Dear Brooke –
Since I discovered you via Corinne Crabtree, my life has exponentially changed for the better. In fact, I am signed up for 2019 Coaching Certification & stoked to get started.
I have a personal protocol that I am very proud of & thinking about it now makes me proud & gives me a sense of peace.
That being said, I have dealt with depression & anxiety for as long as I can remember (I’m 39 now). I have long recognized lack of sleep as my biggest trigger for what I call a spiral. The one thing I have implemented for those times is that I never make any major life decisions & I try to give myself some grace.
I recently had a weekend where I definitely didn’t get enough sleep; my one year old daughter was sick and woke up fitfully many – MANY – times a night both on a Friday & a Saturday night, & she only wanted mommy, so even when my husband tried to help she just cried for me. Normally, I would have rested as much as possible all weekend and just cared for her. However, I didnt have that opportunity this weekend because it was also my 14 year old son’s birthday outing with his friends & my husband was having people over from his spiritual group for their winter gathering. (There are a whole host of reasons why rescheduling those would have been super challenging).
I kept halfheartedly grasping at my coaching tools; I could make a model, do a TDL, change my thoughts…SOMETHING! Right? Except I just couldn’t. Have you ever had your head half submeged in a bathtub or swimming pool where you could see the world as it was happening around you & you could hear noise but it was muffled, it kind of didn’t make sense, even though you knew you were there & life was happening the same as always? When I am struggling with a bout of depression, it kind of feels like that; like I am straddling two versions of consciousness and both are real but I am not fully participating in either because I’m underwater.
This weekend I felt very much like I was grasping for my protocol and it was just slightly out of reach or it didn’t make sense. For example, one of my main guiding principles is “I listen to my body.” But my body was in desperate need of a nap & yet life still kept going on. I found myself making unhealthy choice after unhealthy choice & the closest I could get to my newfound coaching tools was to recognize that cookies aren’t what I actually need, the voice in my bead was screaming “I NEED A BREAK! I NEED A BREAK!!” My husband did try, and yet I kept trying to keep up with life.
Finally, last night the baby slept & I slept. Now it feels as though the fog is lifting & when I was trying to do a review this morning of “how can I use my coaching tools next time this happens to anchor me to my healthier self & still recognize that it feels hard to function?”
My thought was that I need a new protocol that I can lean on that will meet me where I’m at during those times.
Some things I am putting on this list are:
Listen to a song you love
Think of 5 things you are grateful for (hint: start with yoir babies)
Take a sip of water…and then another

What are your thoughts on alternative protocols and using coaching strategies when you are in times of mental chaos such as grief or depression?

Thank you, from the bottom of my heart, for helping me reframe my thoughts from “I’m just broken” to “I just need to figure out a process to handle things differently next time.”

Amber Kaan