How to Recover From A Breakup, The Healthy Way

How to Recover from a Breakup in the Healthiest Way

(Published here.)

I think the most important thing to remember when going through a breakup is that it is a loss. Allow yourself to grieve. Give yourself time to feel the pain, go through the hurt, and let go of attachments, dependencies, hopes, dreams, and fantasies. Feel all of the anger, sadness, bargaining, denial, and shock as you process this relationship ending. This will take time, and will involve many complex emotions.

Make sure to use your coping mechanisms to help you sort through these emotions and manage them healthfully. Dealing with emotions of loss (and hurt, and anger and anything else that has come up in your relationship) can be hard, and can cause us to react in unhealthy ways which will only prolong our pain and prevent healing. In your grief and upset, do be aware of your unhealthy patterns and try to create new patterns of coping. Make sure to get the support that you need in this time, be it from a friend, family member, community support, clergy, or therapist. Honor and respect your emotions, but be mindful of your relationship to them and your relationship patterns and dynamics. Support yourself in feeling your emotions and healing through them in positive ways that have worked in the past.

As you feel yourself move through your grief, engage in positive activity to help yourself to start to feel better. Try to think positively, challenge negative thoughts, and have perspective about the meaning of this time in your life. Try to use positive action to increase positive feelings, engage in meaningful activity and do things that bring you happiness and fulfillment in you.

Reflect and reframe, by looking at your relationship and taking time to learn about yourself in your relationships. What can you see in examining past dynamics and connections? Is there a pattern to your attachments? How can you see this as a time of rebirth, a time of building your relationship with yourself, and of fostering independence? How can you see this as a time of evolution, healing, and building? Know that it is, and know that this is a time to reconnect with yourself separately from your relationships, which can feel so hard, but is so important to self love and healthy future relationships.

Lisa Resnick, EdM, LPC

Lisaresnicktherapy.com

Pureed Parsnips

2 large Parsnips, diced
1 cup 1/2 and 1/2
2 Tbsp Butter
Sea salt and fresh ground Black Pepper
2 cloves Garlic thinly sliced

Place all ingredients in a medium sauce pot and bring to a boil. Once boiling lower heat to medium-low and let simmer for 10-15 minutes until Parsnips become soft.

Using an immersion blender (or your standing blender) puree all ingredients until smooth. ***If you prefer a silky puree make sure to remove the Parsnip skin.

Recipe adapted from Bon Appetit

Gluten Free Paleo Pancakes

Gluten Free Pancakes!

3 eggs
2 bananas
1 tsp Vanilla Extract
3 Tbsp Almond Flour
Pinch baking soda

Recipe courtesy of @paleohomecooking on instagram.

The only equipment you need is a food processor.

Step 1 Place 2 Bananas in food processor and puree until liquified.

Step 2 Add 3 Eggs and process until well blended.

Step 3 Add remaining Vanilla Extract, Baking Soda and Almond Flour.  Process all ingredients until smooth and evenly mixed.  Your batter is now complete!

Step 4  Heat Pan or Flat Top Skillet and use Butter, Coconut Oil, or other high heat fat to coat cooking surface and prevent sticking.  Pour pancakes and cook until they have achieved your preferred golden-ness.  A good rule of thumb is that once you start to see air/steam bubbles on the top of your cakes they are close to being ready to flip.  Cook evenly on both sides and serve with whatever you like.

I keep it simple with local and organic Maple Syrup, but you can certainly get as creative as you’d like with this as the base.

This recipe makes 4 large pancakes and 8-10 smaller ones.

Enjoy

Garlic and Greens Soup

1 bunch Swiss Chard, stems chopped

1 bunch Kale, de-stemmed and chopped

1 bunch Mustard Greens, de-stemmed and chopped

1 bulb of garlic, whole peeled cloves

1 cup chopped Carrots

1 Leek, chopped

1/2 cup Basil, fresh

pinch nutmeg

1 teaspoon crushed red pepper

1-3 Tablespoons Nutritional yeast

fresh ground Black Pepper and Sea Salt to taste

Veggie Broth (8 cups)

Throw everything into a large pot and bring to a boil.  Once boiling lower heat to medium/medium low and let simmer covered for 1-2 hours.  The lower the heat the longer this can sit on the stove.  After an hour or so, use a hand/immersion blender to puree all solids.  If you do not have an immersion blender you can pour the soup into a blender in batches until it is all pureed.  Serve immediately or store for later use.

This is an extremely easy and healthy recipe which I often like to use to jump start my spring cleanse.

Easy Spiced Lentils

So I have recently decided that the best way to eat healthy is to make it easy and prepare a grain, a bean, and lots of veggies at the beginning of each week to have around for the week’s healthy meals.  Instead of having these simply steamed/boiled I decided to make em spicy and tasty to eat all on their own.  Because this is a rather small portion the spices are a bit hard to measure exactly, but I’ll try 🙂

Ingredients:

1 Cup brown lentils,rinsed and sorted through

2.5 Cups water

1/4 Tsp Cumin
1/8 Tsp Coriander seed
1/8 Tsp Turmeric
1/4 Tsp Garlic powder
1/4 Tsp Onion powder

Salt
Pepper
2 Bay leaves

Instructions:

Throw it all in a small pot and bring to a boil.  Lower heat and simmer covered for 45 minutes to a half hour until water cooks off and lentils begin to break down.  Stir once in a while to prevent sticking. Once done allow to cool and serve with whatever your heart desires!

Fermentation basics with Phickle! Sauerkraut and Kombucha!

Recipes (click on link):

Sauerkraut

Kombucha

I took a class about fermentation with Amanda Feifer of Phickle Philly at Greensgrow recently and am excited to share what I have learned and spread the word about this easy food fun (and deliciousness).  Her recipes are at the above links!

After 5 days I tried my kombucha and it was perfectly sweet and tangy.  At 9 days it looked like this and I decided it was time to make more sweet tea to refill my jar.  I will keep you posted about how my next (unsupervised) batch turns out.

Sauerkraut takes longer to ferment, and after tasting it I know it has a lot longer to go before it reaches a sourness that is strong enough for me.  I like things (pickles most notably) extra sour, so I will learn as I go along about how long I like to let me Sauerkraut sit.  That’s definitely the beauty of some fermentation processes- you get to taste as you go and see how taste evolves, mellows, strengthens etc. over time, and can witness the actual process of fermentation.  Yay!  I am turning more and more into a food nerd and loving it!

How to Forgive Yourself

How to Forgive Yourself as published here.

If we want to forgive, we must first identify what we are upset about, why we are upset, and what the meaning of our upset is. If we are responsible for this situation, then we also need to find a way to accept what has happened and move on. This can be easier or harder depending on the situation, your level of involvement and how self-critical you are.

Considering these things, I find it helpful to sit with my emotions, write, draw, walk, or engage in some activity that helps me get into my head and be with my thoughts. Once there I try to understand my emotions, their roots, and what would help them to be soothed. Often when we make mistakes we cannot let go of some aspect of the situation and in holding onto that we prevent progress (or acceptance) due to resistance of some form.

Instead of invalidating ourselves it can be very helpful to take responsibility for our behavior, and to also acknowledge to ourselves the reasons that we acted how we did. While reasons do not justify, we often have very real reasons we took the action that we did.

Instead of beating yourself up, try loving that part of yourself that is imperfect, and give it the space to grow without judgment. Have compassion for your humanness and do not criticize yourself for your regrets. Know that in acknowledging this part of yourself, non-judgementally, that you can begin to change it

Try to have patience and understanding with your process of growth as a person and don’t forget that this lifetime is a never ending education. Try to challenge your self-expectations of perfection, and trust in yourself to manage all actions, both success and failure. Remind yourself that you are not alone in your human condition, and that there is no one way to actually “get it right”.

Forgive yourself for whatever you have done, and try to see that all of your experiences, no matter how you judge them, contribute to who you are and your strengths as a person. Know that whatever distress you feel at present will fade with time, acceptance, and progress. Allow yourself to be human and to make mistakes.

Seasonal Affective Disorder Resources

For more info on seasonal affective disorder:

Psych Central

Psychology Today

NAMI

Medline Plus

Holistic Depression Treatments

http://www.drweil.com/drw/u/ART00696/depression-treatment

http://www.motherearthnews.com/natural-health/natural-supplements-to-combat-stress-zmaz00amzgoe.aspx

http://publichealth.yale.edu/news/archive/article.aspx?id=8678

How To Silence Your Inner Critic

Read the full article as published here, or below with links to resources and more information.

1. Education

Understand that the origins of your negative thinking lie in a self-protection mechanism, the fight or flight response, serving to alert you to any potential danger. This is a normal part of our biology and survival instincts rooted in caveman times. We no longer face prehistoric dangers, and yet our mind continues to detect and alert us to any perceived threats to our safety. Today these threats are often emotional, and can FEEL more dangerous than they are.

2. Acceptance and Self Compassion

Once you know that this is a normal part of yourself, you can stop fighting it and work to accept it. Begin to realize that it is a part of everyone, a part of you that deserves compassion, and something that through awareness you can address.

3. Insight and awareness

Now that you know why this occurs and work to accept it, you can create space to identify what it is you are telling yourself and start to challenge that. Sometimes we have created a narrative about ourselves throughout life to criticize ourselves around, other times we are simply self-critical. Whatever the case, figure out what you are telling yourself, and where it is rooted, so that you can start to deconstruct and change it.

4. Action

Once you identify your negative thought patterns and their origins, you can take action to challenge thoughts. A few different suggestions for angles that you can take are listed below.

Use Positive Psychology to focus on the positive, identify your strengths, or do things that help you to feel good about yourself.

Use Self Expression to release the negativity and use it constructively, or share with others.

Use Thought related techniques including writing positive affirmations, reciting mantras, challenging negative self-talk.

Use Self-exploration to learn what you need to love yourself and accept yourself for who you are no matter what you learned in life or the experiences that you have.

It is crucial to love, honor and appreciate yourself in this lifetime and to find ways to let go of ego, self-criticism and judgment to increase satisfaction. There is no reason for us to criticize ourselves as we are all imperfectly perfect in our humanness, and destined for unique glory.

Lisa Resnick, LPC, LMHC, CHHC – www.Lisaresnicktherapy.com