How to look after yourself when there's no-one coming to rescue you
A while ago I read an article that suggested tips for self-care if you were having a bad time. The first on the list was to cancel on your friends and have a cosy night in with your significant other. I don’t know about you but this drives me up the wall. It was actually one of the two articles that sparked the idea for this newsletter because I was so bored of writers assuming that every reader is coupled up.
Anyway, now I am finally going to do my alternative version of that shitty article, which I won’t link to. I have had one of the worst weeks so it’s for my benefit as much as yours.
The thing is when you are single, you don’t have that partner to come home to at the end of a rough day at work. There is no-one to hold you in bed as you cry and, if you live alone as I do and there is no-one to do the cooking and pick up the slack with the household chores if something out of your control is taking all your focus.
Accepting your circumstances in the moment can help if you are finding yourself wishing things were different. I have often told myself: “No-one is going to come and rescue me, I have to rescue myself.” Far from making me feel depressed, I actually feel empowered when I think this.
So here are a few tried and tested ways of surviving when the shit hits the fan. They have been developed over several broken hearts, work crises, health scares, deaths of loved ones and other crappy life experiences. These are obviously universal but why shouldn’t we have a list of our own?
The simplest one I learned at a yoga workshop I went to a few years ago. The teacher reminded us that during a crisis, we can often lose perspective. “Remind yourself that there is no bear chasing you,” she said. I recently did a course run by a life coach who said something similar and suggested we use the phrase: “You are safe.” This week I combined the two: “There is no bear chasing you, you are safe,” I told myself over and over.
Instead of cancelling on your friends because you feel shit, arrange to see one just for an hour. This is what I did this week. I was exhausted from little sleep and thought about cancelling a pre-arranged meet-up. Instead, I asked if we could just meet for an hour. In the end, it ended up being several hours and involved burritos, beers and a good gossip. I felt better than if I had just gone home and sat by myself. I have written before about the fashion for cancelling on friends. I hate all those memes. If you can’t face a night out, meet your friend for a coffee or an exercise class instead. But don’t stop seeing your friends. Calling your mates is also obviously a good thing to do.
Do some exercise even if it’s just putting some music on loud and having your own kitchen disco. I did this yesterday and broke a sweat and had a big smile on my face. It’s also another benefit of living alone. Going out for a walk, even if it’s just around the local park, can give you a new perspective. When I was going through the worst heartbreak of my life, I used to do this little nighttime yoga routine every night in the world’s smallest flat in South Korea where I was living. In the morning, I would choose a more energetic one. One day I will thank Esther Eckhart in person for saving me. Here’s some more inspo.
I am notoriously messy and when I am stressed or feeling like shit, cleaning is the first thing I stop keeping on top of and then, of course, I just end up feeling worse. It really is a vicious cycle. Living alone means I can get away with this but it doesn’t help my wellbeing. Today I considered going to a yoga workshop. Instead, I stayed in to have a clear out because I felt like I was drowning in newspapers and magazines and random crap. Now I feel much better and calmer.
I love cooking when I’m stressed and nothing makes me feel at ease than knowing I have a freezer full of homecooked food. When life gets busy, I have loads of healthy ready meals to shove in the microwave. Also when you’re single, it’s good because you’ll probably make way too much food anyway.
I have so many more but this is getting way too long. I’ll leave you with the song that I was pulling some serious shapes to in my kitchen yesterday.
Have a good week,
Nicola
Twitter: @TheSingleSupp | Instagram: @TheSingleSupplement
What caught my attention
Emily Atack just nailed the big problem with the way society talks about single women
Last week a Twitter friend tagged me in a post suggesting someone might like the newsletter. I looked at the thread and found the woman was Emily Atack, the actor, who had written a tweet about how people react to her being single. As the article says, some people really cannot grasp that a woman can be happy and single. I haven’t checked if she did subscribe (do say hello if you are reading this, Emily!)
I wish my single life was enough for me
To balance that out and because I know a section of the readers of this newsletter will relate, here’s an article about not being happy and single. As I have mentioned before, there are times when I do feel this way. “My life is basically the best it’s ever been in every way, but I have not loved someone who loved me back in a number of years now, and the longer this persists the more sorrowful it makes me,” Brandy writes. BTW I actually stole this out of my new friend Tiffany’s Philippou’s new weekly newsletter The Tiff Weekly (which I think a lot of you would like).
‘I always wanted to be a dad’: the rise of single fathers by choice
Here’s a perspective you don’t often hear about. The men who want to be dads – but who actually go for it and do it by choice. I love hearing the other side of the story. “We’re used to the idea of women as single parents, but there seems to be an assumption that men can’t do it on their own,” one of the interviewees told journalist Sirin Kale. Stigma really harms everyone!
The lowdown
The lovely Jessica Evans recommended The Single Supplement in her newsletter for freelancer writers. I am blushing at how she described it: “The Single Supplement is a gorgeous, non-patronising, funny and honest newsletter about being single. It's charming, needed and absolutely best read with a cup of a tea.”
I’m going to announce how the book club will work next week so watch out for that if you were one of the people who expressed an interest. I’m excited to start to build a community up around the Supp!
I don’t know if this is going online so I am just going to recommend you head to the local newsagent and grab yourself a copy of Red magazine. Inside there is a great article by the amazing Harriet Minter about learning to accept rejection plus there is a series of stories about finding love and only one of them is about love with a partner (!!!)
About me
For those who don’t know, I’m Nicola Slawson, a freelance journalist who lives in London, UK. I don’t get paid to do this newsletter (maybe one day I will), but if you enjoyed it and would like to buy me a coffee, you can.
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