I'm Being Gentle with Myself in 2020

I’ve always been a pretty intense person. Go big or go home. There’s always room for improvement. 110%. Very high aspirations. That “most painful peel off face mask” didn’t even hurt that bad and I used it weekly. I took shots of pure apple cider vinegar daily because someone told me it was good for my vocal health. If I got a massage I wanted the pressure as deep as humanly possible and the rocks as hot as they could go without making my skin blister.

I also had very high levels of anxiety. If I wasn’t acting in a show there was a deep feeling that I would die because being onstage was the only time I felt genuinely okay. I was always reaching for a higher peg. If I didn’t have something to work towards I would spiral into deep bouts of depression.

After I had my daughter I was in one of the darkest places of my life. I was having fewer auditions, and even if I managed to book a show I was miserable.

My hormones had my skin out of control, and my postpartum depression was so, so bad.

We FINALLY got our blog going after like eight years of talking about it and I felt like I had nothing to contribute. I had no control and I was so angry at myself all the time.

I found a YouTube channel (Aloha Hyram you probably aren’t reading this) about skincare. I was hooked on this sweet bois videos talking about skincare ingredients and what they do. His main message is truly to be gentle with your skin.

Don’t strip the moisture, don’t irritate it with essential oils and fragrances, and don’t let the sun damage it. In one video he described a pimple as a micro-wound on the skin, and we need to give it the proper space to heal.

I was honestly floored. Whenever I had a pimple I would squeeze it and put toothpaste on it and borderline pour astringents on it to get it out as quickly as possible.

If my friend had a wound on their body and they were treating it that way, I would scold them--and tell them to be gentle with it and give their body time to properly heal. 

It sounds INSANE to say that learning about pimples taught me to be gentle with myself. But my entire existence has changed. 

I changed my entire skincare routine. If my muscles hurt too much in my barre class I drop my weights. If I’m too sore or tired the night before I cancel the next day’s class. If I get my period I rest. I don’t beat myself up if I do something wrong at my new job. I haven’t been in a production for over a year. I don’t obsess over how many vegetables my daughter has eaten in a day. I feel so….. relaxed. 

I’ve never operated without a certain level of stress before and it’s definitely a strange adjustment. But honestly I can’t recommend anything more. Be kind to yourself. Give yourself time. Heal and give yourself the proper space to heal and to grow.