DEPRESSION AND OUR DAILY ROUTINE. WE NEED TO BRING IT BACK.

[Ggrand]

Hello,

A lot of us (me included). take to our bed for days on end when we are depressed.

This is unhealthy for us...We need to look after us as best we can, I feel we should try as hard as we possibly can to make up a routine to keep us healthy and get us out of bed.

I believe we need structure in our lives more so when we are depressed,

A sense of structure is important to provide goal to your day, it gives a pattern to your day which supports your body's natural health structure.

• I think it's important to try to go to bed each night around the same time. Put away your phones,I pads etc, put on some soft music and drift away to sleep.
• Set the alarm to get up the same time each day, but don't just wake up, get up out of bed, open blinds, curtains the doors, let some sunlight into your home.
• Try having a healthy breakfast, lunch and dinner, keeping roughly the same times to eat and enjoy the meals, we need to eat healthy meals daily to fuel our bodies for healing.
• Try having a morning and afternoon cup of tea or coffee, maybe a couple of bickies as well, or my favourite cake.

• Try some light excersises throughout the day, or go for a short walk daily. even walking around your yard, just doing something will give our mind a rest.

A daily bath or shower either morning, night or both, a bath or shower late at night might releases some stress and many relaxe us a little for sleeping.

1. House work, not fun but necessary to keep our environment clean and healthy, set a day for washing, another day for ironing, try washing the dishes daily.

Even if we just set a few of these goals to start with, it will still give us a purpose for the day, a purpose to get out of bed.

Once we get into a routine we can then slowly add to our days activities to maybe add some social events, hobbies, things we like to do, things we enjoy doing.

Recovery has to come from us, we can't give up on us. We have to try to help ourselves to mend our broken minds.

All these activities will be doing mindfulness, getting our mind away from our dark thoughts while we are carrying out these simple but necessary tasks.

All thoughts are welcome.

Kindness only ,

Karen..(GG).

[Birdy77]

Hi Karen,

These are wonderful ideas! All of them.

I currently have a Chairdrobe (huge pile of clean clothes on my bedroom chair that i haven't yet put away in my drawers or closet). It gets bigger and bigger and looks so annoying and ugly and depressing to me, and then later when i can't find what i want to wear it drives me nuts and i have to rummage through Mt Everest. Very annoying.

I would like to add to your list (for myself):

• Complete your laundry tasks from start to finish, including putting items back where they live. No more Chairdrobes birdy. No more Floordrobes either.

Thank you Karen. Great thread idea.

🌻birdy

[Ggrand]

Hello Birdy,

Thank you for your suggestion, all are welcome,

I have a bad habit of leaving my clean but folded up clothes in the laundry basket, then when I had to get other clothes off the line the following week, I was forced to put them away. Now I do complete all washing and put away in the same day..

GG.

[Quercus]

Hi GG 😊

Routines are my friend too. One thing I would like to add to your list is if your partner is on leave it is ok to ask to keep some of your routine as is.

Hubby has had a month off and I'm paying for not speaking up. I felt bad to say well ok you want to do this but normally I would be going for my run right now. So for a whole month my routine went to pot (and my stability went with it).

So that's my addition... If you have a routine that helps you... Communicate that. It is ok to say no and do your own thing.

Love the point about exercise too very helpful and easier once it has become part of your routine.

Hope you're finding some improvment after the stress of Christmas.

❤ Nat

[Ggrand]

Hi Nat,

Welcome and thank you for your post.

I think it's important to stick to your routine if it's helping you even in the tiniest bit. Maybe by communicating with your hubby about your morning run he may have joined you, or if he didn't feel like it he maybe would have encouraged you to keep to your routine.

My son and his family came for a visit for a few days over Christmas, he brought his routine with with..Every afternoon at his home he jogs around the school oval for half an hour. Where I am there is no school oval, he did the next best thing and jogged around our small town twice. He did ask me if I wanted to Jog with him, I told him thanks for the offer but no thanks, lol I haven't jogged for over 10 years..My DIL, and grandson usually jogs with him but they declined saying there were on holidays. I suppose it's up to the individual if they want a break from there routine and if so if it has any effect on there outlook of their day.

They enjoyed the break from the usual routine, my son needed to keep his routine to feel he had completed his day..

Kind thoughts

GG.

[White_Rose]

Hello Karen

How can you say you are not worthwhile when you come up with threads like this. It's great. And so very true. Routine in a life that can barely get out of bed is the answer. I have a routine for getting up and dressed when I am OK and I expect everyone else has a routine as well. It sounds easy to say just carry on. I agree with you Karen and of course it is not at all easy.

I used to count the things I needed to do and then do them in that order. OK I'm up to six so now I need to ..... It helps me to keep focused on what I need to do. Once the morning getting up routine is completed I can start on what else I am going to do and it's so much better. At least I am dressed.

Great thread.

Mary

[Sad_Mushroom]

Hi Karen,

Great to see you. I'd like to add some ideas if I may.

Lists should be divided into Must Do and Might Do. I found that having too many must do's just made me feel bad if I did not comply with them all. Must Do, would be bathing, eating, sleeping etc but Might Do's might be cleaning, exercising etc.

The list would be different for all as I would rather go for a run than eat or clean when I am depressed. Options I think is the word I was looking for. Optional routine ideas. Like if I am coping and doing OK the options for that day could be exercise, shopping etc.

My head is not working but rather than delete I will try and explain. I would rather explain than delete, so you can see on some days my head stuffs up too. I meant a list of goals where some are definites and some are optional. Not two lists. (might do was the only words I could think of when I meant optional) So more of a weekly list. A week planner. A list of everything we have to do each day and a side list of the things we should do within that week. So that we know we have to exercise at least 3 times for the week and we can pick the days where we feel capable of exercise, rather than thinking we failed because we did not exercise today.

oh oh I almost forgot....(silly head) remember the ideas of why behind our goals....write them next to our goals. EG: Opening windows etc not only lets the sunlight in, but the sun kills germs/mould, the wind blows out smells and germs (planting mint or lavender outside windows/doors provides free air freshener)

My biggest thing I done that I think helped was fighting the 'bedtime blues'. I made a rule that no bad thoughts were to enter my bed. At first, I fought these thoughts which did not allow me to sleep. Then I stuck a piece of velco on my bedside drawer and I run my thumb/finger over it to distract me when the bad thoughts start. I focus on the velco and how it feels and describe it in my head and compare it to other things that would feel the same. Regular bedtime can be a hassle for many of us as going to bed often means things are quiet and the nagging is louder. Velcro was the boring distraction for me.

Sorry I am rambling on.

SM

[Ggrand]

Hello Mary,

Thank you for your kinds words,

This is a first for me, I usually stay in bed for days on end when I'm really in deep, but quite a lot of research suggests that putting some structure into our day by doing just simple everyday chores helps us in redirecting our depressed thoughts.

Simply put, we sleep regular hours, get up get dressed, do our everyday chores of looking after us, ie: eating three meals a day, showering daily, then from there whatever we are capable of doing to fill in our day, away from bed. Could be just reading, playing games, dusting, gentle exercise. Etc.. Just start small.

just small baby steps,

Kind thoughts GG.

[Ggrand]

Hello Sad Mushroom,

Welcome and thank you,

You are not rambling, you have good ideas there.

I like your idea of a weekly list, where we can list our goals to be reached weekly, .we can then spread exercise out over a period of days, when we feel able to cope doing so.

Our Daily chores should include, getting out of bed, getting dressed, opening up doors, curtains, windows etc: eating 3 healthy meals a day and showering, Then to spread it out weekly we can then add, excerise, washing the clothes, cleaning our home, gardening etc..

Thank you for your input.

Kind thoughts

GG.

[Elizabeth CP]

Hi Karen I think this thread gives valuable ideas to help deal with MI. SM mentions splitting lists into must do & might do. When deciding on priority ie what is a must rather than might do consider the effect on yourself. For example walking daily is important for my well being. Having my house spotless is not essential but having things all in the right place is. I become very stressed when I can't find things or can't do what I want because things are in my way.