How long have you been sick?
As the weather’s gotten colder across the country, keeping us indoors, breathing each other’s air for more hours in the day, contagious illnesses are having a field day. I can’t count how many people I’ve spoken to who have described being sick consistently, for weeks or even months at a time. I’m not a medical doctor, so questions about virus vectors and immunology are best answered by those experts. However, the reasons we become sick and stay sick are not always 100% rooted in the illnesses themselves, but elsewhere in our bodies.
- Many aspects of our daily self-care routines relate to increasing or decreasing our vulnerability to illness. Getting consistent and good quality sleep, maintaining some consistent physical activity, and eating an overall healthy diet (including maintaining gut health) all help to strengthen your body’s defenses against a variety of physical and mental illnesses. Those of you with busy schedules probably place these foundational self-care tasks on the back burner – and paradoxically, may do so even more during periods of illness, due to a sense of needing to press on, accomplish things in case you start to feel sicker, etc. If you struggle with depression or anxiety, your baseline ability to engage in daily self-care is already compromised. When you then become ill, it’s a double whammy. Sometimes, all we can do – both physically and emotionally – is get back to basics. Start by taking one day to rest your body and mind; clear your schedule, ask for support around the house, and make it clear to those in your life that you are prioritizing your health for a day.
- New and growing immunological research is showing the links between trauma, adverse childhood experiences, and chronic stress on the functioning of our immune systems. It’s not just an old wives’ tale – stress CAN make you sick. While more intense short-term, or acute, stress can have impacts, we’re more concerned about how chronic stress impacts overall health. The results of chronic stress can show up in the short-term (e.g., increased susceptibility to colds and other infections), or can have delayed effects, causing more adverse health outcomes as we age (e.g., arthritis, pain, heart problems, diabetes). The earlier the intervention, and the earlier we develop effective ways of taking on and managing stress, the better.
- Many workplaces foster a culture of prioritizing work over health and family, meaning that taking sick days to care for yourself or a loved one who is ill may not be supported, or might even be punished in some way. Not only does this increase the likelihood of spreading illness, it is also likely to prolong illness. If this type of workplace culture sounds familiar to you, it’s in your best interest to advocate for change within the culture, or pursue a healthier work environment. Your health is not worth someone else’s bottom line.
- For those of you in a role of caregiver, it can be difficult for you to take the time to care for yourselves when this is needed. It’s tempting to push through, prioritizing the needs of others over your own, and before you know it, you’re feeling sicker. No one is invincible, and the mantra of pulling yourself up by your bootstraps and pushing through doesn’t work for every challenge. There’s no shame in being vulnerable, in realizing that you, too, need care – especially from yourself.
- Maybe you’ve learned in your life not to address stressors or difficult emotions. While there’s no straightforward medical way to describe this, almost every mental health clinician I know would be able to describe dozens or more experiences with clients in which they’ve seen the long term impact of pushing away emotions or over-experiencing negative emotions on people’s physical health. Some recent research has begun to explore this, demonstrating a link between positive emotionality and reduced inflammation in the body. Emotions can feel big and scary – especially when they’re related to painful or traumatic life events – and you don’t have to experience them alone, or all at once. A therapist can help you find ways to make space for emotional experience, and not be held hostage by difficult emotions.
With all that we cannot control within and around us, it’s easy to forget where we do have power – even in the face of physical illness. I challenge you to evaluate yourself in the areas discussed here, and find a place to take some healthy control of your body.