Heal with Pride
Welcome to The Pride Law Firm’s exclusive self-care and wellness resource. In the 17+ years we have spent working with and supporting survivors of assault, we’ve seen the beauty in empowering our clients to protect their emotional health and happiness. We are more than just legal advocates — we’re self-care advocates!
Here is a primer on the value of self-care, and resources stocked with some of our favorite ways to practice self-love. If you do not find what you are looking for, reach out online or give us a call at 619-516-8166. We are a personal injury firm dedicated to the holistic well-being of our clients, including helping them find justice under the law.
Don’t forget to check back occasionally for our newest #WellnessWednesday post and additional resources. Remember that Jessica Pride and The Pride Law Firm are here to help you along your journey to peace and restoration.
Why Is Self-Care So Important?
“Self-care” is a common way to refer to prioritizing your mental and emotional health. It’s widely understood that stress causes real, measurable harm like rapid heart rate, fatigue, skin rashes, hair loss, and mood swings. Self-care practices have the same verifiable
The reason self-care is important can be found in science-supported wellness data for:
- The nervous system: Your nervous system is the network of your brain, spine, and the full-body sensory system. There is research-backed science behind practices like meditation, mindful breathing, and progressive muscle relaxation to improve. Therapies like acupuncture or tapping pressure points also provide proven benefits.
- Mental health conditions: Self-care includes psychiatric management skills for conditions like PTSD, anxiety, and depression. Carrying objects of significance (touchstones), keeping a diary, and using grounding techniques can help manage triggers.
- Injury prevention: Maintaining flexibility through yoga, morning stretches, or regular exercise helps prevent tension headaches and tight-muscle injuries like tweaks, sprains, and tears. Avoiding and minimizing these harms reduces aches and pains and the need or desire for painkillers. It also protects your body’s reserves for cell maintenance and stopping opportunistic infections like cold and flu viruses.
Self-care is self-maintenance and is vital to your health. Actions as small as keeping a grooming or beautification routine, making time for hobbies, and setting movement or fitness goals can greatly improve your health and strength.
The time to focus on yourself is now, but there is no rush — gradual change is sustainable change, and every step you take is an equal part of your journey. Here are some basic tips to start prioritizing self-care:
- Try new recommendations: Look for lists like those created on the Jessica Pride Instagram page with the #WellnessWednesday hashtag. Ask your friends to share what currently interests them. Research those you admire and see what they select for self-care.
- Diversify your wellness: Wellness of mind, body, and spirit should be balanced in your life. Excessive exercise cannot counteract a stressful mind, just as constant mental input cannot replace moments of rest and reflection. Take from each basket when selecting self-care activities.
- Lean into your interests: Did you feel exhilaration when playing childhood sports? Did you read voraciously in high school or college? Do you find satisfaction from gardening? Spending time with animals, with family and friends? Recommitting to the activities that you know feed your soul provides a great jumping-off point towards a better way to be.
The tips and resources on this page are a great place to start, and we congratulate you on beginning this journey to sustain and nurture yourself.
Emotional health is an aspect of your mental health, and emotional self-care means maintaining the tools necessary to cope with both negative and positive emotions.
Emotional self care can include:
- Identifying and utilizing healthy coping mechanisms for negative emotions like:
- Reaching out instead of isolating
- Maintaining sleep and nutrition during low or stressful times
- Finding functional alternatives to substance reliance or abuse
- Balancing positive emotions so they don’t become overwhelming by:
- Recognizing manic episodes and funneling the energy into positive outlets
- Halting destructive impulses like overspending, overeating, or taking on too many projects at home or at work
- Slowing racing thoughts with focusing tactics like mantras or deep breathing
- Embracing strategies for resilience and reward such as:
- Setting aside designated time to celebrate achievements like career progress, personal accomplishments, or anniversaries
- Reflecting on failures or frustrated plans and looking for ways they were learning experiences
- Avoiding negative self-talk or disparaging thoughts and prioritizing positive and uplifting thoughts — our attitudes can become a self-fulfilling prophecy
If your emotional wellbeing is off, your mental health suffers. Mental health problems can manifest as physical problems due to stress and possible unhealthy coping mechanisms around it like smoking, drinking alcohol, or emotional eating. By nurturing your emotional health, you strengthen a frontline defender against psychological and physical harm.
The National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) lists these central aspects of self-care:
- Exercise regularly: With only 30 minutes of physical activity each day, you improve your blood flow, digestion, muscle health, and energy levels. If you don’t have 30 consecutive minutes, remember that smaller amounts of exercise add up. A few 5-minute sessions of desk yoga combined with an evening walk with your partner, child, or pet still gets it done.
- Eat well: A balanced diet or regular healthy caloric intake is the basis for a strong body and sound mind. It’s recommended to limit alcohol and caffeine, and instead prioritize nutrient-rich whole foods.
- Prioritize sleep: Sticking to a sleep schedule, practicing consistent pre-bed rituals, and reducing screen time and blue light exposure from phones and other devices helps your body maintain this natural rhythm.
- Embrace relaxation: Meditation, journaling, and yoga are all examples of relaxation tasks that calm the mind and release tension from the body. Relaxation can be a proactive practice that helps prevent mental breakdowns and harmful inflammation throughout the body.
- Stimulate interests: Focusing on positive growth by socializing, reading, engaging with music, cooking, or entertainment events creates gratitude for the good things in life that feed your self-development and overall joy.
Practicing self-care is unique to every individual. It means staying in tune with your needs on a mental, physical, and aspirational level, and seeing that those needs are met in manageable and enjoyable ways.
Jessica Pride and the attorneys and staff at The Pride Law Firm have curated lists of books, recipes, mental health resources, and fitness guides to help start or encourage your wellness journey. We can be contacted online or at (619) 415-8822 for emotionally supportive legal help.
Contact Attorneys Who Care
The reason Jessica Pride and The Pride Law Firm emphasize self-care is because we understand just have vital it is to healing after traumatizing and dehumanizing experiences. Our staff is trained in trauma-informed care, meaning we strive specifically to recognize signs of trauma in our clients and their families. We structure our policies, practices, and procedures to avoid re-traumatization.
Part of healing for many who have experienced sexual assault, abuse, or harassment is the self-care of finding closure and justice.
If you need to speak to experienced attorneys about violations against you or your child, reach out to our San Diego offices online or by calling 619-516-8166. Your communications with us are completely confidential, and you will be met with the compassion and care you deserve.
