07/10/2025
Self Care- Hiked 22 miles in three days…. Small steps, slow down, notice the small gains, and for me and my clients, walk. Last month, I found myself operating outside of my window of tolerance. I was irritable, checked out, impatient, unmotivated, overwhelmed, and at times, dissociated. I knew that this was not sustainable. When we are outside of our window of tolerance (WoT), our behaviors and emotions affect those around us, both at home and at work. It’s more arguments with our partner, finding ourselves more reactive with family, avoiding situations, dissociation (checking out/numbing), not sleeping well or sleeping too much, and getting the “F*$k it's!”
A bit like a PTSD reaction- my conceptualization is that when outside the WoT, the amygdala gets exhausted from alarms and decides everything is an alarm, because it doesn’t get a regroup break (Think of the movie Inside Out. My visual is of one of the characters sitting at the controls exhausted, head down, just continually hitting the alarm button). Self-care means finding your way back into the window of tolerance, opening space for daily stressors not to throw you over the edge. It’s not bubble baths and reading a book for me, not when I’m this far out of my window. Those things can help me maintain when I’m back in… But for now, it’s losing myself in nature, hiking as meditation, unplugging from electronics, work, and expectations, and regrouping. It’s hiking for miles and letting life stressors be washed away with sunlight, trees, and rock scrambles. It’s realizing that there are still 2.5 miles to hike up to get out of the Grand Canyon, and my legs are so tired, it’s hot at 7 am already, and there is no choice but to keep walking. It’s learning tricks from my hiking partner, being teachable! “Slow down, small steps, relax your muscles, feel the softness of your muscles as you take each step.” THIS! The anxiety stopped. It felt like therapy: slow down, notice the small gains, relax to give yourself momentum…sounds counterintuitive. Still, with each step, I gained energy and confidence, lost the anxiety, and left behind the stressors that I had been carrying. Small steps, relax, develop realistic and doable plans, take time, build in breaks to be more present.
Why did I push to 22 miles? IYKYK. The 22 miles was a statement, a recognition of veterans and suicidal ideation and attempts. How does one get to that point? We work with this every day here. And what I find is that many times it starts with being outside of our Window of Tolerance, the stress/activation level where one functions well and can handle stressors. Living outside of that zone for long periods can kick in a sense of wanting the feeling to end, to escape, feeling like it will never end. It will, with work. Small steps, relax, slow down, notice the small gains, and for me and my clients (who know walking Flash/EMDR for relaxation), walk.
