I’ve long wanted to write a series about “the basics”: essential behaviors and life-skills that can get pushed into corners or relegated to the backburners of our lives, our treatment plans, and our therapy sessions.

For my next few posts, I’ll be covering ” The basics”- elements that I ( and the evidence) know are incredibly important for mental health. These are things like sleep, eating regularly, balanced nutrition, and movement.
Simple.
Hard.
So basic that they can be revolutionary for our health, mental heath, and quality of life. Some of these things are free, and not super sexy, so they can’t easy be monetized… so there may not be as much buzz around these practices. That’s great. I specialize in talking about unsexy things, as I’m pretty sure all moms and eating disorder therapists do…

I think that discussion and evidence are important, but in this series I’ll be talking about things that may feel lacking in your life, without giving you any earth-shattering or novel information. We know about the basics. The knowing doesn’t seem to be the issue… Its the practice. So I’ll share some research and basic persuasive arguments. More importantly, I’ll talk from my usual CBT, MI, and trauma-informed perspective about specific things you can do on a daily basis to rehab these basics. We will drill down on strategies for building up the basics and enhancing the way you engage with them.

More and better sleep.
More regular fuel.
Sustainable exercise habits.
No woo.
All leading toward better mental health, physical health, and quality of life.

Welcome to The Basics!