How To? Heal from Chronic Stress

Here's a list of things I've been working with to manage chronic stress, a condition I've been experiencing over the past two and a half years; I'm healing, but I'm also still very much in it. If you're in this boat, maybe you'll find some of the following practices and strategies helpful.

• I read a lot of books. Some helped me more than others. I've put together a list of books here for your consideration. (NB: I'm allergic to podcasts, so my self-help consumption is literature-based.)
• Online resources that have been helpful include:
  • Mandy Brown's outstanding (like, there aren't enough superlatives for what I think of her work here) blog at Everything Changes.
  • Jennifer Armbrust's "Feminist Flourishing Framework."
  • Mierle Laderman Ukele's "Manifesto for Maintenance Art".
  • Fred Moten and Stefano Harney's talk, "The University: Last Words" offers a useful framework for thinking the distinction between work and job.
• I keep going to therapy. I've been in therapy since 2011. It's made the greatest difference in my overall well-being and provides a place for healthy and constructive transference. My therapist happens to specialize in burnout and its responses, and so this relationship has been especially important in the last couple of years.
• I continued to avoid alcohol. Though choosing sobriety predates the onset of my chronic stress experience by about four months, it has helped to keep me moving forward toward healing. I'm similarly indisposed to other forms of recreational chemical intervention, including THC and CBD.
• I keep taking a low dose of SSRIs under the supervision of my GP (a larger dose makes enormous colorful spots appear in the sky before me).
• I added non-sleep deep rest (NSDR) activities in the middle of the day. Affectionately known to my friends as "sleepy rest," during the academic year I make sure to have an afternoon NSDR session on my schedule. Because I work on my writing in the late afternoon and early evenings, sleepy rest is necessary to reset the table and get the brain oriented toward creative activity. My therapist also suggested that a day in the cycle of chronic stress without NSDR leads to me having the equivalent of an anxious tantrum at night.
  • I've also used EMDR and other forms of bilateral stimulation, hypnosis, and - more recently - Image Transformation Therapy.

While the preceding are more universal things that have helped me deal and start to heal (you'll likely see similar lists elsewhere), there are some more local, personal things that have made big differences:

• I stop my creative work around the same time each day and meet my husband at our dining room table for a game of Backgammon. We've been playing every night since mid-October 2023. I try to leave my phone on the charger upstairs and move through the evening with my attention tethered to the present. This set of motions seals the day, facilitating a transition into evening and toward sleep.
• Movement: I started lifting (very) heavy weights again safely and under the supervision of coaches (each USAW and USAPL certified). I participated in a powerlifting competition on June 2, 2024, went 6 for 9 on my lifts, and immediately signed up for the next competition. The difference in my countenance between June 1 and June 2 surprised me, as did the lasting effects of training, choosing supportive food and rest in the weeks leading up to the competition, and the competition itself. This has reminded me of my power to meet goals, to trust my preparation, and to perform - these are capacities that chronic stress robbed me of.
• I started paying attention to my tendency to eat and spend; these are efforts to break the tension chronic stress produces through dopamine production. Spending and eating treat symptoms of stress (and, in fact, compound that stress) but not its causes; I'm still working on addressing the causes. I log my food and take care of my spending with a budget.
• I took Lucille the dog on a walk in July and got a message from good orderly direction while out. The message was, "You only need to be where your feet are."
• I spent part of July 2024 and early August 2024 largely in my own company. I built lots of Lego and played Solitaire. Tactility is an important feature of my creative process (I handwrite most of what I write before I type it); shuffling and dealing cards, and free-building Lego are similarly helpful in this regard.
• Though I enjoy my own company (maybe more than I should), I've recently started connecting with friends again, and especially outside circuits that facilitate stress.
• I walked out of a room that gave me bad vibes before the bad vibes could sink me. This led to my next realization, that healing requires supporting myself, not sticking it to the stressful place.