Share your tips for self-care...

Accept what is and what will never be. Accepting no cures, medications are temporary only and side effects are worse. Surround yourself with positive people. Give your disease to God, he gives us no more than we can bare. Have hope for tomorrow.

Talk to yourself & outloud & make it funny. Laugh out loud if you can. Verbalize what you think will work, out loud!!! Even if & especially if nobody is listening 💕

Hello,
This is a great topic of discussion! I constantly review and revise my self care plan and how to prioritise it over all the other activities I do. It can be challenging sometimes to find time to self care, so I guess I plan it by saving time for it, scheduling my self care routine in my timetable. I also try to stick to it no matter what, like my physiotherapy and hydrotherapy sessions are on Monday evening very week. Therefore I decline any other offers or invitation on that day, as for me attending these sessions is a must and non negotiable with anything else. I get so much out of these sessions! My daily stretching in bed, morning and evening are a priority too, even if my timing is tight to wake up and get ready. This routine is my way to start the day by waking up my body and feeling better physically when I leave the bed after hours of lying down. I also need regular breaks during the day when I am working, and I make sure I take those breaks. That means asking how long the meeting will be for, asking for a short break half way through, asking to delay a meeting if I have just been in a long meeting so I get a breather before joining another meeting. I have learnt all this along the way, to honour my self care plan and needs in order to function better and live better with AxSpa, and that includes asking others around me to adapt my timetable according to those needs.
Take care all,
Julie.

I had to learn to tell my son if my grandkids were sick I couldn’t watch them. They have other grandparents that do so much but they live a block away, not 1& 1/2 hours away. When they aren’t available, my son would say “Oh I can’t be out of work, neither can my wife.” I finally said I not only have AS and take biologics & Dmards which lower my immunity, I have asthma. I got passed over for raises bc I was out with 3 sick kids, then usually got sick myself. This is all part of parenting. If no one is sick, I still will try to help out. But my son finally realizes I’m a bad bet. I love my kids & grandkids more than anything. I would take a bullet for any of them. But I won’t impair my health when they have other options: ie work from home and hire a babysitter.