The Churn
The Morning After: Starting the Work of Self-Healing in 2021
Mike JordanJanuary 21, 2021
What do you do when you arrive at an inflection point, knowing you don’t have a lot of time to make a decision? And what does that look like when you’re not exactly out of the woods when it comes to the challenges you face?
It looks a lot like looking within, then looking ahead, giving yourself the space to plan where you want to go from here, but starting where you are.
One thing’s certain: It looks nothing like looking back.
That doesn’t mean you don’t acknowledge where you are today, so say the experts. If you feel as if you are in “a disordered psychic or behavioral state resulting from severe mental or emotional stress,” you are experiencing what Merriam-Webster defines as trauma.
Our Atlanta neighbors over at the CDC have good tips on how to deal with trauma. One of their suggestions in this tip sheet is to turn off everything that’s feeding your trauma and take a break.
“Staying up-to-date about a traumatic event can keep you informed, but pictures and stories on television, in newspapers, and on the Internet can increase or bring back your stress. Schedule information breaks. If you are feeling upset when getting the news, turn it off and focus on something you enjoy.”
That means television, radio, podcasts and anything else that reminds you of the cause of your trauma, and keeps you in the same mental space. You know — don’t make the same ol’ mistakes.
Back in September, and again in November, Salon published a two-part conversation with Dr. Seth Norrholm, scientific director at the Neuroscience Center for Anxiety, Stress, and Trauma (NeuroCAST) in The Netherlands, and one of the world’s leading PTSD experts. In the interview, Dr. Norrholm says that the former president — who we will not mention again in this story — fits the description of a domestic abuser in the ways he treated the American public.
“There is definitely going to be post-Trump syndrome — especially for those people who have been more engaged with current events. They are obviously at much more risk than a person who says, “You know what? This is just politics.”
Dr. Norrholm also talks about how the cycle of emotional abuse leads to the release of cortisol, which is a stress hormone released by the adrenal glands as a natural evolutionary response to repeated exposure to chronic stress and anxiety.
“Excessive cortisol can damage different areas of the brain,” he says in the interview. “That too has a range of consequences, whether it is learning and memory deficits and emotional dysregulation. Anger and mood disorders can become much more pronounced.”
So yeah, you’ve gotta start the work of healing, ASAP. Here’s a screenshot from that CDC tip sheet, in case you didn’t already click that link above:
And here’s a link to a Healthline article about how to naturally lower your cortisol levels. Suggestions include deep breathing, yoga, laughter, healthy eating, owning a pet, increasing your amount of sleep, and more. In general, that means relaxing.
And of course, music. There are lots of studies, including this one, on how relaxing music can affect mood and cortisol release levels. According to the Healthline story, 30 minutes of listening to music dropped the cortisol levels of 88 male and female college students in a study, as compared to 30 minutes of watching a documentary, or even a half hour of silence.
So this should get you started. Atlanta didn’t change the world by showing up to vote just for you to miss out on the benefits of the better world that will come from what we’ve gone through together.
Get some rest. Find ways to relax that work for you. Remember that the trick is to keep breathing.
And listen to long, calming music, like this timeless classic (as Big Boi would say) from our own pioneering hip-hop heroes, OutKast.
Shake that load off.