Tag: selfcare

BOOK, Harmonious Health 4 Life, Soul Notes, Write Pray Recover

Living with Lupus And Thriving in Recovery – Love, Wendy

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Living with lupus requires a great deal of determination and patience and willingness to listen to what your body needs and what it’s asking for…especially when you are an otherwise active person and your body just…S-T-O-P-S…

And if that isn’t enough to embrace…when you are living in recovery from prescription drug addiction, as I am, it is even more of a mindful experience where I must choose only what will promote my wellness, as I do not accept any prescriptions that contain codeine and the like as that was my addiction…

So in the past 13 years of my “Wellness In Recovery…” I have learned many alternative solutions to soothe chronic pain and anxiety which I choose every time…and I am open to an integrative approach, as I write about in my book, Write Pray Recover:A Journey To Wellness Through Spiritual Solutions and Self Care.

For me, as I continue to heal from a serious Lupus flare, I am choosing non-narcotic prescription meds that my rheumatologist has prescribed including steroids, in conjunction with my holistic practices such as gentle stretching, yoga poses, gentle walking, and of late, learning a little bit about Qi-Gong. One of my mantra’s is “Mindset over Movement…Movement over Medication.”

In addition, I do a significant amount of breath work to literally breathe in, or lean into the pain rather than tense up my joints and muscles where my body is able to relax as I use my mantra, “With each breath and step I take, I am healing.”

Organic foods, hydration, meditation/prayer, and surrounding myself with loved ones are just as important in promoting my own wellness.

My ongoing recovery from addiction and my desire for thriving in wellness is my most important intention and purpose. It is the foundation of my life.

Lupus is so unpredictable and this flare was triggered by a disc herniation and nerve impingement. Lupus invaded all of my joints and muscles, and halted any movement of my body…and in the moment that I realized that I could no longer move freely…I surrendered. (Read Chapter 13-“Surrender:The Peace of Knowing”) in my book.

I am moving slowly these days with purpose. Lupus is slowly subsiding…I am regaining my strength…And through the stiffness and heaviness, I choose to move. I am able to move. I set an intention to move and to be cognizant of how much my body is able to sustain…and then I rest accordingly.

I use deliberate breath work, and I listen and feel what my body has the ability to do each day…and sometimes it changes throughout the day…and I honor whatever that looks like.

For someone else, the right balance of care may look different, and I encourage you to find what resonates with you under the “umbrella” of healing, and implement it into your daily practices.

My wellness is my most important tool…through self care of healthy practices and a mindset of “With each breath and step I take, I am healing.”

From my book, Chapter 4:Self Care…“Think of it as you would your bank account. You must continue to replenish your bank account as your bills come in each month, otherwise your account becomes depleted, or even bankrupt. You must think of your wellness account in the same way! We have so many demands on our time and energy each day. If we do not replenish our wellness account, and we continue to “give out” our energy to all of the demands, we will go into debt, energetically, and become physically, mentally and spiritually bankrupt.”

“We must make the time for ourselves, through healthy practices, to experience wellness.” Wellness is ALWAYS a choice. My choice is to always live each day through healthy practices that support my health and wellness goals year round so that my body remembers exactly how to heal when I experience a flare. The brain remembers the rhythm of resilience, and it signals the body to return to balance, peace, and healing.

“Self care is the actions that we take to achieve wellness, and wellness is where we stand in our power!”

“With each breath and step I take, I am healing.”

Love and blessings,

Wendy

Author Bio

Wendy Blanchard, M.S., INHC is an author, speaker, and Integrative Nutrition Health Coach specializing in holistic wellness and recovery. She is the author of Write Pray Recover: A Journey To Wellness Through Spiritual Solutions and Self Care and is currently writing her second book, Soul Notes. Wendy is passionate about guiding others to sustainable wellness through spiritual solutions, self-care, and integrative practices.

BOOK, Harmonious Health 4 Life, Soul Notes, Write Pray Recover

What’s Your Story? – Soul Notes – Love, Wendy

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Our minds are always speaking at us…to us…chattering words and stories that are on a loop of repeat, and that which we have internalized. 

The stories you tell yourself shape how you feel, how you see others, how you witness your environment…and how you behave.

These inner narratives can either promote joy and wellness using dis-cernment…or they can promote dis-order, dis-ease, dis-appointment and dis-illusion…

These stories can also influence the choices that you make…it can make you question your worth…

Today, ask yourself…”Which of these narratives serve me? Are they fact or fiction?

Am I just used to telling this story so often that I have come to believe the narrative that was perhaps originally spoken by someone else? Which stories are keeping me stuck? Do I want to continue to tell this story? How does it make me feel as I share my story? What would a gentle rewrite sound like, look like, feel like?

When we understand that our inner dialogue is created by our instilled beliefs, judgments, memories, fears and even our hopes, and that they are not necessarily truth, we take back our power to be able to write a new narrative. 

When we recognize that these stories are subjective and interpreted by our experiences, our culture and even our emotions…we have the awareness of their origin, and have the opportunity to take the first step in our own transformation.

And…transformation does not suggest that we ignore the reality of our experiences. It suggests that we choose a wider lens where we observe ourselves in our experiences with self compassion and even curiosity as to the possibilities of the meaning of these experiences. 

When we use forward thinking and use discernment to internalize meaning…we provide ourselves with a narrative of a “growth mindset” versus a “fixed mindset” or, where “A fixed mindset can physically prevent you from learning from mistakes, while a growth mindset can empower you to perceive mistakes as learning”…where change is a choice.

Ask yourself, 

“What narrative do I want to tell myself moving forward? How does this new narrative support a growth mindset and my well-being?”

Mantra:
I am learning to use discernment for a more forward thinking, wider lens of my experiences that promotes self nurturing, self compassion and self empowerment.

Love and blessings,

Wendy

Harmonious Health 4 Life, Soul Notes, Write Pray Recover

To My Fellow “Humans…”

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A letter to my fellow “humans…”

Your outrage is not only understandable…it’s justified. What you’re feeling is the deep pain and fear of watching a country you care about veer into dangerous, undemocratic territory, while those who swore an oath to protect its people and principles appear complicit, cowardly, or corrupt.

You are not alone in your devastation. Millions are witnessing what feels like the dismantling of democracy in real-time. A narcissistic leader consolidating power, stripping away rights, threatening essential programs like Medicaid, and stacking the system with loyalists is the exact playbook of authoritarian regimes.

And yes…the Senate, the branch of government meant to check executive overreach, has largely enabled it through silence, self-preservation, or ideological alignment. That betrayal feels like a punch to the gut. You’re watching a system built on supposed accountability abandon its most vulnerable citizens.

And…we are all deeply concerned about our children, grandchildren, and our aging population, our population who depend upon our government for peace, protection and prosperity.

The fear is real. The grief is real. And you’re allowed to feel all of it. Let yourself rage. Let yourself mourn. Let yourself scream.

And when you’re ready…remember this: we’ve been through dark times before. Civil rights leaders, Holocaust survivors, the LGBTQ+ movement, women’s suffrage—they all stared down evil and refused to be silent. 

People are not able to self soothe right now when their lives and liberty and all they depend on to live with dignity has been stripped. Saying, “Just breathe” is not a solution…and feels insulting. People, myself included, need to seek personal solutions that will ensure our loved ones and our own protection. We must have the right to personal agency. I am FUMING and feeling deep loss. I am grieving the loss of our democracy and the loss of personal agency…of freedom.

Your fury is sacred. It’s what keeps people from going numb. It’s what births movements. 

Here’s what is true…

  • This is a crisis of democracy.
  • The system is not broken…it is operating exactly as it was rigged to function when power becomes more important than people.
  • And people are not crazy for feeling terrified, betrayed, and enraged.

You are not overreacting. You are under-protected.

KNOW THIS…

What’s happening now…stripping away Medicaid, threatening bodily autonomy, attacking marginalized communities, deportation, attacking free speech, cozying up to authoritarianism…is strategic. When the chaos is constant, the goal is to wear you down. To make you believe it’s inevitable. To silence your scream by overwhelming it.

Your clarity…your refusal to be gaslit…is a radical act.

EXERCISE YOUR PERSONAL AGENCY!

Document. Your voice matters. Write, speak, post, protest. Authoritarians win when dissent is silenced. As I ALWAYS say, “Speak your truth…unapologetically and loudly.”

Local action. National politics feel unmovable, but local organizing changes lives. Find local candidates or grassroots groups protecting healthcare, women’s rights, or immigrant families. Show up!

Support mutual aid. If institutions fail, communities survive by taking care of each other. Look into ways to directly help families in need—through money, food, rides, or housing support. Even small acts are acts of rebellion.

Call your representatives—even if they don’t listen. Flood their inboxes. Let them know you’re watching. History records silence. Make yours heard.

Protect Your Nervous System (Not to Pacify—But to Persevere)

You’re not soothing for comfort. You’re stabilizing so you can keep showing up.

  • Rage-walk, run, go to the gym and find a punching bag to release aggression. Self soothe in any healthy way that grounds you and releases the anger.
  • Scream in your car, into a pillow, out in nature.
  • Write what you want to scream at the Senate and burn it. Do it often.
  • Talk to others who feel this too. Don’t isolate. Start a meetup group for others of like mindedness where you can constructively share, share a coffee, a walk, a smile of comfort.

Your nervous system isn’t weak for panicking…it’s wise. It knows something terrible is happening. The goal is to tend to it, not to silence it.

And as in so many events in my 67 years, I once again ask, “Where the hell was God when the world was/is burning?

And I know I am not alone in screaming this into the void. People have been asking this for centuries—from the ashes of Auschwitz, from the slave ships, from mass graves, from school shootings, from sickbeds and war zones and every place where evil has walked free while the innocent begged for mercy.

What we are confronting is not just grief or anger—it’s betrayal. A kind of soul-level betrayal that cuts deeper than anything else: “I believed there was something sacred, protective, maybe even loving…and it didn’t show up when it mattered most.”

This is a shattering thing to face.

So if your conclusion right now is: “There is no God. We are on our own.” — I hear you. That may be your truth in this moment, and it’s earned through heartbreak, not cynicism.

I say this:

If there is a God…maybe it’s not some all-controlling sky-father who intervenes like a puppet master. Maybe it’s not the version that we were taught in churches or books or prayers.

Maybe God is the spark that refuses to die inside you, even when you’re sobbing and hopeless and ready to give up.
Maybe God is the grit in your voice when you say, “This isn’t right, and how can I help?”
Maybe God is in you, not above you…A “collective consciousness…”

I know that right now…in all my fury and grief…I am more honest, more righteous, more awake than all the false prophets and smiling politicians put together. 

And if a God exists, I imagine they’re weeping and screaming right alongside me/us, not floating above the pain like it’s someone else’s problem.

I haven’t any answers. I will not offer a spiritual spin because I am at a loss. But I am here as a witness to all of our pain. 

We must stand together in our pain and not allow the chaos to confuse us…

We must be…

A companion and solution seeker in the devastation.

Love,

Wendy

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Empowering Wellness – Love, Wendy

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Using healthy self care practices are the tools that empower my wellness.

Two of my favorite tools are breathwork and music which are grounding, no matter what’s happening around me. It’s like building my own little sanctuary in my body and my mind which ripples into my external space…a space where I can breathe, reset and feel safe.

I always say that breathing is an access point for improving our self-awareness and self-regulation. It is our most accessible tool for intervening with our physiology in real time. Music reminds me of simpler times, and elicits a deep sense of connection.

Empower yourself through healthy practices and do not allow external turmoil and disorder to dictate your inner peace.

Love and blessings,

Wendy

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Mental Health and Wellness – Love, Wendy

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Our mental health is on a continuum and on any given day, for any given reason, at any given time we move along that continuum and we must be armed with a variety of tools at our disposal as we move along the continuum.

Movement along the continuum could relate to biological factors, environmental factors and even how we practice daily self-care.

Self care is one of the most effective ways in managing our symptoms and to stay ahead of our symptoms. This is especially true when we are aware of our body/mind connection and recognize the symptoms in the early stage of escalation. With this information, we can intervene immediately, and/or ask for support.

We all have mental health.

Our relationship to self driven by self care, self respect and self preservation above all else is the foundation of wellness.

Wellness becomes not just an outcome, but a living practice grounded in our ability to honor and protect the integrity of who we are, and how we experience life.

Love,

Wendy