Why Self-Care is the Key to being Less Triggered & a Calmer Parent

Self-care is important for everyone, but it is especially important for parents. Parents are often so busy caring for their children that they don’t take time to care for themselves. This can lead to burnout and chronic stress. When you are taking care of others, it can be easy to forget about yourself. But if you don’t take care of yourself, you won’t be able to take care of your family. That’s why it’s so important to make time for self-care, even if it’s just a few minutes each day.

Self-care can look different for everyone, but there are some basic things that all parents should do to take care of themselves. Getting enough sleep, eating healthy foods, and exercising are all important forms of self-care. But self-care can also include things like taking a break to read or watch a movie, spending time with friends, or doing anything that makes you happy.

One of the things parents struggle with is the endless ‘to do’ list: the parenthood juggle of life. It can feel like there’s just not enough time in the day to get everything done, let alone take care of yourself. But if you don’t make time for self-care, you’ll eventually reach a breaking point. That’s why it’s so important to schedule in some ‘me time’ every day, even if it’s just for an hour.

Often, when parents do find an hour to ‘not do anything’ they can easily fill it. How many times have you found ‘an hour’ and thought, ‘oh I’ll just do….’ and find something from the list to fill it? How many times have you sat down with a cuppa and, instead of relaxing and switching off, felt guilty that you should be doing something, or that you are wasting time? This is actually a sign that you really do need to relax. If this resonates with you, then you need to make a bracketed time a couple of times a week that you can call your own. To do with what you want. You need it in order to balance as a person.

Not prioritising yourself is the sure-fire road to being easily triggered, to the feeling of being burnt out, living on the edge and being in a flight or flight state.  Parents that come to work with me, who are exactly as I have just written in the previous line, come to me because they want calmer home, less fights, they want less arguments, less triggers, less Mum guilt and more connection with their children. They are looking outwards of themselves for all these things ‘What can I do or change to get this? What do my children have to change to get this?’ When, really, 90% of the work I do with my clients is about working on themselves.  And, for most of my clients, that starts with looking at self-care and how they prioritise their own needs, before we can ever start to look at everything else.

If you’re not used to prioritising self-care, it can be difficult to know where to start. I hate the adages about bubble-baths and chocolates – yes, they are true just for a moment. But real self-care is about learning to know who you are, how to think, what your values and needs are, and then looking at how you prioritise these things in to your life so you feel seen and heard by yourself.  You feel valued by yourself.  Without that, you will always feel second rate to everyone and that is the fastest route to burnout, overwhelm and living of the triggered edge.

Making time for self-care is essential for all parents. It will help you be a better parent and a happier person.