Solutions for Life

10/10/2024

Looking after your mental health -

🥑 Pay attention to your nutrition. A whole food, one ingredient eating plan that is individualised to how your unique body functions is key to reducing inflammation that is strongly related to mental health conditions and also gives your brain and body the key nutrients it requires to think, focus, maintain a stable mood, be energised, rest and sleep.

🤸🏽‍♀️Move your body regularly - find and regularly engage in a movement practice that you enjoy. Movement is a good way to de-stress, reset body, mind and emotions and boost brain neurotransmitters.

🧘🏽‍♀️Develop and engage consistent stress management tools. Being outdoors in nature, right -brained activities such as creative tasks, music and mind-body practices are very useful to restore an overworked nervous system

💤 Prioritise sleep - quantity and quality of sleep both matter for your mental well-being. Explore how much sleep you need to wake feeling refreshed the next day. Developing a sleep routine and supportive sleep practices can be very helpful in this regard.

👯‍♀️ Invest in quality connections - authentic relationships that you can trust and depend on. Feeling lonely or isolated triggers the same neurological areas in the brain as when one is in physical pain so don't underestimate our need as human beings to have a tribe of people to do life with.

04/10/2024

Happy Children's Day 👣

To all the precious little ones and the child in us all - You are loved, You are valued, You have purpose and significance, You are a gift to the world, You are enough !!

As you treasure your children today remember this is what a child needs :

Safety and Connection are the primary needs of all children. They are like two sides of the same coin -

💑 The need to feel physically safe, in a home and living environment that is not physically dangerous or threatening, causes fear or stress. Consistent and adequate basic needs such food, shelter, clothing and education

💑 Emotional safety - consistently experiencing warm and loving parental relationships that are unconditionally accepting, non judgmental. A space where all emotions and experiences can be felt and expressed - a space for a child to be their authentic self.

💑 Stable, consistent and predictable connection - a bond with parents/significant others where a child feels seen and understood, even when they don't understand themselves, they can look into the emotional mirror of these relationships which help them to make sense of themselves.

💑Emotional regulation is a key feature of safe connections characterised by parents who are attuned to what's happening for their child, can help to facilitate expression of emotions, to name, make sense of and provide coping mechanisms.

💑 Apart from regulating emotions safe and healthy connections involve seeing and supporting other aspects of a child's development such as body (nutrition, hormones, physical wellbeing etc), mind (unique aspects to how this child thinks, learns and needs stimulation etc), and spirit (beliefs, values, sense of purpose and meaning)

It sounds like a tall order when most of us parents are wounded children ourselves but awareness and conscious parenting helps us to pay attention to and heal our own childhood needs so that we can in turn show up in the way that our kids need us most!

02/10/2024

Great book - dispelling myths and tackling issues that people find uncomfortable to address even in the safe and nonjudgmental therapeutic space.

14/02/2024

Celebrating love....

There is a lot of hype and pressure around occasions such as Valentine's day. It's easy to fall into the trap of the idealized view of what love and relationships should be. Dangerous words like "always", "forever", "my everything", "you complete me"... flaunt cards and notes perpetuating a fantasy.

This year I encourage you to stop and meaningfully consider what you truly want to convey to those you love. As you take a moment to celebrate your partner, children, friends, family, friends who are the family - communicate honestly and authentically -

💕 Share gratitude for what they bring to your world

💕 Express appreciation for who they are, what you truthfully value and admire in them

💕 Make commitments to the relationship based on where you are at, what you can genuinely bring, and the next growth step you are working toward

💕 Balance hope with expectations that match reality

💜💜💜 Most of all, take a moment to consider how you are loving yourself. The work you are doing on You is the most integral element that you bring to any relationship.

28/10/2023

*** Creating Emotional Safety in Relationships ***

Understanding emotionally safety is a key aspect in creating secure, trusting, healthy relationships.

Emotional safety is a two way street - when you feel secure and show up as your true self, it creates the conditions for others that you are in relationship with to do the same.

Ultimately, knowing that you can be completely open and vulnerable without fear or judgement builds deeper connection and closeness.

Here are some steps to create more emotional safety in your relationships -

🔑 Be an active listener - listen to understand not to prepare your response or a defence. Listening is completely about the other person, leaving your world temporarily and entering theirs.

🔑 Be empathic - statements such as " I hear you say... ", "It sounds like..." help to reflect what is being communicated and to validate and affirm what is being shared. Asking curiousity questions like "Would you like to share more about that?", " Can you tell me more?" show interest and desire to learn more about the other person.

🔑 Be aware of non verbal communication like body language, gestures, facial expressions, tone of voice etc - those often communicate more about your thoughts and feelings than your words do. For example raising eye brows might suggest judgement or disagreement even though you may be silent; looking away or fidgeting could suggest that you are uncomfortable with or not fully invested in the conversation.

🔑 Be willing to be vulnerable as well. It is useful to take ownership of your experiences by using "I.... when" statements, e.g "I feel disregarded when you do not communicate a change of plans in advance".

🔑 Be transparent and accountable - you don't have to account for every single aspect of your life with others, however sharing your thoughts, feelings, interests, activities of life freely shows that you are an open book with nothing to hide.

🔑 Set and uphold boundaries - keeping boundaries demonstrates respect for personal limits and preferences and that these will be protected. Boundaries help to honor what's important to you, protects your time, space, comfort levels etc.

18/09/2023

Hormones and Mental Health

💡Did you know that low thyroid hormone can look like depression?

💡 Excessive cortisol can mimic symptoms of anxiety!

💡Dysregulated blood sugar can impact cognitive functioning 🤔

💡Changes in s*x hormones can lead to foggy brain, erratic mood, poor concentration and decline in sleep - think peri-menopause!!🥵

💣 Our hormones have a huge influence on our mental well-being and they can play havoc with our coping even in the absence of any significant trauma or life challenge.

The good news is that we can be informed on the signs to look for as well as equipped with effective lifestyle strategies to care for our hormones, and in turn, our mental health.

Scan the QR code for more info and registration, see you there 🦋

28/08/2023

The value of authentic connections - such food for the soul when you can pick up after a few years, across an ocean and enjoy meaningful conversation great laughs and share new experiences together.

24/08/2023

Truth bomb 💣for all of life....

"The miracle you're looking for is hidden in the work you're not doing!! "

M. Willet - Fitness & Nutrition Coach

28/07/2023

Island getaway !!

Benefits of time by the 🌊

1. Sights - the blue hue of the sea helps reduce stress levels
2. Sounds - crashing waves can bring calm to the mind and body
3. Smells - the salty scent has been known to increase mood and levels of motivation.

Add some loved ones and nourishing food and an ocean get away can be one of the best resets for your mental well being.

Enjoying our family weekend break and especially celebrating our princess who turns sweet 16!!

14/06/2023

A must watch for all parents.

Connection is crucial for all aspects of development. Hearing it from a 7 year old makes it that much more impactful!

It's never too late, start today!

https://www.ted.com/talks/molly_wright_how_every_child_can_thrive_by_five?fbclid=IwAR0-CzyFzlAjwJiYm3d-iI64I-Vu2TCLChpla0_U8Id-A0rWqv56YsWmZ4w

"What if I was to tell you that a game of peek-a-boo could change the world?" asks seven-year-old Molly Wright, one of the youngest-ever TED speakers. Breaking down the research-backed ways parents and caregivers can support children's healthy brain development, Wright highlights the benefits of pla...

27/05/2023

**Mental Health Awareness for Relationships***

It is a basic human need to belong and to feel intimately and authentically connected to others. When we observe repeated patterns of behavior, conflict or hurt in our relationships it may be necessary to take a closer look at the deeper dynamics that might be influencing how we connect to others.

The patterns of interaction with our significant others in our formative years can lay down an unconscious template of how we relate to others in our adult life. Warm, attentive, attuned, understanding caregivers in childhood build our sense of security and trust that the world is a safe place where we can be vulnerable, be known, have our needs met, bravely venture out and return to find a haven. These types of secure relationships set us up for healthy connections with others. Secure adult relationships are characterized by the ability to freely share emotions, grow deeper and closer connection, enjoy being together but at the same time feel comfortable apart or alone.

Early bonds with caregivers that might have been inconsistently available, inattentive/preoccupied, unattuned to us, our emotions and needs can create insecurity in how we relate to others - fears around trust, safety, whether we are valued or not.

How might insecure attachments look in relationships?
☑️ wanting to get closer to someone but withdrawing as the relationship gets deeper
☑️ believing that you don't actually need anyone or relationships
☑️ avoiding, suppressing or disconnection from feelings or becoming uncomfortable when interactions become more emotionally intense
☑️ being jealous, clingy, controlling or over involved in their life
☑️ putting in more effort or energy in the relationship than the other person
☑️ over valuing the other and undervaluing yourself
☑️ seeking approval or validation from others
☑️ preoccupation with the relationship potentially ending/ fear of being left
☑️ frequent emotional dysregulation, chaos or confusion

Improving the quality of our relationships means healing our early attachment wounds as well as understanding and repairing how they influence our connection with others in the present.

12/05/2023

Mental Health Awareness for Moms

"Mom-guilt" is real!!

Do you feel that you have lost connection with yourself, that your primary identity has become about the care of others around you?

This is a sad yet common reality for many who feel that they are strangers to the self they once were before they stepped into the role of "mother". However at the same time any inkling of a desire for self love or self care is quickly overshadowed by the darkness of guilt.

Do not be surprised by guilt, it's unlikely to disappear altogether - we have strong societal messages that bombard us constantly, ideology that prescribes what good "mothering" looks like, the measuring stick that we regularly weigh ourselves up against.

So where does that leave us?

We need to be clever about arming ourselves, being prepared when guilt shows up. Like pesky insects that arrive uninvited into your home, es**rt it out the door, don't let it get comfortable and build a nest. Remind it that it doesn't have a place there. That doesn't mean that it won't try to creep back in again, maybe it might even try to sneak back in disguised as a false sense of responsibility.

Start small - maybe disarming guilt looks like taking a nap when you are exhausted and allowing yourself to wake to kids that are still content, alive and well and a house that hasn't burnt down. Maybe it's saying yes to that walk with a friend and learning that the rest of the family are happy to sort out dinner and don't actually feel that you've abandoned them. Maybe it's managing your time around what you really value and is significant to you rather than all the things that that punitive internalized inner voice tells you that you "ought to be doing" "should" or "must" be doing. Have you ever questioned where these "ought to's", "shoulds" and "musts" come from? This is part of the work to free ourselves from guilt.

This is the journey to self connection, it might never be about reclaiming the self you once were, or about some idealized future you that you hope to be, but about creating a healthier, happier version in the now.

Take a moment to celebrate you this Mother's Day!