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I have part of the day alone today. Wow. How nice is this? And at such a much needed time, too.
Today is a bit of a celebration. Last tuesday at my doctor appointment my blood pressure was high to begin with. After my news, it shot up over 200 (not sure what the bottom number was-cannot remember-but I do know it was over 100 something). Two days later when I visited again, still very high. She started me on my meds and this is my third day on them-I am now happy to report as of this morning my BP is 121/84. YES!!!!! I feel REALLY good. I feel calm and happy. Even though the other news I received was bad, my first priority is getting my blood pressure down. I didn't know it could cause so much damage. My husband told me last night to NOT get myself stressed out over my blood pressure now-it will make it worse!LOL I realized yesterday that I hyperventilate constantly-apparently that increases anxiety. I am the type that runs constantly-I rarely sit down. Always going going going. When I was at the library, I picked up a book about anxiety. It talked about these relaxation techniques and one of them is breathing deeply-3 secs in and 3 secs out. I tried it and WOW what a difference. Seriously. I never realized I hadn't been breathing deeply. So now I am training myself to do that. I have to train myself to do alot, actually. Lots of things outside my comfort zone ( like asking for help). Today I am so thankful I have a wonderful doctor who cared about me enough to call me back into her office just to tell me that I NEED to take better care of myself, or else! Thinking today of the things I HAVE to do inspired me to do a piece of art today-sort of like a mini journal page. I want to put this in a place where I can look at it each day and REMEMBER these things.
Here is my list :
BREATHE deeply
Go for a walk
Let things go
Ask for Help
Watch a funny movie
Go to the Library ( a place that I love)
Imperfection is okay
Call a friend
When I thought of these things, I realized, ya know, someone else may need this too. Don't we all need these reminders sometimes? I need these every day.
My goals for this week is to learn to ask for help (thats the hard part-I don't know who to ask, really) and to accept imperfection. To walk past the sink of dishes, or the rug that is out of place (two of my very big peeves).
Ingredients used here:
Acrylic paints, patterned paper, stabilo pencil, Prismacolor pencil, and a sharpie :)