Self care

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A therapist recently told me I'm getting better at "self care." When I asked for clarification, he said I am identifying situations that are harmful to me and avoiding that harm. As this is apparently a positive behaviour it got me to thinking about other applications, and it seems the principle can be adapted. I realised if I don't feel comfortable doing things, I don't have to just to accommodate others, often people only minimally connected with me. I can put myself first when it's appropriate. I'm also getting better at factoring autism in where I wasn't before - I assumed if I wasn't comfortable or couldn't deal with things "normal" people could, I was just being weak or cowardly or lazy. Apparently I'm done forcing myself to fake being normal as camouflage at my own expense, making myself uncomfortable or getting into situations which are going to end in disaster just to try and prove I'm just like everyone else. Though I'm slightly worried about this thinking possibly becoming limiting, there's also the chance of this making me happier and making better decisions.
I'm curious what others have done in this way to "self care."

My autism diagnosis has made me aware of that kind of "self care". I stopped blaming myself for things that I can't do. You could say it can be limiting but I think the consequences of the lack of "self care" are far worse. Having realistic expectations of yourself will lead to a happier life.

Eating healthily, exercising and meditation are the main ways that I look after my wellbeing.

For me, self care really started when I stopped trying to desensitise myself to loud noises, it had not worked and I’ve possibly made my attitude to noise worse. Once I did that, I felt an immense relief and have applied a new understanding to the ways I had been normalising, the decisions I make are better informed.

The ways that other people had insisted that I alter myself, because it was ‘odd’ that I did xyz, are now largely ignored. ‘It’s ok to be me’ has been a transformative mindset and feeds into my self-care approach. I hope that this will help alleviate the depressive symptoms I experience.

I still have to function etc but for example forcing myself into situations where I have been sick to my gut with anxiety for years, have also stopped. Learning to pay attention to my bodily signals and understanding why 'I am the way I am' has been self care; my aim is that this approach will facilitate personal progress in a meaningful way.

I envy and admire you, because all the things you mention are things I'm struggling horrendously with, and failing at daily. It's become agony for me and is at the moment a huge issue in my life. NOT being able to do this is causing me stress of every kind, yet I can't manage to make the necessary changes.

Tried to reply to this thread twice, but the forum keeps glitching.

Anyway I've found that the most important thing for self-care, is to simply avoid being around people who don't support self-care. Certain things I am always going to have difficulties with, and other people may not understand why. But they don't have to fully understand. They just need to be supportive of me figuring things out for myself.

When the people around me don't support self-care, it becomes exponentially more difficult. The smallest things become a battle.

People really can put pressure on us to be "normal" and just go along with things no matter how we feel. Everyone has to deal with that to some extent. Society doesn't want people to truly take care of themselves. It just wants people serve a function in its mechanism. People can push themselves to be productive, but in the long run everyone suffers the consequences of that.

The difference for me is, I tend to burn out faster and crash harder than other people do. It's sort of like being the canary in the coalmine. The canary doesn't drop over because it is unable to be "normal" or adapt to its environment. The canary has a normal reaction to a toxic environment, and that is precisely the function it is intended to serve.

Some of the things we try to adapt to are actually toxic to us, and might even be toxic for people in general. But if you are not putting yourself and your own well-being first, it's easy to assume that "you" are the problem and you are supposed to adapt somehow. When in actuality, it might be a really dysfunctional environment. Trying to adapt to that will lead to rapid burnout.

In fact...I'd say that when people are under a lot of pressure to be "normal" I believe that's a SURE sign of a toxic environment. That means diversity is not welcomed or tolerated. It's also totally incompatible with self-care. It's very difficult to take good care of yourself when you are under pressure to appear normal.

dianthus, your post is so wise and rings so true, and I can see the truth of it in a lot of my struggles with this, now that I think about it that way. Thank you for that post; it's stunning.

@ BirdInFlight - one disturbing thing about coming to some understanding of this skill for me has been embracing traits that I had always considered negative traits, to be avoided. Selfishness, arrogance, anger, disobedience, argumentativeness, nonconformity, coldness, being antisocial and allowing myself to use others have all had small parts to play. It sounds bad but some selfishness allows me to actually put my needs before accommodating others', some arrogance lets me see that as worthy, anger allows me to take action when someone is wronging me instead of just allowing it, disobedience for doing what I need to and not just what I'm told, argumentativeness for lobbying and negotiating those needs, nonconformity to stop putting pressure on myself to be normal, and being cold and antisocial to smaller degrees for not pushing myself to be overly social with others so much so that it's a constant effort and drain, and the ability to use others helps being able to accept help, which I usually cannot do.
I still keep true to my principles - for example I refuse to be rude or unkind in a simple retaliatory reaction, and I prefer equilibrium so maintain that generally - its more about trying not to be so everything-or-nothing in my views about positive/negative, polaric thinking. It's a start.

I can't really say that I take the best care of myself. Always seems to b something more important that I have to deal with like work or my extracurricular involvements. Doesn't help that I always put others needs above my own and I'm rather hard on myself. At the very least I've never harmed myself, something which many of my friends who know me rather well actually find shocking granted my past, or indulged in harmful pursuits. Could always be worse, fun way to look at it

C2V, thank you very much for that, that sounds like great advice. You are using the surprisingly positive side of what are usually considered negative traits to help you take care of yourself. That one about putting others' needs before my own is one of my Achilles heels for sure -- I think I've become such a people pleaser out of striving to fit in, that I basically put myself aside on a constant basis. Looking at how you list the ways you can work things, I can learn a lot from that.