Self Care Isn’t Selfish

[00:00:00] Self-care really isn’t selfish. Yeah. You have implicitly or explicitly signed up to do a lot of different things that require the best of you, and if you don’t take good care of yourself, you can’t show up as the best of you and you can’t meet your. Commitments or the things that really mean the most to you?

Hi, this is Emily Harmon, host of the Onward Podcast. Welcome, I hope you enjoy this episode. In this episode, I’m interviewing Karen Clark Salinas, and she’s a national board certified health and wellness coach and founder of Rebalance Wellbeing. Karen coaches very busy women who risk chronic health issues from constantly putting themselves last.

Karen helps them take better care of themselves through [00:01:00] mindset, healthy living, and happiness practices, so that they have the time and energy to put their dreams, goals, and priorities first, at least some of the time. She’s a mother of three and a stepmother of four, all of them in their twenties. Karen is a thriver of divorce, her most difficult life event, and she’s a survivor of a 15 year odyssey with Lyme disease, which was exacerbated by chronic stress.

Karen’s mission is to help women succeed in their career and raise a happy, healthy family without sacrificing wellbeing. Very busy women risk, chronic illness from constantly putting themselves last. Have you been there? Or do you know somebody who’s struggling with this? I know I’ve been there. I think you’ll find this episode helpful.

Karen, welcome to the Onward podcast. Thanks. I’m really glad to be here. [00:02:00] I’m happy for you to be here too. We met through the Don’t Keep Your Day Job podcast, and I’ve met so many people through that podcast. In fact, you’re in the Baltimore area. We have a, a podcast listening group. I don’t know if you wanna join it or not, but I find it very helpful.

Cool. Yeah. So something to think about. So you’re a national board certified health and wellness coach, and you founded Rebalance Wellbeing. You coach very busy women who risk chronic health issues because they constantly keep putting themselves last. And a lot of times people start a company, That’s centered around an area that caused them pain or they’ve experienced, and I’m wondering, did you used to be or are you still a very busy woman that’s risking your health?

So I was a, a very busy mom of three kids. Working full-time. So I have a, I have a real desire [00:03:00] to help working moms. Looking back, I think there’s some things I could have done a little differently, but hindsight’s 2020, but, uh, I’d like to help as many working moms as I can during the time that I was raising three kids, I did contract Lyme disease.

And it went undiagnosed for almost a year and a half. And because of, I think because of also the, the very busy life I was living and also putting the needs of my kids and my husband at the time first took me a long time to get well. And that was also exacerbated, uh, by the fact that, uh, my 20 year marriage kind of just.

Imploded overnight. So I, I definitely had a, you know, a few years of single parenting and trying to heal myself, and I did eventually do that and that’s [00:04:00] why I’m, I’m here now. But yeah, I think, I think particularly as we just take on way more than we need to. I agree. How do we stop? How do we stop doing that?

Well, so again, hindsight’s 2020. I know for sure that I could have asked for more help from my children at least. It would be great if I could have done that successfully, uh, with my first husband. But I, I think sometimes we tell ourselves we, it really makes us happy to make everybody else happy, so we’re really doing what we wanna be doing.

And there is truth to that, no doubt. But that doesn’t mean there’s not some room to pull back a little. Not do quite so much, let go of some of the assumptions and expectations that maybe we were raised [00:05:00] with. I think there’s a, a lot of different places to gain a little foothold and begin to help women have the, the time and the energy to put into their own dreams and goals and priorities first, at least some of the time.

And I think we can, part of what we can do is do that as part of our, our parenting and helping our kids see what it looks like to take, you know, for moms to take care of themselves, to see what it looks like and have practice with. A family, a team, a group being only as good as every single member of that group there.

There’s a lot of, a lot of things that you know, we could feel good about because we’re trying to teach our children better, make them better partners, friends, parents themselves. And it wouldn’t have to be super hard. I agree. I [00:06:00] mean, here’s one thing that I did, and I’m not saying I was a perfect mom by any means.

You can listen to some of my podcast episodes with my kids, but I remember when my son turned 13 and he said he’s 26 now. He said, I’m 13, I’m an adult. I wanna be treated like an adult. And I said, Okay. You can do your own laundry from here on out, cuz that’s what adults do. Right. So I stopped doing his laundry when he was 13.

Huh. And that’s, One way of delegating certain chores to, you know, your kids. Right. Right. What other do you have or what tips do you have? Well, so, you know, I didn’t, I didn’t do a lot of that while my kids were at home and I kind of remember this little bit of a, a mad dash. To, oh my gosh. Like, you’re leaving for college in six months or less.

Like, here are the things, and I, I, I will say I, I still sometimes get [00:07:00] calls from my kids about laundry and it kind of cracks, you know, makes me laugh. But I think my kids are, are now, uh, let’s see, 24, age 24 to 28. And I, I think I’ve felt like in, in past few years, definitely. They like seeing me as a whole person.

I know part of that is developmentally where they are, but I’m showing them how to do some different things in different ways where now that they’re working, they can think about, uh, work life integration a little differently. But I do really believe that they like seeing me as a whole person. And they benefit from that.

So what kind of tips do you have for a mom who has three kids that are in their teens, let’s say? I mean, your, your tips are probably different than a mother of teens, than a mother of young children. But what would you say for a mother of teens, what are some things that they can do to help take better care of [00:08:00] themselves and make sure that they have a healthy, healthy living and, um, and practice happiness?

That’s a million dollar question for teens. So, I think it’s, even though it’s gonna, you know, take a little effort in the beginning, I think that you can, as a mom, you can show, first of all, you can slow your lives down a little bit. And, um, my kids played travel soccer and that consumed our weekends and the whole thing.

But I think that had I slowed us down just a little, that would have been good for all of us. But what it would’ve also done was allowed me to be a little more intentional about some of the things that I wanted them to learn, or I wanted them to contribute to the, the community of our family. I am a people pleaser, so it’s hard for me.

I’m working on it and getting better. It’s hard for me to ask people to do [00:09:00] things that I think they may not like or wanna do. Right. And I think if I had been able to switch in my head a little bit, this, this shouldn’t be about whether they like it or not. Yeah. It should be about, I’m trying to help them become the best adults that they can.

Yeah. And, and I’m not trying to excessively beat up on myself either, but So I, I think that, here’s a simple example. I think everybody could just, you mentioned laundry. My kids could have been changing their own sheets on their beds every other week or whatever, you know, whatever, uh, timing. I determined people could have had assigned chores, part of which was some of those life skills, right?

Cooking a meal, cleaning up after the meal, things like that. And again, a lot of that, that was because our, our lives were going so fast. I was, you know, I was focused on [00:10:00] them doing well in school. I was focused on then kind of their extracurriculars. Feeding all of that in with two working parents. And I think I, I wished I had just slowed down a little bit, was a little more intentional about other things in our lives and that I was also more intentional about what I needed.

I kind of ran on the, the fuel of, I think I need to make everybody else happy. And I agree. I think when you’re so busy, like going to soccer, doing this, that by the time you get in bed, You’re just exhausted and then you start the day over again and you don’t have that time to think and to just take a step back.

Right. And be more intentional. I wish I had learned how to meditate back then and yoga. I’ve started doing that lately and that’s really helped me. That’s great. I actually think, and I, I wasn’t as big a thing when. When we were raising our kids. I think those are two skills we could teach our kids. That would be [00:11:00] amazing.

Definitely. Um, so, so here’s another suggestion. So I, I mean, I can certainly imagine, and I would’ve been one of those busy moms, You know, having the same thoughts go through my mind of like, well, right, that would be great if I could do yoga with my kids, teach ’em how to meditate, you know, do all these things.

But h how am I gonna do that? I don’t have the time, I don’t have the energy, I don’t have the mental bandwidth. So I think one of the things that I, I wish I had focused on differently, and it took actually having a, a pretty serious chronic illness for me to question. Some of the assumptions that I grew up with living with a mom who did not work outside of the house, I don’t believe.

I think when I went to college, maybe she started working outside of the the house, so, I joke about this, but it was really true. I just thought that there was no other way than [00:12:00] after every dinner, the dishes had to be cleaned and the kitchen all taken care of. And I, I know that also sometimes that can, having that order in your environment can really help with, with stress relief a little bit.

It wasn’t until I got sick and I was just, Kind of fortunate to manage to get some food for, at that time, I had two kids living at home. One was in college and I, I was too tired to clean up. Now, if my kids were, had that as one of their jobs right, then, that wouldn’t be an issue. But I learned that nothing bad happens if the dishes do not get washed.

That’s true. Turns out they are there the next morning. Uh, so some of it would be to, to question the assumptions. And to manage not only your own, but but maybe of others that you spend a lot of time with. [00:13:00] Could be your family or your coworkers, but manage expectations. Like what, what can I reasonably do and still feel, uh, at least some of the time, not overwhelmed, not spread too thin?

Cause I, I, I get concerned. Particularly with seeing just, you know, the incidence rate of chronic diseases is increasing, it would seem there’s gotta be problems with the food we’re eating also with our reduced exercise. But I just, it just concerns me. I would hate for, would hate for people to feel like that they shouldn’t pay attention to any of those health risks.

Until they were diagnosed, it’s not necessary. Try to prevent some of that by taking care of yourself. Um, I think also like picking your battles with your kids is something, yes. For example, my son did his own laundry, but he didn’t fold and put it away. He liked to have it all over the floor [00:14:00] because he liked to just see what was out there instead of having it be in the drawers and pick it up and wear it.

And, you know, at one point I just like, fine, it’s not worth. Right. It’s not a battle worth fighting. I totally agree. For a long time, my sons had no need for a dresser. It was just a piece of furniture that wasn’t necessary. Um, and, uh, who knows, as, as they’re living on their own right now, uh, that may still be the case, but Right.

You have to, yeah. Really pick and choose. What, what is important, and I would say also think about, and I don’t feel like I did this at least very intentionally until I, you know, maybe was in my, my forties, I’m not sure. But what are my core values? And if this is what’s really important to me to be part of my life, then how does that show up in my family?

How does that show up [00:15:00] in the work that I do? How does it show up in where I spend my most time and effort and energy? And I think we actually have a lot more choice. Than we feel that we do. And I would really like for more working parents to take charge of their choices a little bit to question, is this the way we really want it to be?

And if it is, That’s fine. You’ll know. You’ll say, yes, this is why. And so I’m making these choices because this is the way I wanna live at this time. Right? Instead of just doing something because that’s how you think it should be done, or that’s how you think other people do it, or that’s how it worked for your parents when they were raising you, taking some time to really think about, well, what do you.

Want what is best for you and your family. That’s right. That’s right. Mm-hmm. And if we have to kind of boil it down to the [00:16:00] things that are really the most important, then what, what is that? So, a, a very small example. I remember growing up and a younger brother, most of our dinners were in the dining room with a fairly, you know, nice set table.

And there was a lot of emphasis. On table manners that I just thought were crazy. And it was even worse for my brother cuz he refused to practice them. So, you know, dinners with my own children, it focused on just a few of the basics. But I also, it’s really important to me that my kids say, please and thank you.

So I, I emphasize that a lot and I, I did it based on my own values. So I, I would, that’s a kind of a small example, but I would encourage us to do more of that and to also, Realize that things will change whether you do anything or not. [00:17:00] As your kids grow, as you know, life curve balls get thrown at you.

Things will change, so you can, you’ll either be forced to make some different choices or you can choose also to change things up so you don’t have to decide once and done. Right. Didn’t, I’m not sure I underst well. There was part of me that understood that because I remember being just wishing that childcare arrangements would last for six months.

Yeah. If I could just get through the next six months, that would be great. But there was another part of me that I think just. I don’t know, assumed my husband and I had made decisions about who was gonna do the childcare, who was gonna take care of this and care of that. And I didn’t think that I could come back and say, wait a minute.

I know this is what we decided before, but things are different now. Or what, how can we decide this differently at this point? And maybe you didn’t even decide, maybe you just fell into those roles and never [00:18:00] even had a discussion about it. Very true. I remember at one point realizing that I was the default parent, and I’d always wanted to be a mom.

I loved being a mom. I loved being a working mom. I personally would, would not have made a very good stay at home mom, but I, I also became the default parent, and that’s a very full. Job. It’s definitely a full-time job. I noticed too, I’m somebody who’s always, um, enjoyed exercise and so I would notice that when I didn’t exercise, didn’t get a workout in or even just a walk or, and the other thing is time alone because I’m an introvert, just time to decompress.

If I didn’t get that, then I would be more less patient with my children. Yes. And they knew that too. So them knowing that and and say, mom, go exercise helped too. You know, cuz then I didn’t feel as guilty when they were telling me work out like I was leaving them. [00:19:00] And I would try to fit times in to exercise, like when they were at soccer practice instead of sitting there watching the entire practice on a chair, I’d go find a place to walk or I’d go do my exercises then.

So sometimes you have to be creative Yes. About ways to make the time to take care of yourself. Yes. So that makes me think there, there are a few things that I really recommend as a, a good place to start taking care of yourself. It’s just kind of the starting line. One is also for me is sleep. Yeah. I have to really.

Really wanna encourage moms, dads, women, you’ve got to prioritize sleep. When I was really sick and also going through my divorce, I believe that that was one of the biggest keys. To healing from both was to get good quality sleep, give my my mind and body a break. The next one I would add is [00:20:00] drinking water.

Again, these are not rocket science. No, but I’ve had clients tummy and I’ve experienced it myself, drinking enough water, which they tend to say is, you know, half your body weight in ounces. It gives you energy and the more you kind of increase that intake, the more your body will ask for it. So it becomes really kind of easy.

And there’s all different kinds of tricks to get yourself to drink more by an attractive water bottle that you like. I’ve also seen some people with water bottles that are huge, like their entire daily intake is in one bottle, and that’s what works for them. That’s awesome. Set some rules for yourself.

You know, I have to drink X amount before I leave the office to go home. Or every time I get up to go to the restroom, I’m gonna drink 12 ounces of water and maybe I’ll slip in a [00:21:00] walk around the first lap with a building. Mm-hmm. Set some rules, weave that wellbeing lifestyle into your work because it’s, it’s hard when it’s relegated to the hours outside of work.

And I did the same thing that you did was during practices or, you know, I’d go and, and run or walk or whatever, but there’s more we can also be doing when we’re at work. Another thing is to try and fill your body with foods that are closest to how nature made them really minimize the processed foods and the sugar that’s important for how you feel in the moment.

But it’s also really important for that, that long term, actually, I, I was reading about a term yesterday, your, your longer health span. So if you, if you are trying to impact, uh, [00:22:00] down the road, paying attention to what you eat, It really makes a difference. Um, how do you do that when you’re a busy parent of teens and it’s hard to make a meal every, every night or to make healthy food and it’s easier to just go out and eat, right?

So I think one thing is to invest a little bit of time in thinking about what are the healthy foods. That I can purchase or that can be grab and go for any of us, and that people can kind of cobble together, that’ll still be a healthy meal. So instead of feeling like dinner has to equal. A meat and a starch, and then maybe something a little green if the kids will have a bite of it.

You could just think about, we’re super busy tonight and we’re gonna, we’re gonna make sure we have a, a healthy protein source. It doesn’t necessarily have to be a meat. We’re gonna [00:23:00] try in one way or another, get as many fruits and vegetables into what we’re eating. I know it is not easy, but I, I also know I had a conversation with some mom friends that I have known for a very long time.

And we were talking about how the time when we were raising our kids, particularly like elementary and middle school, we, we gave them chicken nuggets, macaroni and cheese, because we didn’t know any better. Like a lot of the information wasn’t out there. I used to think it was amazing that my kids would eat so much yogurt.

Well, the yogurt was basically dessert, and I didn’t, I didn’t learn about that until later. So I think we made those choices because it was the information that we had and there’s new information available and kids don’t, uh, come to us saying they must eat chicken nuggets and macaroni and cheese. [00:24:00] It’s, it’s not a rule.

It’s not something hardwired and we can help them learn how to better fuel their bodies and we can also get rid of the. Kind of the expectation or the assumption that this is what dinner looks like and I’m short on time, so I gotta do ready made or process things. It does take some effort. There’s. But anything worthwhile takes takes effort, and then you’re teaching them from when they get out on their own.

My parents raised us to eat healthy. They just did, and they’re vegetarian, so I’m pretty much a vegetarian, but I, and I raised my children that way. They were allowed to eat junk from time to time and. When they got out on their own, they didn’t always make the best choices, but they’re definitely coming back to that.

So even if you don’t think your children are observing you or listening and learning from you, and they don’t show that right away, they do. Yeah. Like my son’s neater now. My [00:25:00] son keeps his room. You know, he, he put his clothes away when he put Right, right. Laundry. And they’re both making just definitely healthier choices.

So they learn from us too, as to how we take care of each other. So yes. Ourselves. Yes. And our daughters and sons are watching us and. Making their own opinions based on, you know, and expectations and assumptions based on what they see us doing. So setting the right example is good, like meal planning, things like that.

Mm-hmm. Yes. I actually have, I have a couple of friends, one’s coming to mind right now. Her, uh, son who’s in his mid twenties has become quite the cook. And, um, I think that’s, that’s amazing. Neither one of my sons would fall under that label, but that, you know, but the, the fact that this other young man got really interested in, in cooking and just kind of likes to do it as a hobby, that’s great.

Yeah, [00:26:00] definitely. Did you get your Lyme’s disease from a tick bite? Yes. I never saw it, so that is my assumption. My, you know, I spent, spent a lot of time out on soccer fields. And it that either that or where, uh, where we were living at the time, we could see that deer would come at night and eat like the lower, lower half of some of our, our shrubs and things like that.

So yeah, that, that’s my assumption. Yep. So another thing that is important about. Taking care of ourselves and putting ourselves first is when you’re not feeling well, is going to the doctor and being a advocate for your own health. And I’m sure that you had to be an advocate for your own health when you had that Lyme disease because, um, it wasn’t diagnosed correctly right away.

Right, right. That’s really true in, that’s another time where I can get. Really concerned for, for busy women is, you know, I [00:27:00] know all the different pieces that are in their lives. I also know they’re starting to talk about some of the ways their body is showing them that they’ve got too much going on, but they can’t seem to slow down.

And I end up saying, you have to take care of this health. Right now you don’t have any room in your schedule in your. Your lifestyle, the way you’ve built it to be sick. And if you keep going at this pace, you are likely to become more sick, and then it becomes a much bigger crisis, not only for you personally, but for your family or your coworkers, and.

So it’s something that’s really worth taking care of sooner. I think human nature is to, is to ignore that and just think, well, that, that can happen to Karen, but it wouldn’t happen to me. Well, I said I, you know, I was just out living life, possibly even out of my, you know, front porch [00:28:00] and ended up with being infected with Lyme disease.

There’s no doubt that the excessive stress. That I had in my life, particularly, uh, going through, uh, a divorce really made it much more challenging to heal. But life, life can take a turn for any of us and most of us, myself included, not prepared. And when you have kids to take care of and to lead and you know, teach all of that, enjoy.

You have to really be at your best. That’s why self-care. Really isn’t selfish. Yeah. You have implicitly or explicitly signed up to do a lot of different things that require the best of you. And if you don’t take good care of yourself, you can’t show up as the best of you and you can’t meet your commitments or the things that really mean the most to you.

So you have, you’re [00:29:00] a coach and help women through this and you have a a self-care quiz. Mm-hmm. What kinds of things do you ask on that? I mean, you don’t have to give it all away, cuz I’ll put a link in the show notes to your quiz. But what kinds of things do you ask? And then how do you use that quiz?

What does it look like after somebody takes that quiz and comes to you? Do you coach through Zoom calls or in person or phone calls? How do you help your clients out? So the, the quiz, the self-care quiz, where do you need the most help right now? Gives you, gives the person that takes it a result of either it’s your mind, your body, or your spirit that needs the most help right now.

And I tend to find that mind is the area where most people score. It’s not that there aren’t. You know, any of the others, but mind is, is a popular one, and after taking the quiz, then you receive a guide that’s tailored towards one of those three [00:30:00] areas and gives you six simple strategies to try and take better care of yourself in that particular area.

Oh, awesome. So you’re giving, uh, listeners a link to that quiz and then they will get that guide after they take the quiz? Yes. And then yes. They can start implementing some of that, but if they need help, they can, um, work with you as a coach. Right, right. So a challenge, and I was like this as well as, you know, this, this busy mom is, I think sometimes there’s, there’s a little voice or our, our gut, our intuition who is telling us that we need to take better care of ourselves, that our pace.

Is not sustainable. And so we have moments of saying, okay, I’ve gotta do better by myself. And so then maybe you take the quiz. And then you wake up the next day or the next week and there’s too much of life that’s squeezing out those, those really good intentions. [00:31:00] So I wanna also help people look at where can they kind of integrate work and life, work and family.

So that their wellbeing in all spheres is rebalance and a and a little better because veteran in one area will likely have, uh, positive impact on the other area. And so I am intrigued and interested to talk with people who wanna look at their work-life balance. I don’t tend to focus on balance, but that’s how most people think of it.

Think it can be hard to kind of literally balance work and life, particularly in a 24 hour period. Yeah. Cause sometimes there’s more work, sometimes there’s more life needs, a little more flexibility. Yeah, I think that’s a good point. We tend to just look at work-life balance as today. So today I worked all day, but then maybe [00:32:00] tomorrow maybe I worked all day and I, and I take tomorrow off.

Or maybe tomorrow I’m able to get to the gym as long, you know, maybe take a look at your, your week or your moment. Right. And you might realize that you’re a little bit better balanced. Yes, I think that’s very true. I live by my calendar and one of the things I do. Just a little tip as I color code my, the things on my calendar.

So red is podcast related work. Blue is my coaching and small business consulting work. Green is personal stuff and orange is going to the gym. And yellow is phone calls kind of. But I can just l glance at my calendar, done this for a long time now, and I can get a feel if I’m really out of whack or not right at my calendar.

And that helps. Yes, and strategies like that, they add up over time and. We are as, as human beings. We’re really fortunate that our brains are flexible, malleable, [00:33:00] we can retrain it. And that’s, that’s all, that’s really what, what habits are about, right? We’ve trained. I would either intentionally or unintentionally, our brain has been trained in a certain way to respond or crave to something.

And starting off intentionally we can change our behaviors and over time the brain changes and you don’t have to think so hard about things anymore. The more we do it, the easier it gets. You’re exactly right. In one of my episodes I interviewed Chris Parkinson about yoga, and I used to think of yoga as exercise, and it’s so much more than that.

And he talks in that episode about how practicing yoga can help you change your habits. Yes. That’s a good one to listen to about how it can help you be more conscious. It’s not just about the poses and holding the hook. Right. Right, right. That sounds like a really interesting episode. [00:34:00] Yeah. Okay. Well, um, how can my listeners find you?

1. So my website is rebalance wellbeing.com and you’ll find, um, the quiz there as well. You can, I do have a Facebook group called Working Moms Who Thrive. And would love to have, uh, any of your listeners join us. And I am also on LinkedIn at Karen Dash Clark Salinas, so I would love to, um, connect with people on LinkedIn as well.

Thank you, Karen. I’ll put links to all of those in the show notes. Any one last tip before we close off this interview. I think what’s in my mind right now is that this is your life and you get to choose. What’s in it or how you respond to what’s in it. So I, I would just really encourage people to realize they have choices and to take [00:35:00] them.

Yep. Don’t be a victim of your circumstances. That’s right. We can check your circumstances. Right. That’s really good advice. Karen, thank you so much for being on my podcast. Thank you. I’ve had a lot of fun. I enjoyed that conversation with Karen. It brought back some memories of being a mother to my children and when they were younger, and of course there’s things I would do differently.

I’m sure everyone experiences that, and I can say in all honesty that there’s no better experience in life than being a mother. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed it and I still do. My children and I have been through quite a bit in the past year. It was about a year ago this time that my children’s father was diagnosed with cancer and became paralyzed in both arms.

And when I look back at that year, I just see how far we, all three of us have come. Unfortunately, he passed away on December 11th, and we talk about him and think about him every [00:36:00] day. I know that he would be proud of the young adult. That William and Anna have become. Thank you for listening today. I hope you enjoyed the episode.

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And remember, self-care is not selfish.