I initially described my skill in self-love as “rusty” but I quickly realized that it never fully ripened. I am a bread knife in cutting time for myself. I am a rake in a garden of women who clicks power with their regularly filed fingernails. I’m a sippy cup in a cupboard of wine glasses - infantile, primitive and underdeveloped in sophistication.
How did I grow into dullness to care for my well-being at the age of thirty three? It was ingrained in me that there are more important things in life than caring for yourself.
I was raised in the Philippines, I lived there until I was 14 and depends on who you asked but in my narrative I was dragged to NYC. We were never financially stable before or after. Well, that’s 1. I remember regularly being sent to the local grocery store to get bread and liver spread but since we can’t even afford that, I’d embarrassingly ask the store owner to put it on my family’s “list”- that’s the inventory of things we’ve taken with a verbal IOU. If we couldn’t afford bread every 2 weeks, we definitely couldn’t afford manicures or even DIY sugar scrub.
But I’ve seen my mom get manicures and pedicures. Those times that she got them done, the nail technician came to the house to do her nails while we all packed in the only room in the house with AC to watch a movie. I think the idea of caring for one’s well-being was not emphasized nor explained.
My mom got a haircut every time she felt that her hair had gotten too long or she’d ask my dad to trim it. She’d heat some coconut oil and rub it on her scalp because her eczema is acting up. I always teased her for getting pedicure because she doesn’t have nails on her big toe! She liked to pick on it and because she’s diabetic it’s slow to heal. She said they hurt and that’s why she got her nails done. So primarily they’re more of medical needs than just a way to relax or destress or to make her feel confident.
Now that I think about it, my dad was the king of self-care in our household. Or the only one who made effort. He regularly tinted what’s left of his hair, his mustache and sideburns. He pressed his clothes no matter where he’s going. He also found time to shine his shoes that many of his pairs lasted for 20 years! I didn’t realize this routine because he was made fun of by my brothers and relatives for it, including my mom.
That’s number 2, the disregard and denial for need of self-care. I don’t have a memory of my parents stepping away for the sake of quiet time. My dad stepped away to drink with his buddies. That’s when everyone else had a quiet time because he usually came home extra loud and obnoxious. My mom, I don’t know. She sent me a couple of times to pick up a stick or two of cigarettes for her to secretly smoke, if that counts.
I don’t know what other reasons are for my lack of knowledge of self-love but you catch my drift. I’m here to put a rock in the middle of this selfless river to change direction of flow. Due to lack of experience, I will have to do this slow and steady. And yes, I’m doing this during a pandemic. I mean, I’m stuck at home with my kids and my elderly mom, what better time to learn self-love?
But is there any other time that I will be in dire need of self-love? This pandemic has caused me to be a beauty-school-drop-out-homeschooling-housewife living across the country from my husband in a state where I have no friends. That’s to say the least. Social anxiety has camped in the backyard, killing more than half of my lawn. Depression is moving its way out of the basement trying to get comfortable in my living room. This is the perfect time to learn about loving myself.
I’m scarce of time so I aim to try 2 self-love routines to share here. Normally I would cheat and use my quiet time to fold clothes or clean the bathroom. I am only counting the selfish self-love routines. I will write about a different one to keep this spicy. This blog can count as a love letter to myself, or a memorandum to love myself… finally.
