Putting Myself First Along With Some Self Love.

One thing I have always struggled with is putting myself and my feelings first, for as long as I remember I have ALWAYS been a people pleaser. Not that pleasing others is bad, but I never put how I felt first.

I found myself CONSTANTLY worrying about others and how they feel, how what I do will affect them, often times I found my decisions were made based on what would make other people fell happiest, again there is NOTHING wrong with making other people happy, I just never thought about what would make myself happy.

So I decided to start taking care of myself and giving myself that extra love.

This journy began winter of 2017

I had no clue what self care or self love was until winter of 2017. It wasn’t something I was ever taught, I had heard about it I just didn’t know what it was. So I decided to do some research and figure out what this self care was that everyone talked about.

My reseatech was full of bath bombs, face masks, sugar scrubs, skin care, ‘i don’t need a man’ quotes, and drinking lots and LOTS of water.

okay, I can do this!

So Later that week I went to Walmart with my friend Samrah and bought my favorite water bottle, still is to this day, and the face masks that at 2 for $5 At Walmart.

I am set! I have my water bottle and my face masks, this self care thing isn’t so hard after all! We went back to my house and did our face mask, drank lots of water and probably ate Taco Bell and watched a scary movie.

Then I got a text from another friend of mine saying that the guy I was ‘dating’ at the time had kissed another girl. I was devistated.

So I did another face mask and drank more water.

I continued this face mask, drink lots of water, take a bubble bath, have lots sleep overs with my three closest friends (and sister) every night, and watch a scary movie routine up for a good month and a half while continually getting my heart broken by the same guy

And for some reason I didn’t understand why I didn’t feel like myself care wasn’t working.

I was getting so sick and tired of feeling so bad about myself and where I was. I decided to break up with the guy I was dating at the end of January and I felt a weight get lifted of my shoulders.

My heart didn’t feel heavy anymore, I actually felt a little relieved to get such a toxic person out of my life.

This is when I really began to love myself and take care of my thoughts, mental health and well being.

I found myself feeling genuinely happier, I still continued to do face masks ever so often and having sleep overs.

A few days later Cade and I started talking on January 28th, 2018 and continued talking until February 5th, 2018... Yep we talked for eight days then didn't talk for the rest of February and most of March when we went on our first date.

I think it was good that Cade and I didn't talk for that month and a half because I was still figuring out what self love is and how to make myself happy.

I also started my new job around that time and once I got trained and could pick up shifts for other people I started getting asked constantly to take peoples shifts so I did because it would make them happy. But I was missing out on my personal time and time with my friends, YES IT IS IMPORTANT TO TAKE TIME OFF WORK TO BE WITH FRIENDS AND FAMILY, so I decided to start saying no but explaining why I was saying no, which also isn't the greatest. I slowly worked on not explaining my 'no' unless they asked.

I continued loving myself and taking care of myself and my mental health, and became a better and happier person. I was (and still do) loving life and was enjoying my own company.

Cade started facetiming me every night for three weeks before he took me on out first date at the end of march, kissed me a week later, then asked me to be his girlfriend the week after that. I was ecstatic! I'm dating my best friend, having constant sleep overs with my best friends, I love my co workers but most importantly I fell in love with myself and being happy.

'Our First Date'

Cade and I were joined at the hip every weekend, we would adventure, explore new places, show each other around out home towns, ate lost of food, he came along to my photoshoots with me and second shot a wedding for me in august! we'd rent a movie and get lots of snacks and fall asleep on my parents couch. I was so (and still am) in love with being alive and loving myself. on September 13th, 2018 I packed up as much of my things into my Jeep Liberty and Cade's mom's Jeep and moved to Brigham City, Utah!

When Cade first told me that he lived there I had to look it up on maps I didn't even know where it was. So I moved from living ten minutes away from the city to living an hour away from the city which was hard at first but I slowly got used to it.

'The Day After I Moved In (the first time)'

When I moved to Brigham City a lot of my family and friends weren't too happy with my decision to move to Brigham City and made it clear, and even though they said they still loved me and told me they support me it was hard to know they weren't happy with a decision that I made to make myself happy.

I got frustrated and confused by not only knowing that they weren't happy but with things going on in the household with my roommates. I would be so frustrated and sad somedays , it was hard to go from seeing all my friends every day and having them basically live at my parents house to seeing them maybe once every three weeks if I was lucky, with everything that was going on I was starting to notice my self love going down and I was getting upset easier and I would let it out on Cade.

So I decided to move back to my parents house on January 13th, 2019. Cade and I also decided that it was best that we break things of for a little bit, we ended up talking about everything and getting back together a few days later but in just those few day I was already starting to notice that I was felling less stressed. So I stayed in Bountiful and Cade and I would go back to just seeing each other on weekends. we ended up breaking up one more time for a week for ourselves and personal reasons but talked it through and decided we are better together.

I continued living at my parents and working on my self love and self care which was coming back quite fast. I was less frustrated and stressed, I am madly in love with the love of my life and I already knew how to take care of myself and what I need to do to love myself.

And this time it wasn't all facemasks and water.

This time I painted, I listened to Al Carraway's audio book 'More Than The Tattooed Mormon' on repeat. I practiced Ho' oponopono, if you don't know what that is definitely look it up and if it interests you definitely do it! here's my favorited audio of it and here's my favorite article on it. Ho' oponopono is great for anyone who is struggling to forgive or love them selves.

I moved back in with Cade not too long after we got back together because it makes me happy. Living with him makes me so happy, there is no better feeling than getting to wake up next to him every morning despite what others might think about us living together before we are married or even engaged. It is something that makes up both happy.

'Weekend After I Moved Back In (crystal hot springs seemed perfect to celebrate)'

"It's so important to make someone happy; Start with yourself." -unknown

Brie

I will be doing another post in more detail about all the self love and care I have learned over the past year.