7/6/2023 0 Comments Daily habits![]() Make it a point to make yourself (and others) smile and remember the feeling of joy.Approximately 45% of everything we do on a daily basis is driven by our habits. Find time to relax and enjoy life, whether that is being with friends or family, taking a nice walk in the park, being kind to a stranger, listening to a fun podcast or signing out loud on your way to work. Stress can negatively impact blood sugar and can lead to a sense of overwhelm. Do something that makes you smile every day. When you identify your support group and ask for assistance, it can relieve your burden and give your family and friends a way to show they care. Perhaps your teenager could help you upload your meter data to the healthcare portal. Maybe you would move more if you had company-ask a friend to be your exercise buddy. ![]() Maybe your spouse is good at organizing-ask them to help you organize your medications and supplies. ![]() Match someone else’s skills with a task that you find challenging. You may not need to ask for help on a daily basis, but ask yourself, “What do I need help with?” on a regular basis. If you have trouble falling asleep or staying asleep, consider factors that can help such as a cool room temperature, reduced noise and light, and avoiding television and other screens 30-60 minutes prior to bedtime. Commit to a calming evening routine and a reasonable bedtime. Sleep is restorative and studies indicate that blood sugar regulation can be improved when you have had a quality night of sleep. When the negative thoughts arise during the day, gently replace those thoughts with positive thoughts.įor instance, if your brain likes to point out blood sugars that are out of target range, remind yourself that you are practicing good care by monitoring your blood sugar and communicating results with your healthcare team. Start your day by reminding yourself of the self-care habits that you are doing well. The human brain likes to focus on things we are not doing well. Below are a few habits that I think can have a big impact on your health and make living with diabetes a little easier in the long run. Over time, new habits will become ingrained, and you can move on to the next behavior to nurture and develop. It is okay to choose more than one habit to develop at a time but try to resist the urge to tackle everything at once. Bring some focus to a specific aspect of health or self-care and keep the focus on this process. One strategy for managing diabetes is to zero in on one or two health habits at a time. As a registered dietitian and certified diabetes care and education specialist, I enjoy helping people find ways to adopt healthy lifestyle habits. The additional self-care tasks, such as monitoring blood sugar, managing medications and going to healthcare appointments can manifest into a lengthy “to-do” list, making diabetes management feel like a chore and making a healthy lifestyle seem a little out of reach.īut there’s good news-it’s not. There is no doubt that our modern lifestyles present some challenges to eating well, exercising regularly and getting quality sleep.įor people with diabetes, the challenge can seem even greater. Every day, I listen as people explain their day-to-day routines and lifestyles-lifestyles that often involve sedentary jobs, multiple jobs, long commutes, convenient foods, family caregiving, after-school sports, late-night television, etc.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |