Category Archives: #PPDChat

The 5 Senses Challenge Worksheet is Now Available!

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Last night’s chat was small and intimate but it allowed for those who did attend to really get in touch with their senses and discover how doing so changed their outlook about even the most common of items.

Today, I am sharing the worksheet to complement last night’s chat with you. Included is a five-day challenge focusing on a separate sense every day. The final assignment encourages you to look over your notes for each day, noticing what emotions are attached to your observances.

There is even a bonus challenge included so you want to make sure you grab this worksheet now!

The 5 Senses Challenge is available here!

#PPDChat Topic 02.03.14: The Five Senses Challenge

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Life is lived through the senses, isn’t it? Memories are not just thoughts put on shelves in our brains, they are remembered best through sights, sounds, tastes, touch, and scents, right?

I remember my grandmother’s perfume. I could not, for the life of you tell you the name of it (I want to say Charlie, but I think I am horribly wrong) but whenever I briefly smell something similar, I think of her. Well, that and bouillabaisse but perfume is far more common.

The scent of ink takes me back to my childhood spent in the family print shop. That’s a cascade of memories – the sound of the presses whirring, the cutter chopping stacks of paper, the cement in the alley outside, the giant cardboard boxes and pallets of paper we would hide behind. Or the darkroom filled with massive amounts of chemicals I’m sure weren’t safe for me to be around but bring a dizzying memory of darkness glowing in the bath of a red light to the forefront of my mind.

Ocean waves crashing make me smell the salt spray drifting through the air, I hear the seagulls overhead, and the warm sun slowly baking me into a loaf of human bread. If I focus just enough, I hear the chatter of other people playing at the beach over the humdrum of the ocean waves.

The wafting scent of a cigar reminds me of my grandfather. He always had one chomped in his mouth as he puttered around outside, it seemed. Mix that with the scent of wet leaves in the fall and the memory of my grandfather is complete. Weird, yes, but that’s him.

Don’t even get me started on the deliciousness that is Entenmann’s or an Eggplant Parmesan sub because YUM. Oh, and delicious saltwater Taffy. OH the memories as it would melt in my mouth and stick to my teeth. Gah, I miss being a kid.

Right now, there is snow falling outside, floating and dancing as it drifts to the ground where it has collected en masse to add up to a minimum of 7 inches for now. It is a good healthy wet snow which means we get to make a snowman at some point. But for now, it is quite peaceful to just sit here and watch it silently and gracefully cover the entire landscape as if it were a bride preparing for her groom. Everything is draped in white, laden with heavy snow.

This week’s #PPDChat will focus on the senses and how living life mindfully helps you navigate your view away from the negative toward the positive. There is beauty in everything, it just takes a few extra minutes to tune in to the heart of it all. Once you do, you will find, however, that you can’t possibly miss the beauty in even the smallest of things.

I hope you will join me at 830pm ET tonight for this fabulous chat. Stay tuned for the worksheet to go along with tonight’s chat – I think you’re gonna love it!

2014 State of the Blog

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Today I finally did something I have wanted to do since starting this blog.

An editorial calendar!

YES!

I have all my weeks planned out through the end of the year.

I cannot begin to tell you how absolutely awesome this feels.

My next big goal around here is to clean up the blog – minimize and streamline tags and categories, redesign, and in May, go completely self-hosted. Maybe even start Vlogging. EEEEEEK. I have BIG goals this year and even better, I AM going to achieve them all and then some.

My sole goal today, as was noted in my post yesterday, was to make it to the gym and sit in the hot tub. I made it to the gym but the hot tub was closed. No idea on when it will be open again but it doesn’t matter because this week’s weather, well, according to R2D2’s severe weather alerts, I wouldn’t make it to the gym unless we had a Tauntaun on the back deck anyway.

Speaking of crappy weather, today’s weather was cloudy yet surprisingly warm. We hit a balmy 48F today and I drove home from the grocery store with the windows down. Crazy? Perhaps. But when you have been in the middle of Hoth for the past several weeks, 48F is a tropical heatwave, baby, and begs for you to ride with the windows down with the tunes blasting because baby, that’s spring.

It’s a new month, a new year, and I have started it off the best way possible with this new habit of writing every day. I should warn you, however, I plan to start working on my book this month and won’t be blogging AS much because my words will be going there instead of here. I hope to have some guest posts for you but that’s going to depend on some serious participation from you, the readers.

For this month’s schedule, the theme is, of course, Love. This week, we’re focusing on things you can do to show love to yourself (get your mind outta the gutter!), next week, your child, the following week, your partner, then the last week will examine extended family. Don’t worry, we’ll be examining healthy boundaries as part of this series too. If you have a piece that would fit into this topic, feel free to send it to me at mypostpartumvoice (@) gmail with “FEBRUARY SUBMISSION” in the subject line. It’d be fabulous if Perinatal Mood Disorders were somehow involved but it’s okay if it isn’t so feel free to submit if you have a great post about love for couples or parents without the PPD aspect. We are human too, after all.

March’s theme will be “Spring” and focus on the rebirth which comes with the season. We’ll be examining Light therapy, Vitamin D, Getting Out and About with Baby, Renewal, and Alternative Therapies. Again, feel free to send any guest posts my way.

I’m also looking for guest hosts for #PPDChat all the time so if you are interested, let me know. All I ask is that you be somewhat familiar with Twitter (even if you’re not, I will take the time to help you learn the ropes).

On that note, and I will mention this again, I’m seeking some awesome people who have been through the hell that is PPD to join me as part of a #PPDChat Brain Trust. You’ll be volunteering to help promote, brainstorm, and organize upcoming #PPDChats as well as possibly help moderate the FB Group. I am completely flexible with whatever your schedule allows as I know life can get very hectic. So if you are interested or know someone who would be a GREAT fit for this volunteer opportunity, send them my way!

Stay tuned for more updates about the editorial calendar and other exciting upcoming announcements. My word this year is ENGAGE and I am absolutely determined to get this party started!

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#PPDChat Topic 1.27.14: Making Unsolicited Advice Turn Into Your Swan

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On Sunday evening, a post entitled “Finding Life Beyond My Comfort Zone” poured forth from my soul. This morning, a post entitled “Meeting Enemies Undaunted” spilled forth at almost twice the length of last night’s post. Today’s post was a response to an unpublished comment on Finding Life.

Someone saw fit to recommend that I do “more awesome things than take medicine” for my current bout of depression. Instead of staying angry, I used her comment as fodder for a post to explain why such comments do more harm than good and how we, as those who are brave enough to speak up about our battles, should not allow people like her to ruin any progress we may have made toward healing.

We all have different ideas for how to heal and must do what is best for ourselves. In the same vein, we must respect the educated decisions others have made whether they be on their own or with the help of a professional (that is, unless said person is in crisis, then we must urge them to seek help immediately). Recommending a different course of action when someone has settled on one which is working for them is well, rude.

Do you know the story of the ugly duckling? It is one I grew up hearing quite a bit. A young flapper (or cygnet), somehow ended up with a family of ducks. He looked nothing like his brothers and sisters and was teased mercilessly, labeled ugly for not appearing to be the same. Then, he grew older, matured, and turned into a beautiful swan, one of the most graceful birds in the world.

Then there’s Rudolph – who wasn’t allowed to play any reindeer games until Santa asked him to lead his sleigh.

In both situations (yes, yes, fictional, I know), the main characters took something which was negative and let it go. It is difficult to do. But once you learn to flip the negative on its head, a funny thing happens. Less is negative and your outlook on life brightens. Perhaps not overnight, but over time you find yourself able to see even the most negative of things as a lesson from which to learn.

That’s what today’s chat will focus on – turning the negatives in your life into situations from which you learn valuable positive skills.

Make that unsolicited advice your swan, perhaps even your swan song. Bring down the house with it as you rise up toward joy.

Look forward to seeing you tonight at #PPDChat. Be there at 830pm ET sharp!

Here’s the worksheet, “How to Write Your Swan Song“, which goes along with this chat. Feel free to download it and use it. Let me know how it works out for you!

#PPDChat Topic 01.13.14: Leaving It All Behind – Embracing Emotional Minimalism

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Today’s chat will focus on a concept I introduced in a post last night, emotional minimalism. The idea behind emotional minimalism is not to be completely numb to feelings but rather to process them in a timely, mindful, and healthy manner thereby traveling light with your emotions instead of dragging a ton of unnecessary baggage along with you. 

Go read last night’s post here and get ready for a challenging chat tonight. See you at 830pm ET!