When Self-Care Doesn't Go As Planned
Read Time: 6 Minutes
Words by Melanie Lentz
My self-care over the years seems to have morphed into a comedy sketch. I started off strong, full of good intentions and a smidge of occasional sarcasm. One bit would flow right into the next. I tried not to miss a beat, but from time to time my delivery would fall flat, leaving me with an unfortunate awkward silence followed by my own nervous laughter. Sometimes I’d attempt an unimpressive improvised ad lib to confirm I’m fifty shades of messed up just like the best of them.
I’ll be here all week, folks. Tip your servers. Make good choices.
More recently, my self-care attempts mimic Saturday Night Live actors desperately trying to hold it together but ultimately breaking character as eruptions of uncontrollable laughter overcome their bodies. They just can’t help it. They’re cracking themselves up.
It’s been said that laughter is the best medicine, and I’m buying into that concept more and more as I get older. Self-care blunders don’t have to be the end of the world. We’re allowed to crack ourselves up and break character because we can’t be completely focused, on track, and successful perfectionists all of the time. We don’t have anything truly figured out except that we want to figure it all out.
Once in a while, it feels good to simply allow the process to be hilarious. If we can’t see the humor, are we even living?
For example, have you ever grabbed onto something that seemed right at the time but wound up being completely wrong in the end?
I made the decision to drink more water in 2021 and become a well-hydrated human. I even got a glittery water bottle with the phrase “Oh, hell no” across the side. I bought little bottles of flavored electrolytes to give my new habit extra fruity flair of better self-care. (Pause for applause.)
But merely one day into my new habit, I filled my bottle, opened the kitchen cabinet to retrieve the electrolytes, gave my bottle three or four squeezes of electrolyte juice, and went about my day. Simple. Painless.
I opened my laptop to work. After clattering away on the keyboard for a while, I absent-mindedly reached for my water bottle and took a long juicy sip from the straw.
My face immediately puckered, my hands started flapping, and I sprinted to the kitchen sink to dramatically spew the contents of my mouth down the drain.
“Oh, hell no.”
What in the world did I just put in my mouth? That’s not even close to strawberry watermelon.
I dry heaved as I opened the cabinet to check the electrolyte bottle. My face immediately did a nice impersonation of the eye-roll emoji followed by a serious case of the giggles.
Allow me to give you some advice, lest you fall into the same fate. Sometimes liquid pet vitamins come in bottles of similar size and shape as human water enhancers. Furthermore, beef brisket may taste delicious as a solid food, but it’s a quite revolting flavor for water.
Self-care doesn’t always go as planned, and my dog vitamins are now stored elsewhere. I grabbed something that seemed right but wasn’t, and that’s okay. Laugh-inducing lesson learned.
Let’s move on.
Self-care. What is it really? It comes in many forms, varying based off how we handle what’s thrown at us, I suppose. Obviously, I get it wrong sometimes. I often wish my self-care was merely a pedicure, an Instagram post, and a cute hashtag. Maybe part of self-care is recognizing that real life isn’t as simple as a self-care checklist formula for happiness. Trial and error – also known as mistakes – are the tools that give us the experiences to keep going and growing.
I recently met a woman who was almost eighty years old but didn’t look a day over sixty-five. If she would have said she was sixty, I would have believed her. The group of ladies we were with asked for her secrets.
“Dish! We have to know!” we chimed.
“A little powder and a little paint make you look like what you ain’t,” she said matter-of-factly.
I have a personal addition to this little one-liner and it goes something like this: “A little airbrush and a strategic filter make you look slightly less off-kilter.”
You know what? I’m too old for filtering myself into selective authenticity, and I like being a little off-kilter. Self-care is a serious matter, but don’t confuse adequate self-care for perfection. Self-care is what we need when we’re more messed up than usual so we can be the best – not perfect – versions of ourselves. The best version of me is the one that can laugh at my self-care shenanigans. Laughter can be comforting.
Speaking of comfort, here’s another self-care lesson I learned. I have been known to refuse to size up when clothing doesn’t fit in my “usual” or “preferred” size. Have you ever squeezed into a pair of jeans that “run small” but lack the “2% elastin” to assist in the matter? That’s not comfort; it’s quite the opposite, in fact. Some may liken it to feeling like a busted can of biscuits. Don’t attempt the “squat test” in those babies or your biscuit butt will bust right out of the seams. Not that I know this from experience. Okay, I’ll keep it real. I do know this from experience.
But here’s the thing. The smaller adult version of me was never the “better” version just because it looked like a size two. To me, that realization is more reflective of MY better self-care. My exterior size matters far less than the quality of my insides.
The smaller version of me had an eating disorder. She never ate dessert, and she didn’t have much of a social life. The couple extra pounds of today’s version are an added bonus of balance and buoyancy. They represent taking days off from exercise to allow for rest and healing. They’re an occasional spontaneous ice cream adventure with my boyfriend. They represent a life I enjoy much more mentally, emotionally, and physically than I did in my old I-live-in-Los-Angeles-and-must-be-a-size-two mentality. Allowing myself to be okay with sizing up actually keeps me afloat today. Literally. Fat does float better than muscle. In my case, sizing up was really a step up in a positive direction.
Proper sizing also helps with unnecessary compression of vital organs. Speaking of vital organs, the experts tell us to check our lady bits regularly, get recommended exams, and be proactive about reproductive health. This kind of self-care doesn’t always result in a clean bill of health, unfortunately. Last year, my routine PAP smear came back with abnormal results. This meant more tests, and some weren’t completely covered by my insurance. (I should mention I’ve learned self-care can be expensive.)
I have never had a baby or been to a gynecologist for anything other than a routine exam. But the day I went in for the colposcopy and endocervical curettage (ECC) was a day of enlightenment.
I’m still trying to wrap my head around why I never knew my nice doctor would take a big mascara wand, shove it up my childless lady bits, scrape around up there, and make me cramp and bloat like it was a bad time of the month coupled with eating excessive cheese wontons from that Irish pub in town. Not only that, but I said I wanted the camera where I could watch it all go down. Why am I the way that I am?
“Crazy to think a baby comes out of there, huh?” Her mask covered her face, but I’m sure the doctor was trying not to laugh at my expression, my eyes as wide as my legs in the stirrups.
The next morning, I woke up worrying about what the test results would say. As I got ready for work, I pulled out my mascara and erupted into laughter as I remembered the different kind of mascara-esque wand from the day before. My shoulders shook and I accidentally smeared mascara all over my eyelids. I couldn’t stop cracking myself up.
In the end, I will be okay. I’ll keep moving forward. I’ll keep taking my self-care seriously while not taking myself too seriously. I’ll wake up every day, fill up my water bottle, and brace for the unexpected. I’ll keep checking in with all of my bits, the physical as well as the mental bits. When necessary, I’ll spit out the yucky, adjust, and belly laugh until my sides hurt. This self-care stuff is hard, but it’s fun (and funny) being the unfiltered, off-kilter me in a pair of pants that actually fit.
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About the Author:
Melanie Lentz, a Southern California native, became a Secret Service agent at twenty-two, one of the youngest females ever hired. She is the author of "Agent Innocent: How the Secret Service Changed My Life" and the upcoming "Advance Work: A Personal Protection Assignment 7-Day Workbook". Today she lives a simpler life in the Midwest near her family and appreciates good books, good workouts, and a warm day on the lake.
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