure you stop and smell the roses.
Reach out and ask for help if you need to.