The Wellness Scoop - Easy Ways to Stay Healthy at Home

Episode Date: April 28, 2020

From finding motivation to boosting your energy levels, emotional eating, boredom snacking, morning routines and managing any pressure to be using this time productivity, we’re talking staying healthy at home with nutritional therapist Eve Kalinik See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Visit BetterHelp.com today to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp, H-E-L-P.com. Hi, everyone, and welcome to the Deliciously Ella podcast with me, Ella Mills. So my co-host is missing again today, and I just wanted to kind of give you a little bit of background. I think he probably won't be joining us for much of this season sadly. We are all good before anyone asks that question. Sometimes if I don't put him on Instagram for a few days I get a message about that. No we are all good but things at Deliciously Ella have been incredibly busy as I'm sure they have been for loads of you guys obviously it's just such huge disruption to everyone's work and everyone's

businesses and just to give you a tiny bit of background on that in the way that we run Delicious Yellow and we run it together Matt's actually our CEO and he runs all the sort of business side of what we do and I think a lot of people think like our products are licensed and things they're not we do everything in-house so we manage all our supply chain all our manufacturing all our customer relationships all you know the whole P&L for everything and obviously yeah like so many other businesses just massive disruption obviously from coronavirus you know we're so honored to be stocked in places like Costa and Starbucks. Our aim is to make healthier options more available. And so being somewhere so mainstream on the high street is amazing.

But of course, places like that are currently closed. So obviously that means a lot of stock with no home to go to and massive changes to our plans and the cash that you think is coming in. And so Matt's literally just been working around the clock trying to keep things going and like the team built a web shop in a week which is really incredible and so he's just been kind of really working like 14 hours a day seven days a week him and the team are doing a phenomenal job at that but I'm gonna really kind of fully take over all things creative and so I'm gonna be doing this on my own I think for a little bit so I just wanted to explain why he was missing

again today but we have got a fantastic guest and I'm really hoping this episode is going to be really helpful again I've got an amazing list of questions from lots of our listeners and our readers and so we'll go through all of those and so today we've got the brilliant Eve Kalinic with us. And we're going to be talking just about kind of easy, small things that we can do to stay healthy at home. So I haven't seen Eve, I'd say for pretty much, it must be almost exactly a year since I last saw her. And I have to say, you won't be able to realize it because you can only see her voice, but she is so glam. It's unbelievable. And the last time I saw her we were both doing some work for this amazing company Simprove which is this

probiotics company that we both work with and we were doing an event for them in Ireland called Wellfest and I was so pregnant and heaving and blinding all over the place and kind of waddling around this field and Eve had like her heels on and her dress and yeah she looked so glam and I'm sure you do still working from home today so welcome Eve thank you so much for joining us oh what an intro actually I think I missed the memo on that one that it was actually in a field and I was tottering around like a bit of an idiot but there you go I thought you looked absolutely brilliant yeah my feet were so swollen I couldn't fit into many shoes by that point so I think the comparison was pretty stark but how are you finding this all I mean I think it's just like everyone really

isn't it it's just all a bit kind of surreal I think just taking it day by day, really finding little moments of happiness and joy where you can, connecting with friends and family. Actually, I think, interestingly, while, you know, there's certain things obviously we can't do. I'm sure you've also found this yourself and like many people listening that actually there's a lot of other things that have sort of become more abundant in a way in that you know you you just connect more with people speak with friends more than you maybe would have done before like as in doing lots of you know facetime and zoom and whatnot so i think it's just been a really interesting period and you know it's it's hard not to dwell on the when is this going to be over and oh my god this is but there's actually quite a lot of positives I think that we can sort of take out of it in terms of slowing down and maybe just having a bit of a reflection I don't know I mean how are you how do you feel about it

yeah no that's that I think it's really been the same for me obviously it's hard not to sometimes especially when you read the papers start thinking when when this, when that, if this, you know, but actually when you kind of take that part away, there is a lot of really nice things about it. And I, for one, am loving not having to be anywhere at a certain time. Obviously you've got lots of kind of organised meetings and things, but it's still not the same

as like rushing on the tube to get from one place to another. And I so, that yeah yeah no totally and I think it's just this we've almost got to surrender the need to predict the future which is quite unusual because normally it's all like what are you going to do next what are you going to achieve next what you know and all of this and actually there isn't an element of that like like you just, we don't know. So it's all about really, I know, it's sort of a concept that's maybe of late or in the past few years, being more mindful and being more present. But we literally have to be doing that now. So yeah, I think it's been, it's been interesting. And one thing I'm definitely finding, and I think it's, it's kind of, I guess,

sets up the conversation for today, which I think is quite interesting, is that I think a lot of us rely on external factors to feel good in our life, whether that's time with, you know, physical time with friends and family or kind of like going out for a meal or, you know, whatever it is that we really enjoy from a kind of mental perspective, but maybe also from our kind of physical health perspective, which obviously is very connected to the mental health part as well but like whether that's a yoga class that we really like to go to or a gym class or just you know work out at the gym that we really like or being able to like buy certain ingredients to make certain meals and we can be quite kind of I guess relying on external factors to kind of make us feel good

about ourselves and about our health. And actually, we don't really have that anymore. We've kind of got to take, I guess, almost the words responsibility, kind of more responsibility ourselves and manage our own days and try and fit in little pieces here and there that make us feel good and I feel it was really interesting looking at all our readers questions for this episode that people are finding that quite hard and it seems like there's such a wide spectrum of reasons why that is so I guess so many different things to talk about but it seems to be everything from people who are finding they are feeling very nervous and they are feeling very nervous and they are feeling very anxious and they're not feeling great about themselves because they're finding they're doing

a lot of emotional eating and kind of using that as a sort of crux for their mental well-being at the time or people feeling they feel really anxious and they don't have an appetite and that's kind of making them nervous and then other people's you know just sort of everything about you know they're struggling for to come up with nice ideas to treat themselves or to create a kind of sensible kind of balance in their lives with the way they're looking after themselves can't find right much of a rhythm don't really know where to turn to to like quick and easy meal ideas and snacks for one or for two people you know people feel like their skin's getting worse we've got nurses asking what to do if they're on a shift pattern and you know people feel like their skin's getting worse we've got nurses

asking what to do if they're on a shift pattern and you know how to stay healthy during that so there's a kind of massive array I guess of different ways of looking at this but I guess if we just start at the top is what are your kind of main thoughts about just easy little things we can do you know to just kind of stay feeling good about ourselves all around while we are at home and obviously do have kind of limited resources yeah I think I think it's a very valid point and I think some people just more naturally in tune to being in their own company than other people and that can be really really challenging I've obviously had a lot of my clients being in touch around this sort of subject as well in my private practice and finding it really the whole ambiguity around the situation almost translating into every aspect of their life.

So I think probably the best or what I would suggest is just taking one day at a time and trying not to kind of think too far ahead into the future. Because I think that can actually breed a lot more of that anxiety. That being said, I do think a little bit of planning can help you navigate your day a little bit better. So maybe just sitting down in the morning and just, you know, doesn't have to be particularly detailed, but just writing down what you're going to do for the day. And then, you know doesn't have to be particularly detailed but just writing down what you're going to do for the day and then you know in terms of food you know doing something like a weekly menu plan because you know certainly food shopping's become a lot more challenging and it's not particularly pleasant experience either you know especially for people that are on

night shifts where they're having to work around all of that on top of everything else so doing a bit of a menu plan can help so you don't end up wasting food if you've got the family at home if the kids are a bit older you know trying to get them involved in it as well so it makes it more of a team effort because depending on your family like sometimes people are having lots of different meals which it's just not really going to happen at this point is it so um and that's something maybe longer term that would be a really beneficial thing for the family to all be involved in sort of in the cooking process and I understand that that's not the best for everybody but I have seen that actually happen quite a bit

within families now where it is becoming a bit more of a team effort in terms of meals and getting, you know, the whole family involved in that planning aspect. So I think having a plan, but not sort of overly planning, if that makes sense, is kind of a good thing to manage those day to day. Yeah, it's nice as well, because I think one of the questions that keeps cropping up is just finding motivation and I think a lot of people keep thinking oh it'd be good to use this time to stop running or like do an online yoga practice or find some new healthy recipes that I like but then they just don't feel motivated to go out and kind of make that happen which I think is so fair enough and I'm definitely finding you know I'm not really used to cooking like Matt bless him like he literally he can't cook it's just not he can do so many things but he just really struggles in the kitchen and it just like overwhelms him and so I really make

like breakfast lunch and dinner and like I'm not used to making 21 meals a week and then obviously Sky our little one's learning to eat as well and so like I am finding I get you know feels so inspired for a day and then the next day I'm like I do not know what to eat that's just all eat toast and I think that is again probably really helps with that I don't know whether you're seeing that cropping up with your clients but finding motivation to actually make something delicious and make something that might have some you know ingredients that are good for us and it's actually quite challenging sometimes yeah no certainly and I think that embrace the days where you do have a bit more energy and use it to do a bit of sort of batch cooking and freezing and things like that so you're not having to cook twice or three times or whatever so you know those are like even like little sort of time savers but I think it's okay

to also just accept the fact that you know there are going to be days that you are just going to feel really overwhelmed and whether that's a family you know family demands or even just from an emotional perspective I think you know what we don't really want to do is create extra stress around what's already a stressful period, right? So having a bit of a plan, I think can help with that as well, because you just know what you need to do. And then you're not really like, there's a less of a tendency to start overthinking because obviously we're all living in our head a bit more than we would be normally, because we're just, you know, indoors and there isn't those external distractions. So just embracing some of those moments as well, I think is a really important thing.

And you mentioned energy there. And I think that's something that crops up a lot in terms of our readers questions at the moment is feeling like a bit of a lack of energy. Probably, as you said, it's only natural to have times where you're feeling a little bit kind of about this whole situation and are there kind of things that we can do from a nutritional perspective that can really support our energy levels or hopefully just give them like a little boost definitely from a nutrition perspective eating regular meals like trying not to like skip meals and, you know, keep your blood sugar levels more even. So that will give you a nice bit of energy. There is a tendency to gravitate towards things that are going to make us feel good in that instance, which would be the sweet treats

and things like that, which are not a bad thing per se, but what they end up doing over time is just having those peaks and crashes with your energy. And that can also then impact on your mood as well. So, you know, think about doing something nice for yourself in the day that doesn't necessarily always have to be the sweet treat. It could be, you know, just making yourself a nice cup of tea or just using the time that we, a lot of time that we've got to go out and have a bit of a walk and get some fresh air because that can immediately help with those slumps of energy you know just even if it's just moving around whatever space that you've got in your flat and just almost like shaking it off can be a good way to just again alleviate a bit of anxiety and also just just get you feeling a

bit more energetic so just trying to have more balanced meals because I'm sure lots of people are like craving and kind of like more comfort foods or like pastas and things like that, but just try and add on little bits to that meal to just kind of make it a little bit more balanced. Yeah, so like, for instance, if you're having pasta, you might add some, I mean, depending on what sauce that you were putting with it, but you might just add a little bit of sort of say cheese into that because that can help again, bring in a bit more protein and that will help kind of slow the release of the white pasta if it's white pasta. If you can get pastas that are made from whole wheat flour or, you know, even now you can get ones made out of lentil flour or chickpea flour, whatever. That will bring a bit more fiber in. So you can have the same meal, but just, you know, adding little bits in will help with maintaining a bit more of a steady release of energy. Yeah, you could try it. One of the things I've been batch cooking is lentil bolognese because it's so easy and loads of veggies and lentils and stuff.

Yeah, it's delicious. It's so simple. And you can just like chuck in whatever you've got in the fridge basically to make the sauce and it freezes brilliantly so again you can have all your pasta and then just have a little bit of that as the sauce yeah definitely and even with if people you know you could do it completely plant-based and just use or you could even if you were putting some meat in it maybe do 50 50 because again that's bringing in a bit more of the fiber and plants and plant foods we know have got a lot of benefits to them as well but it makes your mints

go if you're using whatever mints you're using it makes that go a bit further as well so whilst we're trying to sort of plan meals and try and eke out ingredients particularly right now but more generally we should be doing that if that can help as well yeah do you know it's so funny you said that because we were talking to someone and we had quite a lot of questions about how you know people may be trying to have more vegetarian meals but their family aren't sure and the lentil the 50 50 bolognese was one of the biggest recommendations as a great way of of introducing just as you said just to more plants and more diversity into your diet, but without making it kind of completely unfamiliar at the same time. So thinking about

that, one of the other things that we've had quite a lot of is obviously, you know, I think people are conscious, obviously, of like, I guess this is maybe making us kind of more aware of our health and, you know, trying to kind of prevent if we can any kind of underlying health conditions if we're if we're able to to some extent and I think there's quite a lot of kind of conversation around supporting our immune system and just supporting our kind of everyday health and I wondered if we could touch on that and if there's anything in particular that can really kind of support that part of our body. Yeah, I think obviously with everything people, it has heightened people's awareness around maybe health generally, but certainly sort of

the conversation around the immune system. And obviously I'm just a nutritional therapist. I'm not, I'm no immunologist or anything like that. But where my sort of specialized area comes in, I guess, is in gut health. And I don't think many people, or quite a lot of people, let's just say, are quite surprised to really understand that quite a large proportion of your immune system is actually in your gut. So 70 to 80%, or thereabouts, is in your gut. And actually, it relies a lot on the health of the bugs that live in our gut. So we want to have lots of good bugs in our gut because they help manage or help support the immune system. They're collectively called the gut microbiome. And they essentially sort of teach and train our immune systems to recognize, you know, friend from foe. But what they also do is help to sort

of manage inflammation more generally in the body and crowding out other bugs that we might come into contact with that might make us otherwise feel unwell. So it's really important to support the health of those bugs that live in our gut, which comes sort of back down to having plenty of fiber, because fiber is something that actually we as humans can't digest, but all of the microbes in our gut it's you know it's essentially food for them that's another reason to sort of add in some of those fiber sources so any type of plant-based carbohydrate will do that and as much diversity as you can get in some of those fiber sources so I guess this is kind of in some regards where we might be more exposed now to ingredients that we wouldn't necessarily be familiar with because we're having to find different ingredients to work with.

Right. So that can help with trying different vegetables or trying different grains and things like that that help to support the health of our gut and our gut microbiome. And that's a really important part health of our gut and our gut microbiome and and that's a really important part of supporting our immune system as well amazing and is leap and things like that come into it as well or is it kind of a more nutritional based sort of focus yeah so beyond that what also can sort of impact on our immune system is things like having or not getting enough vitamin d which again is harder now because we're being obviously we're being told to stay inside is things like having or not getting enough vitamin D, which again is harder now because obviously we're being told to stay inside. So predominantly vitamin D we get from exposure to the sun.

So when you do go outside for the allotted time that we've got, make sure that you're getting some unexposed skin to the sun for around sort of 10 to 15 minutes or thereabouts to help with getting sufficient amounts of vitamin D because that's really important for our immune system and if you're not able to do that because you might be somebody that's more vulnerable then you know trying to supplement that is really important. Another thing which you mentioned there is sleep which has a huge impact on our immune system if we're not getting enough of it. And again, that can be challenging when there's a lot of anxiety around what's going on

now. So, you know, trying, it's almost like stress and sleep go together in this situation where helping to manage your stress will probably help to support your sleep as well. So, you know, I think it's important to be informed, but being overwhelmed with what's going on is something different. And, you know, obsessively checking and reading about the situation is probably not going to help. So, you know, try and put a bit of a curfew around it. And also, I definitely would say this, because I'm sure probably you've been sent a huge amount of emails and questions from your listeners and followers and things. And, you know, certainly I have my clients who've read some articles that are really not based on any sort of science or facts and get themselves quite hysterical around it. So I'd just say limit exposure to reading around subject that makes you well informed, but not overwhelmed, and, you know, get it from sort of credible sources. But then,

you know, try and help to support that sort of hour before you go to sleep. So try not to do your reading around it then. Because if it is going to stress you out, that's not going to help with your sleep. And that can have an impact, not just actually on our immune system. I mean, sleep is one of the sort of key pillars of health anyway. So, you know, trying to help lull into a nice, I mean, it's easier said than done when you've got little ones running around, isn't it, Ella? But I'm sure bath time is quite challenging at the moment. But, you know, where you can, even parents, once the kids are in bed, you know, it's, I mean, for a lot of us the moment but you know where you can even parents once the kids are in bed you know it's it's I mean for a lot of us as well you know you're probably just thinking I

just want to have a glass of wine or whatever but you know just trying to use that hour before you go to bed to almost like help the body to kind of like just kind of calm down you know that will help you know even simple breathing exercise is something I get clients to do which is a very simple diaphragmatic breath where you're basically breathing and filling up all the lungs to a roughly a count of five however long you want to do it and then breathing out for the same amount of time and even doing that for five ten minutes can help to shift the body from that sort of fight or flight stress response into the more sort of rest and

digest which is the more sort of calmative mode so I'd say maybe try doing a couple of those things can help overall with supporting immune system. I find that kind of breathing exercises and things to try and slow down at the end of the day makes all the difference it's amazing. Oh yeah and it's something that doesn't cost anything and it's amazing what you can achieve in five minutes of doing that it's I know it sounds a bit um basic but actually how many of us don't breathe properly we're just so we're so stressed we're really breathing up into that the upper part of the diaphragm and you know actually what we're doing is creating more of those stress hormones running around the body. And so even just doing that can just help in a moment, just kind of calming the whole system down.

Yeah, and I guess it kind of taps into this whole conversation, the fact that we can't go to a fancy yoga class or a spin class or anything like that. And we can't go and buy this juice, or do this, and actually looking after ourselves has become like a simple at-home thing of just like making breakfast, lunch, and dinner, going for a walk, trying to call a friend, you said do some breathing, and actually in a way I quite love that, because I feel like it kind of takes away all the frills, and the fanciness, and just kind of brings it back to the everyday basics, which is actually really brilliant. And I think one of the things that cropped up quite a lot, and I can completely understand actually, is people sort of saying, I'm feeling like a real pressure to sort of be healthy at the moment,

because I'm seeing like, you know, every time you go into Instagram, there's a different Instagram live going on of a workout and a this and a that. And there's this sense that you need to be using this time productively and you need to be doing all of this and I think that in itself can add to a pressure when actually like for a lot of people it's just a time to let go and not worry about this sort of thing oh yeah yeah totally I mean I yeah I've had to stop kind of going on Instagram at all really or any of those sort of you know channels because you do feel almost like yeah this sort of pressure in a way but you did touch on something there which I think is really important and and again coming back down to the

sort of connecting with other people so rather than being on that and seeing which we all know is a filtered lifestyle anyway so as much as people are posting things up there might be other aspects of their life that are not going quite so well and they might be really anxious they might be really skimmed back highly likely they are what's the way to like get sort of obsessed with looking at those types of things and then actually what you end up coming off it feeling you know actually much much worse right so use the time to chat to your friends and do that type of thing rather than finding yourself on the devices. Because, yeah, it's quite overwhelming, I have to say, with all of the online workouts and all this, that and the other. So, you know, just a bit of movement, it doesn't necessarily need to be with that.

You know, I think the best thing that you can do for movement is just putting on whatever music you really like and having a bit of domestic disco. Oh, I love that. Yeah, you don't need to be watching somebody and trying to follow the moves. I mean, one of my friends sent me one of these like workout videos. I think it's from the 1980s. It's actually quite entertaining, to be honest with you. But after about 10 minutes, I was like, yeah, I can't follow this. So I just like, actually, no, I'm just going to put on a really like the music that makes me feel good which for all of us is very

different you just like have a bit of a bit of a dance totally for me it's like Spotify 90s playlists and listening to like the Backstreet Boys and I have to say like it feels good it's hilarious but it feels good I'm really with you on that yeah for those readers who have said they're like I guess look we kind of lots of us fit into the camp of like when we feel emotional we kind of tend to like not eat because we feel like stressed and we kind of stay away from it or we can be emotional eaters and maybe slightly using food as a comfort or a crux for maybe a more complicated issue and we did get a lot of people saying they're really struggling because they're just finding they're just kind of eating all day long

because they're feeling kind of nervous whether that's about their job or a family member or something and whether you just have any tips for kind of supporting that obviously like great like listen to your body have snacks have great meals but if you're finding you're doing it in a way that feels like you know you're really not hungry but you're doing it in a way that feels like you know you're really not hungry but you're doing it as a kind of emotional thing rather than an enjoyment or hunger do you have any advice on that well I think that it's symptomatic of of stress really so once you help somebody to alleviate stress they're less likely to indulge in that behavior so whilst it doesn't seem like a direct link some of the stuff that we've already talked about in So once you help somebody to alleviate stress, they're less likely to indulge in that behavior.

So whilst it doesn't seem like a direct link, some of the stuff that we've already talked about in terms of like connecting with your friends, reaching out to somebody if you're feeling stressed or anxious, you know, using ways to kind of remove or physically shake off the stress, breathing exercise, things like that, because the stress is the trigger for that behavior if you know what I mean so absolutely you know just be mindful around your shopping it's quite easy to go and just and I always say don't go shopping this is a good tip generally anyway don't go shopping when you are stressed and anxious and you just you know you're really hungry because you're likely to go and buy loads of things that you probably wouldn't ordinarily go and buy anyway. And, you know, having a bit of a plan around your meals as well. So write a shopping list. I know it's basic, but then you just get what you want rather than walking up and down the aisles and just grabbing things off a whim. But I think for me, really, it's about dealing with the underlying trigger for the patterns of behavior. And that comes down to, you know, the stress of the patterns of behavior and that comes down to you know the stress

sort of management side of it and relieving the anxiety and one other question that came up a few times was people struggling and saying that their skin's got a lot worse during this and is that something that's connected to just our like I mean obviously it's going to vary so much person to person but can that be connected to our lifestyle whether that's going outside or the way that we're the way that we're eating yeah I mean it could be to do with the fact that you know we're not outside and we're not exposing our our skin to the elements that can sometimes that can translate people will find particularly if they've got heating high up and their skin's a bit more dehydrated and then they might be not be drinking enough as much water when they're at home, because a lot of people use things like, you know,

carry bottles around as a measure of how much water they've drunk. So, you know, make sure you're getting enough water. It could be related to certainly stress. If there's a lot of stress hormones running around, that can have a knock-on effect to the skin as well. And then if we're not sort of maybe eating as well as we could be, maybe our bowel movements might have changed, which can then also affect the skin too. It differs from person to person. So, you know, making sure that you are getting a bit away from fiber vegetables to keep

things moving through the system well hydrating definitely and like I said exposing your skin to a little bit of the sunshine when you go out is going to help with all of that. And are you finding you have a few things you do every day that kind of keep you feeling good any kind of like little things that you swear by I'm definitely trying to do some type of movement a day I've I've sort of not subscribed like I said to doing anything really sort of prescriptive workouts online or anything like that personally I thank god that I got into yoga such a long time ago I genuinely think that it's been my saving grace through all of this. I really do. I think there's nothing better than just,

even just doing a simple couple of poses that are not complicated, you know, just get, even if you're at your computer and you're just feeling a bit stressed or anxious or whatever, just get yourself into downward dog. Just for like, you know, a couple of breaths can sort of help with that. So I definitely feel like that's really sort of helped on so many levels, helping with stress, helping to just gently move my body a day.

So I'd say that I'm probably doing, you know, five, 10 minutes of that a day, nothing too extreme. I really enjoyed getting up in the morning and finding some level of using a bit of a plan for the day so getting up and the first thing I do is write down what I'm going to do for the day because otherwise you can feel quite lost really so I definitely think that's that's helped and within that helping to sort of meal plan a bit as well so that there's no anxiety about running out of food or knowing what to eat and you know I think you know those things definitely sort of helped massively yeah definitely I'm finding it's funny because when Skye was born obviously like everything you know suddenly the world's so different

and I kind of found myself going back to the same little things now which is just like because obviously you don't know what the day is going to bring and that was my first real experience of that and for me it's like using the first two hours of the day really productively and energetically no matter how I wake up it likes it sets me in such a good frame that it doesn't really matter if I sit on the sofa for hours and hours the rest of the day and now I mean we get up early because Skye is an early riser she's normally awake by like 5 30 and so we get out one of us gets um probiotics we have like the kitchens in the basement so we have like a we alternate every day who has to go down and get them first but we do we take a brand called Zimproof and then we have Skye's milk in bed and then we one

of us goes the other person goes to make coffees in bed and then I get up I go for a walk no matter what the weather is with our dog and Skye and by the time I've done all of that and then she goes down for a nap and I'll do like a little bit of yoga as you said sometimes it's five minutes sometimes it's one minute sometimes it's 45 minutes depending on the day and it kind of means by the time you've got to like 9 30 you feel so kind of accomplished and energized that the rest of the day can kind of go in any direction and I just have really appreciated that I used to do that with her even when she was so tiny and I might have like not really had any sleep but I found that it got me into yeah a kind

of day of like feeling like I'd looked after myself and done good things for myself and yeah it felt like the day could then go in any direction but I felt kind of positive about it yeah I mean I know from from people that have children and then now homeschooling them so slightly older obviously than Sky that they found actually just getting up an hour before where it's possible as long as they're not getting up super early but just using that first hour to just get some calls done and you know get a lot out of the way right has really helped with because then they can focus on the kids I mean these are kids that are obviously a bit older but

yeah I think that's definitely helped with a lot of people yeah it helps me frame my thinking if I'm just like productive immediately and then it can kind of just all go out the window and it doesn't matter the other thing I would suggest as well is getting dressed every day sorry I know that sounds a bit random but it's again coming to this whole thing about getting up in the morning and having a bit of a plan and because it's quite tempting to get up sidling to your kitchen and then before you know it like you said half the day's gone and you're just feeling like oh I haven't done much I'm not going to bother doing anything now right so it kind of it's sort of almost like self-satisfactory but if you get up and actually say right okay this is almost treat it like you would if you were going

to do your normal day-to-day routines in a way but just creating a different routine no I couldn't agree more with that it's funny I mean I can't I'm pregnant again and so I don't really fit in any of my clothes so I'm I am a leggings girl once more but it's it's quite an interesting one I do find like if you get up in the morning and you just like take a shower and you put on your moisturizer and you put on some clothes even if it is yeah in my case it's just leggings and a t-shirt like it's nothing complicated but you just and you brush your hair and you clean your teeth and this can literally be like a five to ten minute you know routine this is very short and

you know you do you make your coffee or maybe maybe you do a smoothie or you do your probiotics or whatever you do but you just do those tiny little things first thing and you suddenly have this sense that you kind of take care of yourself and you like appreciate yourself and it's funny again I found this so much in my like first days with Sky and I've really taken it into now and the days that I didn't do that I just found myself by the air she said the middle of the day just feeling a bit and nothing was really different you know it was really just like a five minute change but I hadn't brushed my hair properly and hadn't necessarily got around to cleaning my teeth just being honest and I hadn't had a time to have a shower and as a result you

just feel like you haven't looked after yourself and it has this like like there's almost like a mental thing of like you don't you're not seeing yourself as kind of worthy of looking after yourself that day yeah I think you're right like having those small rituals makes such a difference but you know getting up and that that's almost those right the rising 5 10 15 minutes of your day can just set the tone completely and actually it's probably more important right now than ever. Yeah, completely. Yeah. We're keeping this little, I honestly have no idea what it does, but it's like one of those sprays, you know, you spray on your face. I don't think it really does anything, but it smells so delicious. And it's amazing. Again, you just kind

of like stand up and spray your face. It says it kind of like moisturizes and things. I'm not sure it does, but you just suddenly, again, it smells so delicious and you feel like you're just doing something nice for yourself. And again, you immediately feel like perked up and kind of like really special, even though you've literally just sprayed like a smelly liquid on your face and it's taken one second, but there's a sense of self-care in those tiny little gestures that just feels really good if we normally end with kind of five take-homes so kind of just a handful of things that if listeners are going to just take anything away that's what they take away with them and yeah just ideas tips and tricks to kind of focus on well I think based around where we're at right now in this current situation,

probably just going to focus a bit more on those. But these are things that I think probably ongoing might just help. So yeah, make the first, since we've just come off that subject, make the first five, 10 minutes really sort of set the tone for the day ahead. So whatever it is that helps you to do that. Be kind to yourself, particularly during this time. Try not to just put too many expectations on yourself. So yeah, exert a lot more sort of self-compassion and kindness around this time. Make some plans. So have a bit of a routine for your day and use the same planning around meals and things like that, because that will help with relieving a bit of the ambiguity and bringing a bit more consistency. In terms of food specific, I'd say, you know, get into a good routine around sort of

batch cooking anyway, because that's something that longer term will just sort of help and you know try to get some like it's a bit of protein bit of fiber into your meals because that's going to help help with your energy levels keep them a bit more consistent throughout the day so probably would be my five amazing eve thank you so much for your time today and i'm definitely feeling yet inspired to to make something delicious for dinner tonight and not just have toast again and get some get some protein get some fiber into it thank you so so so much for all your time and we will be back again next week have a lovely week everyone everyone. Thank you so much. Bye. You're a podcast listener,

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