Every September, somewhere on the internet, a woman with an immaculate bathroom will suggest that I solve my exhaustion with eucalyptus bath bombs, a glass of wine and a seventeen-step skincare routine.
Ma’am.
I have four children, approximately 700 responsibilities and laundry currently achieving sentience in the corner of my bedroom.
The bath bombs are not going to fix this.
I am certainly not anti-bubble bath. Please bathe luxuriously whenever the opportunity presents itself. Light the candle. Buy the fancy lotion. Put cucumbers on your eyes if that’s what you’re into.
But somewhere along the way, we turned self-care into an aesthetic instead of what it actually is:
Noticing what you need and then doing something to meet that need.
For military spouses, that distinction matters.
We spend an extraordinary amount of our lives responding to other people’s needs. Children. Spouses. Commands. Schools. Employers. Volunteer organizations. Extended family members who still somehow don’t understand why we cannot commit to Thanksgiving plans eight months in advance.
We become excellent responders.
The problem is that we can become terrible at responding to ourselves.
So, instead of adding “self-care” to your already obnoxiously long to-do list, try something simpler.
Think about your needs in four quadrants:
Body. Mind. Soul. Environment.
When you’re feeling depleted, overwhelmed or generally like you might move into a hotel and tell no one where you’ve gone, check the quadrants.
You probably don’t need to overhaul your life.
You may just need to care for one neglected part of it.
Take Care of Your Body: Start With the Basics
Start here: What is one basic physical need you’ve been ignoring this week?
Sometimes the existential crisis is dehydration.
I’m only half kidding.
When life gets busy, our bodies are often the first things we neglect.
We skip meals. Stay up too late. Live on caffeine. Ignore headaches. Forget water exists. Sit at our desks for eight hours and then wonder why our bodies feel approximately 97 years old.
So before deciding your entire life is falling apart because you’re cranky, ask some extremely unglamorous questions.
- Have I eaten?
- Have I slept?
- Have I showered?
- Have I moved my body?
- Have I been outside?
Then do one thing.
Take the shower.
Drink the giant glass of water.
Eat an actual meal containing something besides the crusts from your kid’s sandwich.
Go for a walk.
Lift weights.
Stretch for ten minutes.
Go outside and stand in the sunshine.
Put on the outfit that makes you feel fantastic even if you’re only going to Target.
Or—and this one may be revolutionary—rest.
Your body is not an inconvenient vehicle transporting your brain from responsibility to responsibility.
Take care of it.
Take Care of Your Mind: Close One of the 47 Tabs
Start here: What is one thing you can remove, postpone or say no to?
Our brains carry an astonishing amount of invisible labor.
Appointments. Passwords. Permission slips. Grocery lists. Deployment dates. School calendars. Bills. Birthdays. Emails. PCS paperwork.
Eventually, your brain starts behaving like a laptop with 47 tabs open and one of them is mysteriously playing music.
You don’t necessarily need to solve everything.
You need to close a tab.
Journal for ten minutes.
Turn off social media for an afternoon.
Read something purely because it’s fun.
Write down three things you accomplished this week instead of cataloging everything you didn’t.
Call a friend.
Watch something that makes you laugh until you snort.
Take ten slow breaths.
And perhaps my personal favorite:
Say no to something you don’t want to do.
Not because you’re incapable.
Not because you have an excuse sufficiently dramatic to justify your absence.
Simply because you don’t have the capacity.
Protecting your mind sometimes looks less like adding a wellness practice and more like removing something that shouldn’t have been there in the first place.
Take Care of Your Soul: Do Something That Makes You Feel Human
Start here: What is something you used to enjoy before everything had to be productive?
This is the quadrant I think we misunderstand most.
Your soul needs things that make you feel human.
Not productive.
Not impressive.
Not useful.
Alive.
Play music you loved when you were younger.
Dance badly in your kitchen.
Paint something.
Play.
Sit in the sunshine without bringing your phone.
Pray.
Reflect on your week.
Serve somebody because generosity reminds you that you are connected to something larger than yourself.
Do something creative without monetizing it.
Do something ridiculous without photographing it.
Military life can slowly reduce us to our roles.
Spouse.
Parent.
Employee.
Volunteer.
Caregiver.
Coordinator.
Sometimes caring for your soul means remembering that underneath all those responsibilities is still a person with curiosity, preferences, humor, creativity and desires.
Go find her.
Take Care of Your Environment: Sometimes You Need to Fix the Room
Start here: What is one small space you could make feel better in 15 minutes?
This one surprised me.
Sometimes I don’t need to fix myself.
I need to fix the room.
Military families spend years living in spaces we didn’t necessarily choose, in cities we didn’t select, surrounded by boxes we swear we’re going to unpack before the next PCS.
Sometimes you know you’re leaving in two years—or six months—and it becomes easy to treat your house like a temporary holding place instead of your actual home.
Our environments affect us.
So make yours work for you.
Open the windows.
Declutter one counter.
Deep clean the bathroom.
Clear the chair currently functioning as your family’s auxiliary closet.
Make your bed.
Light the candle.
Put flowers on the table.
Create one cozy corner where you can read, pray, journal or stare blankly into the distance without anyone asking what you’re doing.
You don’t have to reorganize your entire house.
Pick one space and make it feel peaceful.
There is something deeply grounding about looking around your home and recognizing yourself in it—especially when so much of military life is outside of your control.
A Simple Military Spouse Self-Care Check
Here’s what I’m trying this month.
When I feel overwhelmed, irritable, exhausted, disconnected or generally off, I’m going to stop asking the giant question:
“What is wrong with me?”
Instead, I’m going to ask four smaller ones:
What does my body need?
What does my mind need?
What does my soul need?
What does my environment need?
Then I’m going to choose one thing.
Not seventeen.
One.
Maybe I need to go to bed early.
Maybe I need to call a friend.
Maybe I need to put my phone down.
Maybe I need to blast music and paint something.
Maybe I need to clean my bedroom, open the windows and put fresh sheets on the bed.
Maybe I need to say no.
That is self-care.
Not escaping your life for thirty minutes while sitting in expensive bubbles.
It’s learning how to live inside your actual life while remembering that you are one of the people who lives there—and your needs count too.
So, skip the elaborate reinvention.
Check your quadrants.
Notice what’s empty.
And take care of one thing.
Then tomorrow?
Check again.
