{"id":7,"date":"2010-04-13T10:29:58","date_gmt":"2010-04-13T10:29:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/jennifercares\/2010\/04\/take-care-tip-tuesday-settle-yourself-down.html"},"modified":"2010-04-13T10:29:58","modified_gmt":"2010-04-13T10:29:58","slug":"take-care-tip-tuesday-settle-yourself-down","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jennifercares\/2010\/04\/take-care-tip-tuesday-settle-yourself-down.html","title":{"rendered":"Take Care Tip Tuesday:  Settle Yourself Down"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Caregiving and stress go hand in hand.&nbsp; Stress can have so much negative impact in the body and brain, it&#8217;s important for us to learn how to manage the stress in our lives so we can relax.&nbsp; <\/p>\n<p>Hang onto that idea for a minute before we get started&#8230;we are focusing here on <strong><em>managing<\/em><\/strong> stress, not eliminating it.&nbsp; Thriughout our lives, bad things will happen.&nbsp;Things we don&#8217;t understand will happen.&nbsp; Things we don&#8217;t agree with will happen.&nbsp; Many of those things will happen out of our control&#8212;but&#8212;we <strong><em>do <\/em><\/strong>have the power to control our reactions to those things.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>When something upsetting happens, what are you gonna do about it?&nbsp; Figuring out a plan that includes positive, healthy stress relief techniques allows you to manage you stress in a powerful way.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Every Tuesday, I&#8217;ll share a new 10 Minute Take Care Tip with you to help you to be able to care for youself while taking care of others. This week&#8217;s is from my book, <strong><em>Take Care Tips<\/em><\/strong>, and it&#8217;s a good one to have handy this week when tax time tension my be building up.&nbsp; Take a little break and recharge with <strong>self massage<\/strong>.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Rubbing your muscles increases blood flow and helps to releive muscle tension.&nbsp; It&#8217;s a great way to boost your energy, too.&nbsp; Although a professional massage is most therapeutic, you can enjoy some of the same relaxing benefits with these simple techniques you can do at home:&nbsp;<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>For sore shoulders<\/strong>, stretch one arm across the front of you body, reach the opposite hand up and firmly rub the muscle aove your shoulder blade.&nbsp; Switch sides and repeat.&nbsp; Finish with giving yourself a big hug (I know it sounds cheesy, but it helps)! Cross your arms in front and grab the opposite shoulders.&nbsp; Squeeze and releases a few times and feel the tension melt away.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Stress can make it hard for us to digest our food<\/strong>.&nbsp; To help with diegestion after a meal, place your palm on your belly and slowly rub in a clockwise mostion.&nbsp; That&#8217;s the direction that food travels through your intestine.&nbsp; Help it along with this simple circular rub.<\/li>\n<li><strong>For the feet<\/strong>, put some golf balls in a box that will fit at least one of your feet in it.&nbsp; Treat your feet by slipping off your shoes and placing your foot in the box, apply a little pressure, and rub them over the golf balls.&nbsp; This is a good tip to share with the one you&#8217;re caring for as well.&nbsp; It&#8217;s rooted in reflexology.&nbsp; This motion touches pressure points on your feet that open up positive energy flow throughout your body and brain.&nbsp;<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>These tips go over well in a corporate setting.&nbsp; I know several executives who keep a plastic shoe box with golf balls under their desks! <\/p>\n<p>I love hearing your comments.&nbsp; Please leave them, as well as any stress relief tips you&#8217;d like to share below.<\/p>\n<p>j.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Caregiving and stress go hand in hand.&nbsp; Stress can have so much negative impact in the body and brain, it&#8217;s important for us to learn how to manage the stress in our lives so we can relax.&nbsp; Hang onto that idea for a minute before we get started&#8230;we are focusing here on managing stress, not&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":80,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-take-care-ten-minute-tip"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Take Care Tip Tuesday: Settle Yourself Down - Jennifer Cares<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jennifercares\/2010\/04\/take-care-tip-tuesday-settle-yourself-down.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Take Care Tip Tuesday: Settle Yourself Down - Jennifer Cares\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Caregiving and stress go hand in hand.&nbsp; Stress can have so much negative impact in the body and brain, it&#8217;s important for us to learn how to manage the stress in our lives so we can relax.&nbsp; Hang onto that idea for a minute before we get started&#8230;we are focusing here on managing stress, not&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jennifercares\/2010\/04\/take-care-tip-tuesday-settle-yourself-down.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Jennifer Cares\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2010-04-13T10:29:58+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Jennifer Antkowiak\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Take Care Tip Tuesday: Settle Yourself Down - Jennifer Cares","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jennifercares\/2010\/04\/take-care-tip-tuesday-settle-yourself-down.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Take Care Tip Tuesday: Settle Yourself Down - Jennifer Cares","og_description":"Caregiving and stress go hand in hand.&nbsp; Stress can have so much negative impact in the body and brain, it&#8217;s important for us to learn how to manage the stress in our lives so we can relax.&nbsp; Hang onto that idea for a minute before we get started&#8230;we are focusing here on managing stress, not&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jennifercares\/2010\/04\/take-care-tip-tuesday-settle-yourself-down.html","og_site_name":"Jennifer Cares","article_published_time":"2010-04-13T10:29:58+00:00","author":"Jennifer Antkowiak","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jennifercares\/2010\/04\/take-care-tip-tuesday-settle-yourself-down.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jennifercares\/2010\/04\/take-care-tip-tuesday-settle-yourself-down.html","name":"Take Care Tip Tuesday: Settle Yourself Down - Jennifer Cares","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jennifercares\/#website"},"datePublished":"2010-04-13T10:29:58+00:00","dateModified":"2010-04-13T10:29:58+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jennifercares\/#\/schema\/person\/e9b1fa9e83faa387f3bb6a551379f681"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jennifercares\/2010\/04\/take-care-tip-tuesday-settle-yourself-down.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jennifercares\/2010\/04\/take-care-tip-tuesday-settle-yourself-down.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jennifercares\/2010\/04\/take-care-tip-tuesday-settle-yourself-down.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jennifercares"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Take Care Tip Tuesday: Settle Yourself Down"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jennifercares\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jennifercares\/","name":"Jennifer Cares","description":"Making Life Easier for Caregivers","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jennifercares\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jennifercares\/#\/schema\/person\/e9b1fa9e83faa387f3bb6a551379f681","name":"Jennifer Antkowiak","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jennifercares\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jennifercares\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/2fe\/2fedc168aeef94edb0c4000c70dfe678x96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jennifercares\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/2fe\/2fedc168aeef94edb0c4000c70dfe678x96.jpg","caption":"Jennifer Antkowiak"},"description":"Jennifer Antkowiak's expertise in the caregiving field is authentic and inspiring. She is a busy mother of five, wife, award-winning TV news anchor and talk show host, author, and speaker. Jennifer knows how long-term illness affects a family. Her mother had post-partum depression and died of a heart attack at age 50. Jennifer feels blessed to have been a caregiver for her mother-in-law who died of cancer, and most recently, for her live-in father-in-law who died of cancer. Her real life experiences fuel her passionate mission to help the world's caregivers. Through her work, she connects with caregivers to deliver help and hope. 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