5 Tips for a Productive Depression Nap

I know. It seems like a contradiction, productive depression? Nah. Well here's some things I have done to up my game and still deal with my mental illness.

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WHY NAP?

When I am feeling overwhelmed, stressed, sad and otherwise unwell, I have about three coping mechanisms. The first is to overeat. Overeating feels good in the moment, but the feeling of being stuffed, full of gas, and then guilty of binging has finally outweighed the momentary relief I feel by doing so. I have started taking my anxiety medicine in the place of over eating which has worked wonders on my health. My second coping skill is shopping. It gets me out of the house. I get to listen to my favorite podcast, and I get to escape into a world of fashionable possibility. This is my favorite of the coping because, well, shopping feels so good. But again, it comes at a cost. A financial one. Too much. So we are left with clocking out mentally with a nice indulgent depression nap.

Depression naps if done in moderation, can soothe the nervous system, allow your subconscious mind to work through your depressive state, and refresh the body. So how can you nap productively?

1. Set a timer.

I always try to set a timer on my naps. If allowed, I can sleep all day long. (In fact as I am writing this, I am up super late because I had a "nap" that lasted 4 hours... yeah I forgot my own rule. When you are setting your timer, wake yourself up with a song or melody that you like. Don't blast a blaring alarm. Be kind to yourself. Sometimes having a visual representation of the time of your nap can be comforting. I have used this one in the past, and even though the ringer is loud, seeing all that red space that I can take up to nap feels amazing.

2. Don't Judge that you are tired

Having a mental illness is exhausting. You are deserving of ease and rest. So, if you feel that you need time to sit still, to decompress and to check out, you are worthy of doing so. Give yourself permission to exist within that state. Sitting with your emotional self in uncomfortable moments is vital in self-acceptance and emotional regulation.

3. Put it in your schedule

You have time, even if you feel like you don't. Whatever amount of time you have, allow yourself to take that space. I typically use an hour, and I plan my nap for a time of day where when I wake up, the sun hasn't went down. That seems to trigger me because it feels like my day is gone. So for me, late afternoon naps are a no-go. Set a reminder and show up for yourself.

4. Lean into the Self-care Perspective Having your favorite blanket and pair of socks or whatever gives you a small sense of comfort is only a matter of planning. Prepare the room with aromatherapy.

Massage your hands with lavender lotion. Or have a cup of tea before you drift off. I also like listening to Solfeggio healing Hz tones as I fall asleep. I will link some here.

5. Reflect on your thoughts and dreams

Journaling is a powerful tool of self reflection. Thinking through your dreams and thoughts after your nap can be helpful in processing difficult emotions. Your dreams sometimes open a pathway to understanding and accessing your subconscious mind. I often have dreams that I am screaming at someone, though my voice isn't beyond a whisper. To me this speaks to a sense of dis empowerment I feel in a relationship or situation with that person. There are also symbols such as teeth, flying and etc. that have specific dream interpretations. Pay attention to these signs and see if they apply to your waking life.

Everything is perspective. Whether your depressive naps were productive or not in the past, there are ways to make it work for you. Although we can't control the fatigue, we can redirect how we feel about it and our relationship to it. As always gems, I hope this helps. XOXO,

Moody

Dysthymia in the Workplace

Much requested topic and something I have really pondered. How has my dysthymia affected my work life? And what are some tips for others struggling with coping at work?

Consider the Industry + Visibility

I have done countless tests to find a career that is "just right" for me. And I may be wrong, but I am assuming many people with dysthymia get job placements that prioritize individual work, possibly dull or repetitive work, or even artistic endeavors. When I read my report 10 years ago, it said creative writer. I laughed and thought to myself, I am gonna be poor. Currently, I have worked in customer service, retail, student affairs, and higher education. In all jobs, my visibility as a leader was evident. I could not risk "losing face." So, let's break down the "face value"of some popular industries.

Face Value

Face value in the way I am using it is specifically asking: how much in-person, or interpersonal communication is necessary in order to complete my job? And how much is being personable, relatable, and approachable valuable to my work environment? (Mind you this extends to virtual work spaces).

So, I always start putting my jobs in the aforementioned categories. I think of them in context to the job title, location, and what standing I was in at that time in my life. Job titles are telling of your level of responsibility and also gives a sense of power dynamics you may have to navigate in the workplace. Being any type of assistant ensures that you will have to be much more amiable given that you may not have the clearance to access certain information (even though assistants most often have the means of understanding and expertise often far greater than their superiors). Location has to do with the level of entitlement, ease, and culture of the workplace. This often also considers how frequently the public is involved, and what type of establishment you work at. Lastly the standing has to do with what place in life you are. A freshman in college or a middle-aged mother of two will have different expectations placed upon them regardless of their job title. I will break down the "face value"of each job I have had below:

JOB TITLE: Student Assistant at Multicultural Center

LOCATION: Santa Barbara (University) STANDING: Work-study position (undergrad student)

JOB TITLE: Substitute Teacher

LOCATION: working class area (California) STANDING: Master's in English (grad student)

JOB TITLE:Consultative Sales Rep

LOCATION: Sears (Mall) STANDING: Summer Job (undergrad student)

Here's the breakdown of what each thing meant about my job:

As a student assistant, I needed to be a student confident enough to tell other students, staff, and faculty about the services the MCC offered. Beyond knowledge, I needed to be welcoming, as I was a front desk attendant. I also needed to be flexible enough to assist with whatever was needed around the center.

Because it was in Santa Barbara, entitlement and privilege was ASTRONOMICAL (TikTok reference there. If you got it, like this post). Navigating this made me have to be firm, direct and ultimately just a little nice nasty at times. My standing as a work study student meant that the job should not be coming home with me, and it should allow the flexibility to let my school work come first. Thus, in navigating conflicting schedules, I needed to seem apologetic but also not overly so. (A small my apologies aka "my bad" would suffice). I was also in a state of needing to be open to learning and NOT be hard on myself. Having a sense of resiliency would be important in this position.

Therefore, if I were to break down the level of "face" I needed for the job it would look as follows:

FACE VALUE OF STUDENT ASSISTANT AT MCC

Personable: 60%

Relatable: 80%

Approachable: 75%

I was just learning about my dysthymia at the time. So this job was mentally exhausting. I was told I wasn't friendly and hard to get to know. I always felt left out even when I tried to fit in. It was very hard to work there, but I did so for three years.

JOB TITLE: Substitute Teacher

LOCATION: working class area (California) STANDING: Master's in English (grad student)

As a substitute teacher, being firm and kind is a must. Kids need structure but you also have to extend them grace. You have to be flexible because each school site comes with different rules and challenges like finding the location you need to be at, and updated schedules that reflect up-to-the minute changes. Being personable is optional with staff as you pretty much have a few minutes of returning keys and getting checked in to deal with them. Overall, it's a bit easier to manage than others jobs I have had it.

FACE VALUE OF SUBSTITUTE TEACHER

Personable:30%

Relatable: 10%

Approachable: 55%

JOB TITLE:Consultative Sales Rep

LOCATION: Sears (Mall) STANDING: Summer Job (undergrad student)

I hated this job. Retail has way too much face value for me. It often isn't the customers that I dislike, but my coworkers and bosses. So as a consultative sales rep, you make commissions with a base pay. You have to be approachable, personable and relatable. For me, I was a woman in the tools department. It was easy to have women and men approach me and shop with me. I don't know how to flirt, but I know how to smile and tell them I can help them find what they are looking for. Easy. What wasn't easy was making small talk with co workers in the mountains of downtime we often had, standing up for myself when I was singled out at staff meetings. Or advocating for myself when schedule changes needed to take place. Awful face value for a dysthymic.

FACE VALUE OF CONSULTATIVE SALES REP

Personable:90%

Relatable: 70%

Approachable: 95%

So think about your job location, expectations and if that path is providing you a range of face value that is realistic to your needs. If you need time to be able to zone out and cry, you can't work in a dynamic open concept environment comfortably. I understand in this economy, we can't afford to be picky about our job spaces. So, what I will leave with is this. Most people don't care about you. Most people don't pick up on what you say. It is the energy you give off when you are around them that they will remember. Wear bright colors and possibly change up your hair if possibly to always have a light and easy thing for people to pick up on. This helps your approachability. Always sound excited about your free time from off work. And possibly even a creative project that you are excited about. This builds points of reference easy for people to relate to you. If you need help answering the dreaded "how are you doing" question, check out my video. This can help with relatability and personability. Love you gems! And I hope this was helpful.

XOXO,

Moody G

Online Dating While Fat, Black and Depressed

My title just made me tired. Not so much because of who I am. I am learning to love me. More so because the dumb way society decides to treat you because of these three things. Recently had a dope conversation about this topic online with like-minded plus-size black femmes/women. The consensus was being objectified and hypersexualized while also being dateless is a common reality. Way too common.

The Why

This reality is not without historical context. Being fetishized and hypersexualized as black women has infinite reference points.

Saartjie Baartman , the term BBW, and tropes stemming from the institution of slavery come to mind.

Wherever you decide to start, the end point is the same: we are out here black, beautiful, plus-sized and traumatized.

I didn't feel very protected from the male gaze as a child. I was told I "developed" early, and from a young age, I had to become more vigilant of who was watching my body and trying to control how my body was watched. This process of not seeing young black kids as children or extending them the grace of childhood innocence has far-reaching consequences for many black girls. This process is referred to in sociology as adultification. So, not only do fat black girls have the stress, bias, and negative attention of being seen as more "developed," their bodies are seen as such as well. This means that fat little black girls are often hypersexualized by grown men and boys alike. This attention does not come with an instruction manual. And to top it off, the male gaze FEELS gross. Honestly, even as an adult, it still feels this way. But because adult black plus-sized women's bodies are fetishized, black fat girls (given the trouble of adultification) are too. This is the beginning of so many troubling and scary times for many black girls. Whatever decisions they make, they are often done without proper guidance, protection, empathy from adults or extended grace from authority figures.

Provided by Georgetown Law's "Girlhood Interrupted:The Erasure of Black Girls’ Childhood"

My low-self esteem had little to do with my weight. I was okay with my size as a child. It was my personality that I wasn't too sure about. (But that's a whole other story). My depression is clinical. I don't wish to trace its origins because for many people with dysthymia, it has been around for what seems like your whole life. What I will say is being insecure and getting so much attention was not a healthy combination. Some girls cope by being hypervisible. Some step into their "womanhood," by exploring the realms of physical intimacy (this doesn't always mean sex). I on the other hand retreated. I became an ice queen; I was totally unapproachable and prayed no one would test me because I was close to melting. So, old men were always trying to talk to me. Boys my age always assumed I had a man (and I did...long distance). Therefore, I didn't learn how to date until well after high school. I, like many black fat young women my age, started to explore in my early-mid 20's. Because I was comfortable with men at a distance, (and because getting approached in-person wasn't happening) I used online dating sites.

The Evolution of Online Dating

But this was 2012. Most people still shunned online dating as the place where creepy, desperate people find companionship. I narrowed my search terms and only dated within three years of my age range. I had cute guys messaging me. There was hope! Nearly all my long term relationships started online. I was cuffed from 2013-2018. Being off the market and coming back to online dating proved wildly different AND disappointing. More cis-het men, more opportunity, more misogyny.

The Now

Being plus-sized and dating online as a black woman, you get different "vibes."

Preppy black and white professionals

Little room for free preferences beyond location

Athletic to skinny body types

Heights listed

You message first

Crickets

Varie -Tea!

Many free preferences beyond location

All body types

Height listed

Better convos because more effort in profile

Swipes don't expire

Black people of all professions and stages in life

Little room for free preferences beyond location

All body types

Height is NOT listed often

Variety

Many free preferences

All body types

Height is listed

More chance of interesting convo

Semi crickets

All types

All looks

All games

The rest are a waste of time. So here I am, reading through the lines and weeding out profiles. Avoiding the "you're so cute ," "sit on my face," and "I'm surprised you don't cook." Also gems like:

So in all, we have to navigate and ask questions to vet out decent non-weirdos, which adds an extra step to the game of meeting new boos. Yet, I refuse to settle for less.