Bipolar Disorder and Why Self-Care Matters


Self-care is an essential part of living with bipolar. Discover how creating a personalized self-care plan can help you stay well.

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Self-care is basically what it sounds like: care for oneself. It is anything you do to keep yourself well, whether that’s emotionally, psychologically, spiritually, physically, and/or professionally.

It’s incredibly important for everybody, but when you have a chronic mental health condition like bipolar disorder, it becomes all the more important. What I recommend is having a self-care plan.

First and Foremost, Self-Care Is Not Selfish

It’s really important to note upfront that self-care is not a “Western” concept. Many times, people have said to me, dismissively, “Oh, self-care, that’s just an American thing, and it’s actually selfish!” No, it’s not “just an American thing.” And even if it were, there are a lot of great American things, so that’s fine.

Keeping oneself well is entrenched in a lot of different cultures in terms of how we care for ourselves — our bodies, our minds, and our souls. Prayer, for example, is a practice that a lot of people have used throughout history in order to look after themselves. Meditation is another one. Personally, meditation is on my self-care plan/list.

Creating a Bipolar Self-Care Plan or List

There are some self-care practices that are going to be on your list, but aren’t going to be on someone else’s — and that’s okay:

  • For example, I love driving — it calms me down; it’s how I think. But a good amount of people don’t like driving, and some even have panic attacks while they’re driving, so taking a drive would not be on their list.
  • Also, I love nature documentaries and David Attenborough’s voice; something about the way he speaks just calms me down. There are certain voices like that. For me, Garrison Keillor is another one of those. 
  • Also on my self-care list are activities like listening to music, reading, and sewing.

RELATED: Living With Bipolar: Is Self-Care Selfish?

My self-care plan has a long list of activities, and these strategies work for me. But what works for one person may not work for the next, so everyone’s plan or list is going to be different.

Let’s Make a List of Self-Care Strategies Together

Here’s what I’m thinking: We can all compile our self-care lists in the Comments section below to create a comprehensive list that will hopefully be useful to many of us.

CREDITS: All A/V (videography, audio, etc.) courtesy of Matthew Lenard.

UPDATED: Originally posted November 2, 2016

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